Evidence of meeting #123 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 clause.
A video is available from Parliament.
6 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell
Is there any further discussion?
(Amendment negatived [See Minutes of Proceedings])
(Clause 20 agreed to)
(Clauses 21 to 24 inclusive agreed to on division)
(On clause 25)
We have CPC-9.
6 p.m.
Calgary Midnapore, CPC
Our amendments in CPC-9 are to maintain procedures to object early to persons who are incorrectly on the list of electors.
Obviously if there are people who are incorrectly on the list of electors, we would want to ensure that as much time as possible was allowed in an effort to correct the list.
6 p.m.
Conservative
John Nater Conservative Perth—Wellington, ON
Just to clarify, currently as the bill is written, at the end of the day Elections Canada has rules in place whereby you can object to incorrect names on elections lists a couple of weeks in advance. The Liberal bill takes out that provision. This amendment is reversing that provision that has been inserted by the government in this bill.
6 p.m.
Liberal
6 p.m.
Conservative
John Nater Conservative Perth—Wellington, ON
That's if this bill were to pass. Currently there is an ability to object in advance. If this bill passes, that will be gone. That's why this amendment is being put in place.
6 p.m.
LCdr Jean-François Morin
I can confirm that this procedure is being removed from the Canada Elections Act. My understanding is that procedure was not used very much because it dates back to the time when lists were posted on telephone poles.
6 p.m.
Senior Policy Advisor, Privy Council Office
The only thing I would add is that the procedure is removed, I believe, at clause 68. This is a reference to the procedure.
6 p.m.
Liberal
Chris Bittle Liberal St. Catharines, ON
Just very quickly, this provision is based on a recommendation that was made by the Chief Electoral Officer, which is why this is in the bill. We trust the CEO's judgment on this particular clause, so we're opposed.
6 p.m.
Conservative
John Nater Conservative Perth—Wellington, ON
Just to clarify, if this were to pass, the only place where you could object is at the polling location on election day, if you make this change.
6 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell
You're saying the procedure would be that if you think someone shouldn't be able to vote, you'd complain at the polling place.
6 p.m.
Conservative
John Nater Conservative Perth—Wellington, ON
That's correct. That would be the practical effect of this change.
6 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell
Is there any further discussion?
(Amendment negatived [See Minutes of Proceedings])
(Clause 25 agreed to)
There are no amendments on clauses 26 to 28.
(Clauses 26 to 28 inclusive agreed to)
(On clause 29)
On clause 29, I think CPC-10 limits the number of election staff from one party, but I'll leave it to the Conservatives to propose it.
6:05 p.m.
Calgary Midnapore, CPC
Yes, it just indicates a cap at 50% to the proportion of a single party's nominees for election officers who are assigned to a given polling station. It strikes me as fair that you wouldn't want a single party's election officers to have the opportunity to be the majority of election officers.
6:05 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
I'm just trying to think of scenarios in which this would be hard to achieve. Are there such scenarios in which you wouldn't be able to run the polling station? I'm just trying to think about.... On the surface it seems like an interesting idea, but again, many of these things are going to have practical impacts on how the elections are run. Could we not imagine a scenario of people not being available from other parties, and it ends up with more than 50% of election officers being from one party?
6:05 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell
While we're on this topic, I thought there might have been other changes in the bill somewhere related to parties appointing people. Do you remember?
6:05 p.m.
LCdr Jean-François Morin
Absolutely, yes. Part of the polling station modernization portion of the bill gives more flexibility for returning officers in electoral districts to hire election officers in advance of receiving the party appointment suggestions. The returning officers will now be able to appoint up to 50% of the election officer positions before receiving the party nominations.
This is consequential to a recommendation by the Chief Electoral Officer. The party recommendations were coming later in the election period, and often were not sufficient to fill all the positions.
6:05 p.m.
Liberal
David Graham Liberal Laurentides—Labelle, QC
For one, I trust Elections Canada to administer elections. More to the point, in my election, during the first couple of days of the campaign, my phones rang off the hook with people who wanted to be named to work at Elections Canada. I had never heard of any of them before and I have never heard from any of them since, and I suspect that these people called all the different parties so they would show up on all the different lists. If you have to say that only 50% are named by each party, they might have people who were named by all three parties, and everyone's named by everybody, so they could be anywhere.
I see that being problematic in implementation. I don't see any need for this amendment.
6:05 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
I find the sometimes crossover partisan nature of what happens in polling stations just odd. The first returning officer I sat down with in my first election said, “Hi, I'm so-and-so, and I'm a Liberal.” I didn't know that happened. I was new to politics and didn't understand why that happened.
Again, sometimes we have to imagine the worst-case scenarios, not the best-case scenarios, when we're designing these laws. Many laws are only designed for worst-case scenarios. With this new 50% provision offered to returning officers, is it not possible that returning officers who are of a more partisan nature and like their partisan family might hire from only one party and then essentially have virtually all returning officers coming in at their discretion?
I'm just asking for scenarios in which that election officer is dealing with somebody of an “opposing” party. Is that possible with this provision that's coming later in the bill? I say that through you to our witnesses.
6:05 p.m.
LCdr Jean-François Morin
Mr. Cullen, when were you first elected?