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.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
But not a political party that mines information from those outlets.
Liberal
Karina Gould Liberal Burlington, ON
What I would say is that we are open to amendments. I would also say that I think it does merit further study as well, because I think it is quite a complex relationship. I also think there is an important relationship between political parties and citizens to engage and have that conversation, which is slightly different from a private company, because they're actually in Ottawa representing their political rights.
Liberal
Karina Gould Liberal Burlington, ON
I would argue that there is a difference. That being said, I'm open to creative ideas.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
Do you believe a voter should have the ability to phone a political party or email them and say, “Tell me what you know about me”?
Liberal
Karina Gould Liberal Burlington, ON
Well, I think that's something that merits discussion amongst the members of PROC.
Liberal
Karina Gould Liberal Burlington, ON
I think it's a conversation we should be having with regard to privacy. Bill C-76 puts that conversation on the table.
NDP
Liberal
Karina Gould Liberal Burlington, ON
This legislation outlines what the privacy policy is of parties. It also provides a contact person the individual voters can contact to ask information about—
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
Yes, according to privacy experts, it goes little beyond the law that we have right now.
Liberal
Karina Gould Liberal Burlington, ON
Well, this is something that is important, because if a political party does not provide their policy at the time of registration and does not update it when they need to, then they become deregistered as a party. That's actually a pretty big deal.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
Your bill allows parties to still sell data. It would make it still allowable. That seems crazy to a lot of voters.
Liberal
Karina Gould Liberal Burlington, ON
They're not allowed to collude in any way, under this bill, so that would be part of it.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
They can collect data, which they get from Elections Canada and they get from multiple sources. We don't know what data political parties get. I just don't know what the resistance is. You say there's some sort of special relationship.
Liberal
Karina Gould Liberal Burlington, ON
The data that political parties get from Elections Canada is the voters list.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
Yes, and that's not it, though.
You say this is part of the conversation. We're in the conversation now. You've given us a 350-page omnibus bill and a very, very short amount of time, as you will admit, to look into it. We're trying to work with what you've given us in terms of time and a very large, 350-page bill. We want to consider modernizing this. You said it's a generational change. That means it doesn't happen very often. This should be something we ought to consider.
Liberal
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
As my very last comment, I'm going to look at a loophole in terms of foreign influence. Let's say the right wing—or the left wing, it doesn't matter to me—receives an amount of money offshore, displaces their current operating funds, and uses their current operating funds in their Canadian bank account to then run political ads, sponsor door-knocking, or whatever. Put simply, it's a displacement measure.
We've asked your officials if that could be done. Is that a loophole that exists within this bill? We've asked financial experts if it is a loophole that exists within this bill. We've been told yes. Does this present a concern to us in terms of trying to, as you said earlier, limit or eliminate entirely foreign influence on our elections?
Liberal
Karina Gould Liberal Burlington, ON
I think we've done what we can within the Canada Elections Act to limit foreign influence. With regard to the issue you raise, I think it is a legitimate one. The challenge, though, is that we would be asking all third parties to at all times report what they are receiving, whether or not they intend to participate in an election, and I think that poses a serious challenge to the charter.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
Don't you have to register to participate, though, in your bill?
NDP
Liberal
Karina Gould Liberal Burlington, ON
Yes, but they also have to report. Once you registered to participate and decided to participate, then you would have to report all contributions you received since the previous election, regardless of where they came from. You have to state, when you open your Canadian bank account, that you're only using Canadian funds.