Evidence of meeting #110 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 political.

A recording is available from Parliament.

On the agenda

MPs speaking

Also speaking

Taylor Gunn  President and Chief Election Officer, CIVIX
Duff Conacher  Co-Founder, Democracy Watch
Henry Milner  Associate Fellow, Department of Political Science, Université de Montréal, As an Individual
Clerk of the Committee  Mr. Andrew Lauzon
Lori Turnbull  Associate Professor, Dalhousie University, As an Individual
J. Randall Emery  Executive Director, Canadian Citizens Rights Council

11:30 a.m.

Liberal

Scott Simms Liberal Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, NL

Yes. I don't think they face any inhibiting factors when they go into the provincial systems, per se, and do elections.

11:30 a.m.

Prof. Henry Milner

But there is more done in the way of civic education in other countries than in most Canadian—

11:30 a.m.

Liberal

Scott Simms Liberal Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, NL

Well, that was my question, sir. My goodness, you're smarter than I ever realized.

I don't have much time left, but perhaps you want to comment on that part. One of the things, in addition to that, is to allow Elections Canada to have more freedom to go beyond just telling people where and when to vote, which was the contentious issue. We also have the fact that we're allowing people between the ages of 16 and 18 to register to vote—or is it 14 now? Nevertheless, they can register to vote.

Do you see how Elections Canada can do more on the education aspect now that in Bill C-76 they have the freedom we just talked about?

11:30 a.m.

Prof. Henry Milner

Well, if they go back to doing what they were doing when I was sort of a consultant, and so on, that's already a major step. Because of the federal system, you can't have Elections Canada doing what the department of education in the province does in terms of the curriculum for high school students. Yes, they can provide information that the students would have access to, but I'm talking about the curriculum at a certain age, of 16-year-olds, in a public school system. The kind of information they'll be getting is really up to the provinces. Some do a better job than others, but that's the nature of Canada.

I'd be happy to tell you what other countries do, but at this point I won't go there.

11:30 a.m.

Liberal

Scott Simms Liberal Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, NL

Thank you, Dr. Milner.

11:30 a.m.

Liberal

The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell

Thank you.

Now we'll go to Mr. Reid.

11:30 a.m.

Conservative

Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON

Thank you.

I'm starting my little timer here. Is the first round seven minutes? Okay.

You're aware, of course, that the political debates commission, which it sounds like you favour, is not actually part of this piece of legislation. This bill does not contain anything about a political leaders debates commission.

11:30 a.m.

Prof. Henry Milner

You're quite correct. I was suggesting that this was the one thing that was missing.

11:30 a.m.

Conservative

Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON

Right. I personally think that a debates commission is a bad idea, but I do think that leaving it out of the legislation has at least this merit: if you put it in, you now have a statute that ultimately decides what the cut-off point is for parties. Unless you're inviting all of them—the three flavours of Marxist-Leninists who are there, the Libertarians, the None of the Above Party, and everybody else—

11:30 a.m.

NDP

Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC

And the CCF.

11:30 a.m.

Conservative

Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON

—that's right—then the one at the cut-off line, in this case likely Ms. May, goes off to court and says that it's an unconstitutional violation.

I still think there's a risk of that occurring. If it's government-sponsored, with government funds, the rule generally is that the charter applies when the government was involved in setting something up, even if those who executed it are not the direct agents of the government. I think this is the advantage of having these things done informally; i.e., the Charter of Rights does not apply to Maclean's magazine or CTV or whoever.

Anyway, seeing as I've gone down that road, why don't you provide your thoughts on a debates commission, and in particular that problem of someone who effectively is an agent of government deciding who gets in and who doesn't get in?

11:30 a.m.

Prof. Henry Milner

Who gets into the debate?

11:30 a.m.

Conservative

Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON

Yes.

11:30 a.m.

Prof. Henry Milner

I haven't really thought about it very much, but my general principle is that it's not a good idea to have it debated in the last minute before an election campaign, because then the rules will be based on the particular situation at that time. It would be better to debate it when there's no election campaign. Then you try to set up general rules that apply beyond the particular situation and create some kind of commission, a neutral commission or commissioner, with the role of implementing those rules.

