Thank you, Mr. Chair.
The motion moved by Mr. Christopherson was “That the Committee immediately begin reviewing the government's announced leaders debate commission and make any necessary recommendations in a timely report to Parliament”.
Mr. Chair, this is a motion that I support. I support it because now we have a chance to do one of the fundamental things that parliamentary committees ought to do, and this committee in particular, which is to review the proposals from government and to suggest any necessary changes.
In the case of this debate commission, it seems to me entirely appropriate simply because the commission, while structurally it does bear some resemblance to that which was proposed by the committee in a majority report—in which my party did not concur, but nonetheless a majority of the committee—had put forward, a closer examination reveals that it is in fact not the same thing as was proposed. For example, it is not a fully independent commission. The commissioner is almost certainly not a fully independent individual, by any stretch of the imagination, once one examines the nature of the appointment. My colleague, Mr. Nater, will be speaking to that point, when the floor goes to him.
I think it is of fundamental importance to point out that this body and its decision-making power is structured in such a way that it has a great deal of discretionary authority. This was something that was specifically spoken against by the Chief Electoral Officer of Canada, who said it is vital that this body, both the commissioner and the commission, be set up in such a way that they are subject to charter challenge, which is something that has been denied by setting it up through an order in council. This means that the commission could make decisions that have the effect of trampling on one or more of the rights protected in the charter.
From my perspective, the most obvious one would be section three, the right of citizens to vote, which if interpreted broadly and purposively, which is the way in which the Supreme Court normally recommends we treat charter provisions—giving it what was known in the old days as a large and liberal interpretation, with “large and liberal” being a synonym for purpose of interpretation—includes the right to do so in an environment in which the party in power is not setting the rules, not privileging itself and not stripping away the powers of others.
I note that, under the criteria laid out here, the party that I joined in 1990, the Reform Party, would not have been eligible to have a participant in the leaders debates, since it didn't meet all the criteria.