Evidence of meeting #32 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 recommendations.

A video is available from Parliament.

On the agenda

MPs speaking

Also speaking

Marc Mayrand  Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada

12:30 p.m.

Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada

Marc Mayrand

Currently?

12:30 p.m.

Liberal

David Graham Liberal Laurentides—Labelle, QC

Yes. In the next by-election, if you have some that are coming and you wanted to try these things, what would be the process to make it happen?

12:30 p.m.

Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada

Marc Mayrand

There are two types of pilot, just to be clear: one that involves a change to the Elections Act and one that does not involve a change to the Elections Act.

I'll give you the best example. Opening a special ballot office on campuses across the country did not require changes to the act, but we did a pilot on it in the last election.

If the pilot requires a change to the act, we need to present a business case, a proposal to this committee, and get your approval to proceed. We need to redraft the legislation to reflect what the pilot will be about, and understandably we will report to the committee afterward.

I would also have to run the same process in the Senate. You can appreciate that two committees looking at the same proposal may have different views, different requirements, understandably, and also may have very different timelines. That's why I'm saying we're just talking about a pilot to test something. In my view, the approval of this committee should be sufficient for testing a change.

Right now, in fact, there's another tier. If it deals with electronic voting, it requires not only two committees' approval, but the whole of Parliament to approve the pilot, so by the time we'd be ready to run the pilot, the election would be gone. There's a practical consideration that we're putting forward.

12:30 p.m.

Liberal

The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell

Thank you.

Go ahead, Mr. Schmale.

12:30 p.m.

Conservative

Jamie Schmale Conservative Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock, ON

Thank you very much for your comments today. They're greatly appreciated.

I have a point of clarification. We talked a few moments ago about potentially moving election day from Monday to possibly a weekend, and maybe this is where the clarification comes in.

Given the fact that advance polls take place usually over the weekend and offer flexibility of hours, and we had almost 70% voter turnout nationally in 2015, was this more to help with the hiring of competent staff? What was the objective of that?

12:30 p.m.

Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada

Marc Mayrand

There are three considerations.

There's the ease of recruiting qualified people to do the work. It would be easier on a weekend.

There's also having access to facilities. Right now the challenge for returning officers to secure schools for voting is tremendous. Increasingly school boards, for reasons of security, will not allow voting procedures to take place during a school day. One option to deal with this is to move it to Saturday or Sunday.

The other thing is that there is evidence that of the electors who did not vote—we're talking eight million who did not vote in the last election—about 50% pointed out that it was due to everyday life issues they were facing on voting day. Many of them were suggesting that they had a conflict with their work schedule. We think these electors would have been able to vote. We're talking about a population of probably around a million electors who would benefit directly from that measure.

These are the three reasons we're pursuing this change.

12:35 p.m.

Conservative

Jamie Schmale Conservative Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock, ON

Thank you.

Your recommendation A17 is about potentially removing the signature requirement, which would keep the process moving along in long lines. I guess in order to do that, you would have to use, as you pointed out here, the bar code scanner. I find that even today you still have to sign for certain things, so I think one more check—

October 4th, 2016 / 12:35 p.m.

Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada

Marc Mayrand

Oh, yes. That's a very valid point. This is for electors who are properly registered and who show up at the advance poll with their ID and their voter information card.

12:35 p.m.

Conservative

Jamie Schmale Conservative Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock, ON

Okay.

12:35 p.m.

Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada

Marc Mayrand

If you're not registered or if you need to change your registration, you would still have to sign the traditional forms that in those cases you have to fill in. It's really to deal with the mainstream electors who come with their ID and voter information cards and are at the right place. Currently you have to search the paper registry. You have to enter into a book, by hand, the name and the address, and you have to have it signed. If it takes two minutes and you have 10 or 15 electors in line, you're already 30 minutes late.

I think that's the purpose of this recommendation.

12:35 p.m.

Conservative

Jamie Schmale Conservative Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock, ON

Okay. Thank you.

