Evidence of meeting #106 for Procedure and House Affairs in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was elections.
A video is available from Parliament.
Acting Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
They were eating in front of voters. That voter did not understand, of course, that this poll worker cannot stop in a 16-hour day, so we are very careful not to add to the burden of poll workers.
As we move forward, we have improved processes. We have longer hours for advance polls and we have support from technology. It may be more feasible to look at that. We may look at exit polls at the next election.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
Has Elections Canada ever studied what the impact would be of lowering the voting age in Canada?
Acting Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
Not that I know of. There is debate around this and arguments pro and con. That's really an issue for Parliament to decide.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
We've seen a number of provinces consider that in referenda that are held. We saw that in the U.K. recently, where under different circumstances the voting age was variable. There are assumptions made about what changing the voting age would do. I assume, when we went from 21 to 18, Elections Canada probably thought about it, or maybe not. Maybe it was just done, but I suspect not.
We often talk about youth and youth participation. It seems part of your effort is to understand voter motivation, voter behaviour. Most of the research I've seen is that, when young people vote at the first opportunity, the chance of their being lifelong voters goes up dramatically.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
Is this evidence you've seen as well, that if you miss that first opportunity—you're away or choose not to vote—the odds of your ever voting go down dramatically also?
Acting Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
That's correct. The evidence shows that people between 18 and 24 who do not vote in their first or second election have a marked difference in their voting habits later on in life. Those who do vote early tend to vote throughout their lifetimes.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
You talk about burdens. One of the things I've heard of, talking to financial agents who volunteer during elections and fill out sometimes onerous paperwork all for a good cause, which is making sure that money is handled properly, is that the burden of work for all our volunteers who take on that unfortunate role has gone up dramatically in the last three or four elections. Has Elections Canada looked at any ways to streamline that activity so we keep the verification there, yet don't burn out the thousands of volunteers who just try to be the financial agents for us as political actors?
Acting Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
We certainly have looked into this. There is no silver bullet there. We have made some recommendations, not necessarily endorsed either by this committee or followed through in this legislation. For example, we recommended for years not to have a requirement to have a bank account if you have a nil campaign. For some reason, there is still a requirement in the act to have a bank account, even though you're not running a financial campaign.
We have recommended a subsidy for the official agent. We believe the official agent is the one who bears the heaviest burden. For some reason, that is not in the bill. We will continue our efforts to support official agents.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
If you've made public those amendments or those suggestions you've made in the past for this committee, it would be good to have a collated version of them.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
I don't know how it is for other members on the committee but when we go to seek our official financial agent, we try not to tell them what the job entails because very few people would put up their hand if they knew how many hours were about to go into the work.
Acting Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
Certainly we can compile them from the last two reports we made. This committee did endorse the subsidy for official agents. I certainly remember that.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
You made comments about disinformation—I'm not sure if it was in the act or you recommended that it be in the act—about Elections Canada's activities, if somebody is out there pretending to be Elections Canada either online or through robocalls?
Acting Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
A provision in the current legislation deals with impersonation.
The commissioner felt that the wording of that provision could be reinforced to deal with fake communication material, but this was not as clear. We supported that and made that recommendation.
Acting Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
It is in Bill C-76.
However, what we did not recommend and should have and what we're recommending today is that it be tweaked to include documents that are presented to be from Elections Canada, not just fake partisan material but also fake—
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
Are the current prohibitions on someone pretending to be the Liberal Party or the Green Party?
Acting Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
I'll try to be clearer.
The current provisions in the Canada Elections Act, not this bill, covers impersonation in general. They include impersonation of an Elections Canada official as well as a partisan impersonation. Bill C-76, pursuant to recommendations made by us, would clarify this to also cover fake communication material. Just to be clear, on fake websites, fake....
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
As opposed to someone standing there saying they're from Elections Canada.
Acting Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
Exactly. That came from the commissioner.
Acting Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
According to the commissioner, it wasn't clear enough, and we're quite happy to support reinforcing those provisions but we should include Elections Canada in the mix.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell
Thank you very much.
We'll open it up a little for interventions that are not too long. We'll go to Mr. Reid and then Mr. Richards.