Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Oct. 16th, 2018

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

So, Mr. Cullen, we're talking about your amending this to “polling station” from “electoral district”.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Yes. Again, LIB-13 is even broader than my original one, and we've shrunk my amendment to a smaller geographical destination. If we're going to go to Liberal-13, we're expanding it to an adjacent electoral district, not even just within the one zone.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Mr. Bittle, go ahead.

[Chris Bittle, Liberal, St. Catharines, ON]

In terms of Liberal-13, we're dealing with a small category of individuals who have to be identified somehow. There will have to be a letter from management or identification of that individual, and they are working within that polling division. They are working within that group known to those particular individuals, and we know....

I do hear you, and again, when the digital poll books come into effect, I would like to see a broader scope in terms of vouching, but I believe the amendment brings us to a better place than we were before.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Isn't that a procedural question then, Chair? We don't have Elections Canada with us yet, I assume. We've just made the invitation.

Then I guess I'll ask our witnesses now, just in terms of the practicality. We've asked about the practicality of NDP-8. Someone walks in, as my original one said, and they're in the same electoral district. What happens? What would Elections Canada have to do? Would they have to phone over to another polling station? That's what I'm hearing so far.

Is that right, Mr. Morin?

[LCdr Jean-François Morin]

If NDP-8 were to be passed as is, before the amendment, the election officers at the polling station would more than likely have to call the returning officer's office each time to confirm that the elector is on the list in the electoral district.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

And under Mr. Bittle's description, I'm not sure.... I hear your scenario about a letter or something, but I assume Elections Canada would have to do the same thing. If they're not in the same electoral district, somebody says, “I want to vouch for all these people” and they say, “You're not on our voters list.”

[LCdr Jean-François Morin]

That's more than likely. However, the other amendment we're talking about, LIB-13, is for a very precise category of electors—

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

That I understand.

[LCdr Jean-François Morin]

—so the magnitude of the change is not very....

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

It's not about scale for me; it's about principle. If we say the principle is okay here but not there, and if the question is logistics but not the principle of it, then I kind of wish we had done up a clause on Bill C-76—not a sunset clause but a revisit clause—to say, go this far, and then expand it once we have the digital polling books. That's the future scenario we're imagining—that we get to the digital polling books. Is that correct? If somebody walks in from the same electoral district but not that polling station, it's simply a matter of typing into the laptop to find and confirm that the person is who they say they are. Is that right?

[LCdr Jean-François Morin]

I don't have any information on that. It would be—

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Let's write to Elections Canada, then.

[LCdr Jean-François Morin]

Absolutely.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Gosh, I wish they were here. They'll get here.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Nathan, in practice there actually is a sunset clause, because for every election, the Chief Electoral Officer makes a report to this committee.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Oh, good.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Mr. Cullen, I just want to confirm that we're discussing the amendment and we have changed the words “electoral district” to “polling station”.

Mr. Graham, go ahead.

[David Graham, Liberal, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

It's the polling location, yes.

The one point I want to make about LIB-13 is that those instances are generally covered by the itinerant polls, which is a whole other kettle of fish. The itinerant polls go around to.... They're the mobile polls. I just want to put it out there that it's a very different beast to work with itinerant polls versus the regular ones.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

We are voting on Ms. Sahota's subamendment to Mr. Cullen's amendment, which changes the words “electoral district” to “polling station”.

(Subamendment agreed to)

(Amendment agreed to [See Minutes of Proceedings])

I'll tell you the ramifications of that.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Are you going to tell us now?

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Now I'm going to tell you.

It's easy to change NDP-9 and NDP-11, so when we get to those, they'll be considered passed, but with that change in those as well. NDP-16 and NDP-26, though, talk about a person living in an electoral district. You can't live in a polling station, so we will—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

I know we have a housing shortage, but.... So we're going to put those back in for discussion when we get to them, because they're not dealt with consequentially.

We're going on to PV-4.

There are four amendments or four suggestions—from virtually all the parties, if not more than all the parties—about enfranchising seniors in homes. That's great. It's just a question of which ones we choose.

I know discussions have been had, but what did you discuss?

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

My amendment, as you said, Chair, is directly related to some of the concerns raised by our former Chief Electoral Officer, Marc Mayrand, that in seniors homes we might have a problem—and in fact we have had a problem—with staff who were not electors in that district vouching. Everybody wants to fix it.

I'm very fond of my amendment, but having discussed this with Bernadette, it seems to me that LIB-9, which comes up next, is close enough to mine that the simplest procedural thing for me to do is to withdraw my amendment. However, I'm not allowed to withdraw my amendment, because I'm not allowed to move my amendment because of the motion you all passed, which is why I'm here, but I still don't like it. That motion means that my amendment is deemed to have been tabled and deemed to have been moved.

I would like to request, on the advice of the clerk, that by unanimous consent my amendment be withdrawn.