12:35 p.m.

Liberal

The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell

Thank you.

Ms. Petitpas Taylor is next, and then Mr. Kang.

12:35 p.m.

Liberal

Ginette Petitpas Taylor Liberal Moncton—Riverview—Dieppe, NB

I have a quick question.

It's hard to believe that last year at this time we were in full election mode, working very hard, all of us. We also remember that it was a 78-day campaign. Can you describe the consequences, if any, of extended election periods like the one we experienced last year?

12:35 p.m.

Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada

Marc Mayrand

I can certainly speak for Elections Canada. I won't speak for candidates and campaigns.

The main challenge, which I'm sure you faced as well with your volunteers, was retaining people on board for twice the normal length of a campaign. Many ROs, returning officers, faced that challenge. We had people who could not be available for the extra month. That kind of thing changes all your preparation, your training, your readiness.

Another very concrete example is that we constantly monitor or maintain an inventory of sites across the country. Normally we're looking for sites available for about 36 to 40 days. Suddenly, with 78 days needed, landlords were not willing to enter into those leases. You had to either renegotiate or find another place. That happened to a large extent.

These are not insignificant administrative impacts. Most importantly, it did delay the opening up of offices across the country, and it did, in a way, deny some services to electors that they are entitled to from the moment the writ was dropped. That's why I'm advocating for more certainty.

12:35 p.m.

Liberal

The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell

The last questioner is Mr. Kang.

12:35 p.m.

Liberal

Darshan Singh Kang Liberal Calgary Skyview, AB

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Sir, do we know how many Canadians overseas are eligible to vote in elections?

12:35 p.m.

Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada

Marc Mayrand

We have a register of citizens residing abroad. I would have to look up the figures again, but it's roughly 5,000 Canadians residing abroad. There is an estimate of the population of Canadians abroad that runs over a million, but as I said, very few are registered.

12:40 p.m.

Liberal

Darshan Singh Kang Liberal Calgary Skyview, AB

If all of those other one million registered, then they would be eligible to vote.

12:40 p.m.

Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada

Marc Mayrand

They would have to register and they would have to have been away from Canada for less than five years. That's the current status of the law. If they've been away for more than five years or haven't resumed residence in Canada, they can no longer vote. I say that with a caveat, because the matter is before the courts. The Supreme Court will be hearing it next winter, in February or something like that.

12:40 p.m.

Liberal

Darshan Singh Kang Liberal Calgary Skyview, AB

Okay.

When you talk about mail-in ballots, they could be prone to abuse if one family member mails in ballots for the whole family. What kind of checks and balances do you think should be in place to stop that abuse?

12:40 p.m.

Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada

Marc Mayrand

We have checks and balances to ensure that these are properly qualified electors, but I will not deny that this is an unsupervised voting process. We rely on the honesty and the good faith of Canadians.

We have also a system that provides a criminal offence for this type of interference with voting, and we also are relatively easy to reach if someone wants to bring to our attention, or the commissioner's attention, any irregularities with regard to voting.

12:40 p.m.

Liberal

Darshan Singh Kang Liberal Calgary Skyview, AB

Yes, I know it would be based on an honour system, but by the time we find out, it would probably be too late to charge anybody with an offence.

12:40 p.m.

Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada

Marc Mayrand

That's already the system in place. Whether you print your ballot or you get it by mail, the issue will be the same. The system assumes that those who rely on voting by mail will do it as independently and secretly as all other electors. I'm sorry to say that I don't know how we can allow those people to vote otherwise. It's a compromise we have to make.

12:40 p.m.

Liberal

Darshan Singh Kang Liberal Calgary Skyview, AB

Okay. Thank you.

12:40 p.m.

Liberal

The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell

Thank you.

I will excuse our witnesses again, on behalf of Parliament and the committee. I think we owe a great deal of debt to you for a great job done over the years in keeping our democracy strong. On behalf of all of us, thank you, Mr. Mayrand.