We've been living with these limits for over a decade now, so it's hard to know what would happen if there was more space. Look at the Harper case and some of the facts that the dissent put forward. I mentioned one, that you couldn't run a single-day ad in national newspapers. With the constituency limit, you couldn't actually send out a bulk mailing to everyone in certain constituencies. Those are the kinds of metrics I think we need to be looking at when we're trying to set some of these limits.
I appreciate that there are concerns about groups that may coordinate, or that there's the potential for third parties to overtake the space that political parties operate, but I think right now the balance is too much in the other direction. Political parties and candidates are able to dominate the discussion, and there isn't that effective space for third parties. The definition that incorporates this issue-based advocacy is problematic, and I think it's problematic not just for those who need to be governed by it but also for those who need to enforce it. To expect the Chief Electoral Officer to understand what issues are on the table for every candidate and party—that's a pretty significant undertaking.