Okay. It's just that I'm used to hearing that I need to have my original. If I don't have my original driver's licence with me in my car when the police pull me over.... It's that sort of thing. I'm not used to hearing the reverse. It's interesting that it can actually arise in the law.
Minister, one of the things that has been a frustration to me as we've gone through this bill and the more general updates that you made to the Canada Elections Act about a year ago is that in critiques of the legislation, critics have been happy to point out the constitutional right that all Canadians have to vote and to stress the importance of going to extraordinary measures to make sure that every Canadian who is constitutionally permitted to vote is not deprived in some form or other of that vote, without any regard being given to the fact that there is another side to this problem.
In the event that someone gets to vote illegitimately, to vote in more than one riding, to “riding shop” and choose to have their vote go not to the riding in which they resided when they were last in Canada but rather to the riding in which their vote is most likely to make a difference.... If that sort of thing can go on, then other Canadians can have their vote devalued to nothing by seeing the outcome of that election manipulated.
This never gets mentioned, yet it is clearly the deprivation of every Canadian so affected of their right under section 3 of the charter to have a vote and to have that vote count. I'm glad that you continue to fight this fight, notwithstanding the fact that many of the advocates neglect that key aspect of the issue at hand.
I want to focus a little more closely on the issue of riding shopping. At this point, what will happen, as I understand it, and I'm seeking your confirmation on this, is that, if I leave the country—currently, I live in the town of Perth in Ontario—and want to vote in a future election, I will always be voting based on the address I was last at in the town of Perth, regardless.
So if that town is moved from one riding to another via redistribution, I am attached to that location, not to a particular riding. Is that correct?