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.
Prof. Henry Milner
At least at the local level we've seen that. I don't want to make an accusation at the national level.
Liberal
Ruby Sahota Liberal Brampton North, ON
You have made some statements in the past about increasing voter turnout. A lot of your studies have been done about increasing voter turnout when it comes to youth. Also, you've made statements that the ability of Canadians to vote was restricted in this last Fair Elections Act to five years if they were abroad.
Can I get more of your thoughts on that and why removing that restriction is a good thing?
Prof. Henry Milner
I wasn't very strong on that particular aspect before, and I looked around to see what other countries were doing. On balance, I would like it to be a bit longer, but the numbers, I don't think, would be significantly affected, so I wouldn't slow down the bill to try to amend that, for example.
Liberal
Ruby Sahota Liberal Brampton North, ON
We've removed the restriction, so now when you're abroad.... This bill removes it.
Prof. Henry Milner
Is that right? Then I misread the bill.
At this point, a Canadian can...and not return at any point in the interval? Is that really the case?
Liberal
Ruby Sahota Liberal Brampton North, ON
Can I get your views on that? That is more like the American way, right?
Prof. Henry Milner
Yes, but remember, the Americans have to pay taxes. They can never have lived in the United States—and I can give you examples of that—and still pay taxes.
Maybe that's going too far. Again, it's not something you'd worry about right away, but I think it's worth thinking about. I don't know of other countries, apart from the United States.... There probably are some. I think the French are like that. The basic idea is that you live your whole life out of the country, but this is still your identity. Do we think that? That's a cultural issue, right? Or wouldn't we say, no, your new identity is the country you live in, even though technically you still have Canadian citizenship? I would say there should be a point where you have to decide.
Liberal
Ruby Sahota Liberal Brampton North, ON
Do you think we should be concerned about flocks of people who are living abroad wanting to vote in order to influence an election?
Prof. Henry Milner
Again, that's the nice thing about being Canadian. We don't take the division over politics so seriously, as certain neighbours tend to do. Politics become such a powerful, emotional division that you can imagine a manipulation of external.... In fact, some effort is made to get democrats abroad or republicans abroad. That's fairly healthy as long as it's fair.
I don't worry about that, especially for Canadians.
Liberal
Ruby Sahota Liberal Brampton North, ON
What do you think is the main cause of our lower voter turnout? I know you've done some work in terms of younger people not voting now, and how even in their older age, they're not more likely to start voting. What can we do to promote that within—
Prof. Henry Milner
Again, I think more effort should be made on civic education. For those of us who are active provincially, that's really the primary focus. That's where I would put the main focus. It's not here. Here the work of Elections Canada is very important. We're too many people to think we can bring.... In Norway, for example, something like one-third of high school students are brought to Parliament during ages 14 to 16 to participate in a kind of simulation. It's an interesting exercise, but numerically, we're better off doing that at the provincial level, where the numbers are.... There are examples of this in other countries. I think the work of Taylor Gunn, which again, is around elections, makes a difference, and I think the Canadian government is still supporting this.
Liberal
Ruby Sahota Liberal Brampton North, ON
This bill has increased the ability of Elections Canada to do outreach.
Prof. Henry Milner
Yes, absolutely.
It was very hard for me to understand why one would be opposed to that. It's like being opposed to motherhood, at some level.
