Procedure and House Affairs Committee on June 2nd, 2015

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Thank you very much.

I don't have a lot of time. I wish I could spend more time with you, but I want to move to Dr. Frank.

Considering the government is challenging Justice Penny's ruling, is it appropriate or not to be doing this Bill C-50? That's probably the easiest question you're going to get.

[Prof. Gillian Frank]

Is it appropriate for the government to be doing Bill C-50?

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Is it appropriate to be proceeding with Bill C-50 at this time, given the fact of what the decision is and given the fact that the election is coming in October.

[Prof. Gillian Frank]

I'm not a constitutional expert. To me it feels to be doing an end-run. It seems inappropriate to me.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Given what was said by the French ambassador earlier, and listening to his testimony, do you feel that the system favours the voter in their case, their permanent list of electors? Would you agree with what the ambassador had put out there?

[Prof. Gillian Frank]

It seems that their system is much more geared and willing to accommodate expat voters than the Canadian system is, and is shaping up to be with this legislation.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

I was surprised to hear that you had to hand in your driver's licence to do this, to sacrifice your own driver's licence in order to drive in the United States. This is one of the issues we're going with. As was pointed out earlier, and you quoted, this certainly is a solution in search of a problem.

You also said Bill C-50 falls within this inglorious tradition of what you called voter suppression.

The two things that are at play here, the permanent voters list as well as the time that it takes, in addition to your testimony, as Madame Latendresse also pointed out from being in Moscow, the disenfranchisement under Bill C-50 is now going to be astronomical as opposed to what it was before.

[Prof. Gillian Frank]

I would agree with that.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Given this, what is next for us? Is this particular legislation salvageable in any which way, shape, or form? Is there anything in this that you see that's palatable, acceptable, and maybe encouraging you to exercise your right under section 3 of the charter?

[Prof. Gillian Frank]

I find no encouragement in this legislation. I see it as an attempt to make voting more difficult. I would have to study the nitty gritty of it in much more detail.

Again, I read through it closely a couple of times. There are parts of it in terms of the requirements for identification that I simply do not understand. I asked my wife, who is an attorney, to puzzle over it with me and parts of it still remain opaque to both of us.

Again, I can't speak as a total.... Are there any parts of it that might be encouraging? I would have to look more closely. As a whole, it sends a powerful message to me, which is that my vote is not welcome.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

That certainly is a powerful message.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

Mr. Richards is next on the list.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Wild Rose, AB]

Mr. Ambassador, I want to just ask you a few questions. The first one touches on what Mr. Simms was speaking about just a few minutes ago.

I want to make sure I understood correctly. You mentioned in your opening remarks that those who were expats who were voting could actually make the choice as to whether they vote in one of these out of country constituencies that are set up—I believe there are 11 of them—or they can choose to register in a constituency in France based on some familial connection. It's a choice that they can make of one or the other. Is that correct?

[Nicolas Marcel Jacques Chapuis]

Absolutely.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Wild Rose, AB]

You mentioned registration in your opening remarks. I think that I saw, of the 2 million to 2.5 million expats, about 820,000 that are actually registered. If I understood your opening remarks, they register at an embassy. They come with proof of citizenship, a piece of ID, and a visa for the country they are living in, in order to register.

Is that the only method to register out of country? Is there a method to register by mail, email, facsimile, or anything like that, or is it simply at the embassy?

[Nicolas Marcel Jacques Chapuis]

It would be at the embassy or consulate.

With your question, I can announce that, as part of the reforms that the government is preparing for the end of the year or early next year, a French citizen living abroad will be able to register electronically. In other words, we are going to reform the registry of French citizens resident outside France to allow them to register directly online.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Wild Rose, AB]

That's something you're planning to do. It's not currently in effect.

[H.E. Nicolas Marcel Jacques Chapuis]

It is under way. Obviously there are security issues to avoid fraud related to identity documents, but we now have the opportunity to do it. With the French ministry of the interior, the ministry of foreign affairs is in the process of defining the perimeter of the information system that will make this possible.

And with this possibility of registering online, we are hoping to encourage a lot more of these French citizens who are not registered to do so, especially younger citizens. They don't want to go to a consulate or embassy, but if they can register online, they would find a link to their citizenship.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Wild Rose, AB]

Okay, thank you.

I also noted that there is essentially the system for them to register, and it appears to me, from what I can see here, that if they move to a different jurisdiction or a constituency outside of the country, when they move they actually have to re-register in the new location in order to be able to vote. They're not automatically shifted to the new constituency or whatever you want to call the outside-of-country area. Is that correct?

[H.E. Nicolas Marcel Jacques Chapuis]

Yes. Once again, we need to make a clear distinction between the registry for declaration of residency abroad and registration on the electoral list.

For example, businessmen from Singapore and China often settle in Canada. They register on the registry in Canada and must then say whether they want to be added to Canada's electoral list. They are no longer on China's electoral list because they have left the country, but they can still ask to exercise their right to vote in the national territory.

In short, the answer is yes. They must register again. This is also true for the national territory. When a French citizen moves to a different commune in France, the citizen is on a different electoral list.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Alexandrine Latendresse]

Thank you very much. Your time is up.

We will now move on to Mr. Dusseault for four minutes.

[Pierre-Luc Dusseault, NDP, Sherbrooke, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Mr. Ambassador, I would like to thank you for your very enriching presentation on the right to vote that is facilitated for French citizens living abroad.

Along the same lines, I would like to know a bit more about Internet voting for French citizens living abroad. From what I've understood from your presentation, they can register electronically on the electoral list abroad. When an election is under way, a French voter living abroad can also vote by Internet. Did I understand that correctly?

[H.E. Nicolas Marcel Jacques Chapuis]

Currently, they can do so only for two types of election: in legislative elections of members for French citizens living abroad and the democratic local entities created for them, which we call consular councils. For those two elections, Internet voting is permitted. The government is currently considering extending Internet voting to other types of election.

[Pierre-Luc Dusseault, NDP, Sherbrooke, QC]

I suppose the Internet voting process is very quick. A voter can register at any time during the election and be verified as a voter living abroad, and vote fairly quickly.

[H.E. Nicolas Marcel Jacques Chapuis]

Absolutely. For legislative elections, for example, there is an electronic voting window, which is added on to the vote by proxy. From the time voters have asked to vote by Internet and have received their identifiers through secure means, they may exercise their right to vote in the prescribed window before election day in France.