Evidence of meeting #109 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 election.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
Scott Simms Liberal Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, NL
People have told me about this before, about how I should just keep going. Okay. All right.
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
Thanks, Mr. Chair.
Let me start with you, Ms. Furlong, in terms of a bit of background about your organization. From where does your organization receive its funding? Do you receive any foreign funding?
Executive Director, Council of Canadians
We are the Council of Canadians, which is the largest citizen-based social justice group in the country. We have individual donors who donate to us.
For our campaign work, we do have an international program on water, which is called the “Blue Planet Project”. We have foundations that donate to that work.
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
Do those include foreign foundations, or are they just all Canadian?
Executive Director, Council of Canadians
They could be located internationally, so in the U.S.
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
You mentioned that you do some election work. Can you give us a bit of a sense of what type of advocacy work you do during elections?
Executive Director, Council of Canadians
We're a non-partisan organization. In our work we focus on public health care, we focus on the right to water, and we focus on climate justice. With those issues, during the time of an election we look at all the various parties. We look at how they're working on those issues and what their platforms say. Then we collect that information and make it available to people to inform their decision on how to vote.
We don't tell people how to vote. Again, we're non-partisan. As a civil society organization, that's very important to us. We want to inform people on the issues that are very important to us from a social justice perspective and on how the parties are working on those issues.
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
So you analyze the issues and determine what political parties align with the thoughts and beliefs of your organization on those. You don't necessarily advocate for who voters should vote for, but you provide information about parties and how they align with those interests. Is that correct?
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
How is that information provided? Do you advertise that information in some way? Is it simply mailed to your members? How does that information get distributed or shared?
Executive Director, Council of Canadians
We certainly distribute it amongst our members through social media. We have it on our website, our internal email lists, and those sorts of things.
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
Okay.
In the last federal election, was your organization registered as a third party?
Executive Director, Council of Canadians
I believe we were. I'm new to the organization—I took on the role as executive director only in February—but that is my understanding.
Conservative
Executive Director, Council of Canadians
I would assume so, but that would be an assumption on my behalf. I'm not entirely sure.
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
Sure. That's just based on the work that your organization does. Obviously, you would see that as election-related, and that's why you think your group would be registered, as far as you know, as a third party.
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
Okay.
You mentioned that you do receive some foreign funding specifically for the more international bit of your work. Do you know what would be done to keep that money separate from money that would be used for that work during elections in Canada?
Executive Director, Council of Canadians
The Blue Planet Project specifically is registered as a separate entity from the Council of Canadians. We are a third party organization to one another. They have their own board of directors. They operate and also have charitable status in the United States.
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
Is it a deliberate choice of your organization, then, to try to ensure that when you're advocating in Canadian elections, it's done with money that's provided by Canadians? Or is it something that just happens to have happened?
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
So it's not necessarily a policy where you feel it's important that it only be Canadian money. It just simply happens to be that way.
Executive Director, Council of Canadians
No, it's more related to accessing foundation funding. It's something that foundations in the United States are interested in—donating to a section 501(c)(3) charity.
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
I'm just curious, then, what your thoughts are in terms of foreign funds. Obviously, political parties or candidates in Canada can't take donations from foreign individuals. I think that's a good thing, by the way, personally. I imagine you probably would agree with me.
What are your thoughts on third party groups using foreign funds to advocate or engage in activities during our elections? Do you think it's something that is advisable, or do you think we should discourage that?