Just as a general principle, I think that's a better idea. I don't think we do a terrible job in Canada, but we're always left uncertain until the last moment in terms of how many debates, what the rules are, and who will be in the debate. I don't think that's a good way to do it. I think we can do better.

11:35 a.m.

Conservative

Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON

That is messy, I grant you. Let me give you another example of a mess.

Ontario is about to have an election. We don't know who will wind up being the new government. We could imagine a very tidy election scenario, like, say the People's Republic of China or the people's democratic republic of North Korea, where we'll know exactly who is going to win beforehand. I'm just saying that untidiness is sort of inherent in democracy.

I want to submit to you, as a counter-proposition, the idea that norms grow culturally in a messy way, but they do emerge. As to what is a reasonable set of debates, what kinds of topics they ought be on, whether there should be specialized topic debates, what the ratio of English and French languages ought to be, length of interventions and so on.... I would submit it's better to have them emerge organically and be generally accepted in society. If it's felt that it's too restrictive, there will be pressure on someone to create a new debate beyond the ones that already exist. It actually did happen in the last election.

Does that not seem like a robust solution that we really haven't given a great chance to develop, given the fact that last time around we could see some new formatting springing up that had never previously happened?

11:35 a.m.

Prof. Henry Milner

Again, I don't want to talk about the specifics. My general position in these areas, and it comes from knowing a lot of what goes on in other countries, is that the clearer the rules in advance, the better the situation overall. That's why I favour fixed election dates. Everybody—the potential candidates, the media, the people who are going to knock on doors, voters—knows when the next election is going to be and they have to prepare themselves accordingly.

It's not just the strategy of political parties and so on. It's the wider political culture. I would apply that the same way, in terms of debates. There are certain things that are understood to be taken for granted. That's my general principle. We can talk about the particular cases and so on.

11:35 a.m.

Conservative

Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON

You brought up the issue of electoral reform. You appeared before the Special Committee on Electoral Reform on which I sat. I very much enjoyed your testimony there.

Since that time, there's been some water under the bridge, both at the federal level and in the two provinces that are perennial experimenters in this matter, those being British Columbia and Prince Edward Island. They have taken somewhat different approaches to how to deal with it in the upcoming period of time. I would be interested in your comments on the two paths that the two provinces are taking.

I ask this particularly, because this issue could conceivably recur following the next election at the federal level. It's good to get some input in advance.

11:35 a.m.

Prof. Henry Milner

Let me add that you should include Quebec. All the parties, except for the Liberals, in Quebec are now in favour of electoral reform. It's part of their platform going into the October 1 election. Although it's not like B.C. where there will be a referendum already, and that referendum—if the “yes” side wins—will start the process. These other parties in Quebec are all committed to come forth with a proportional representation proposal within a year, if they are the government . They're pretty much agreed on the components of this proposal, which is one of the three proposals that will be posed in British Columbia.

You may know that it hasn't yet been accepted by the British Columbia legislature, but it's been proposed by the attorney general. I think it's a good proposal, namely, that the first vote will be on principle and if there's a majority for the first vote...in other words, proportional representation versus first past the post. If proportional representation wins more than half, then there are three versions of it, and the voters will choose between the three.

11:35 a.m.

Conservative

Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON

That's the model New Zealand used 25 years ago.

11:35 a.m.

Prof. Henry Milner

The model New Zealand or Scotland used.... I prefer the Scottish variant, but they're very similar. That's the one that has been agreed upon in Quebec by the other parties, with the exception of the ruling Liberals.

I know less about what's happening in Prince Edward Island. I guess they're still waiting for the premier to set up the mechanism by which there will be a referendum, but I think something will happen there as well.

11:40 a.m.

Conservative

Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON

Thank you.

11:40 a.m.

Liberal

The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell

Mr. Cullen.

11:40 a.m.

NDP

Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC

Thank you, Chair.

I appreciate your being back, Professor Milner, and your continued optimism sprinkled with a dose of skepticism.

11:40 a.m.

Prof. Henry Milner

I've been at this for a long time.

11:40 a.m.

NDP

Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC

Some of us have too, but not maybe quite as long.

I want to talk a bit about process because I think it's as important as the substance of the bill. Just on principle we had a tradition in Canada of one party not changing the rules of the game, if you will, unilaterally, or invoking closure until the unfair elections act came. Is my history correct?