Procedure and House Affairs Committee on May 5th, 2022

[Ruby Sahota, Liberal, Brampton North, ON]

Thank you.

Madam Chair, I'm looking forward to the report that's going to be submitted in May. I think there will be a lot of questions around how things can be improved for the next election or what things were learned in this election that might be implemented again, even though it was a pandemic election.

I'm wondering if the commissioner could highlight one thing that he thinks could be kept from what was learned in the pandemic election. Then I have a few other questions, so I don't want too much detail on that one.

[Stéphane Perrault]

There are a few things, certainly, that we would want to keep. I'm thinking in particular of how we serve long-term care facilities, for example, with more flexibility in serving them at different times in the calendar between advanced polls and polling day so that we can secure their vote and make sure that they are able to vote in a way that works for them and for the institutions. That's certainly one thing.

We used drop boxes for the first time. That was by way of adaptation; electors could bring their special ballot to a polling station. That's something that we may want to include in the future. It's hard, once you've offered something, to take it back, right? People expect that service again.

There are a few things from the pandemic election that we would want to bring back even outside of a pandemic. Of course, we're still in the pandemic and we don't know when the election is going to take place. That, of course, will influence other measures of protection we would bring in.

[Ruby Sahota, Liberal, Brampton North, ON]

Thank you; that's quite interesting.

Madam Chair, next I'd like to ask about the electoral boundaries readjustment that you oversee.

We've been getting some early information as to what some of the changes might be. I'm wondering if the elections commissioner could inform us of the work that's been done thus far and when we can expect the final versions to be coming out. The last election, perhaps obviously, took up a lot of your time. Was Elections Canada able to be involved in that process as they usually are?

[Stéphane Perrault]

Madam Chair, we provide support for the 10 independent electoral boundaries commissions, but we are not involved in the exercise of making decisions on the boundaries. We provide tactical assistance and we set them up and support them administratively. The commissions decide on their activities and on the recommendations that they want to make, and the work is ongoing in that regard.

I know that so far three commissions have published a proposal. Other commissions are receiving input from the public prior to making their proposals. They have different approaches.

Certainly we would expect that the commissions' final maps or proposals, having gone through public hearings and having gone through this committee as the act provides, would be completed in the fall, around October 2023. Things are in line for that.

It should be noted that once the maps are finalized, they must be approved by order in council. There is no discretion there. Then they apply to any election that takes place seven months afterward, so there's a seven-month period for Elections Canada as well as for district associations to get organized under the new boundaries and reappoint returning officers. There's a fair amount of work that needs to be done. Once the maps are proclaimed, they do not take effect immediately. That would take us to the spring of 2024.

[Ruby Sahota, Liberal, Brampton North, ON]

Madam Chair, through you, does that mean the technical side of the work that you provide assistance on is more after the fact, after the drawing of the boundaries is done?

[Stéphane Perrault]

No. We provide technicians and software to the commissions, for example, so that they can work with the boundaries and look at the data that we obtain from StatsCan. Using that data and using our software, they are able to look at the impacts of changing boundaries here or there. We support them in that aspect of the exercise as they look at different options and make proposals for public consultation.

[Ruby Sahota, Liberal, Brampton North, ON]

Do the independent commissions ever ask for advice, since Elections Canada has a lot of experience with electoral boundaries?

[Stéphane Perrault]

We never provide any advice to the commissions on the drawing of the boundaries. At the start of the process, we did hold a conference to bring the commissioners together and to have those who were part of the members of previous commissions speak to their experience. We had external speakers talk about the legal framework.

We set them up so that they're knowledgeable, but once they are in the process of working on the boundaries, they work entirely independently of Elections Canada. That's by design.

[Ruby Sahota, Liberal, Brampton North, ON]

Thank you.

Madam Chair, through you, I'd also like to ask about the work that Elections Canada does in monitoring the information environment and whether there have been more security issue threats identified by your organization and what those might be.

Could you shed some more light on that aspect? Is there a growing concern on misinformation and disinformation?

[Stéphane Perrault]

We do monitor. We starting monitoring in 2015. The 2015 election was our first attempt at social media monitoring. We've gained a lot of experience in that area since then.

We monitor in some 18 to 20 languages. We chose in the last election to monitor fewer languages to focus on those where there's more content, where it's more important. We look specifically for misinformation on the electoral process, and determining whether it is domestic or international is not our focus; we look for misinformation on the voting process, not on campaigns and candidates.

We've been doing that now for the last three elections. Obviously, there is a fair amount of confusion out there; some of it may be disinformation. The important goal for us is that we are able to correct that and made sure electors have the right information.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Kelly Block]

Thank you very much. We are well over time.

Thank you, Ms. Sahota. We will now go on to Madame Gaudreau for six minutes.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

I will gladly take the floor, Madam Chair. By the way, you are doing a great job in the chair.

I'd like to thank the witnesses very much.

It's important to ask questions, too. I, for one, want to speak on behalf of my constituents. Obviously, we will get the report in May. We may not have enough time to review it, but I'd still like us to find a way to ask our questions, with a view to improving the train of events. I'm referring not only to redistricting, but also to the pandemic, which we will have learned from.

I have two concerns. You know me, I'm very practically oriented.

I did hear Mr. Perrault mention that his office needed more preparation time because of the pandemic. Of course, that came as a surprise, and in the end, there was no more time.

I'd like to know what the challenges were, given that you may not have had enough preparation time. I'm sure you are going to talk about labour. Other than labour, what challenges will you bring up in the report?

That's my first concern.

[Stéphane Perrault]

They won't necessarily be listed in the report, because some things I have already talked about. However, certain things will come back in the report, such as mail‑in ballots, for which there are various solutions.

We certainly faced several challenges. One of the issues came up when we were in the fourth wave, we will recall. In July, when we were preparing for the election, some landlords had agreed to rent their premises out as polling stations. They were mostly schools. Many of them changed their minds when the writs of election were issued. Returning officers had to go back to the drawing board and find new locations. Not only was it difficult to find polling stations, but we were also late getting the voter information cards, which must include the polling station. I would say that was the main consequence.

We also note in the report that, because we had four fewer days than the previous election, the percentage of mail‑in ballots that were received late and therefore not counted rose from 1.5% to 7.1%. A few days can have a huge impact on the mail‑in voting process.

I would say those are the two main issues related to the electoral period.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

What I've just heard is a bit shocking in that it seems to be necessary to promote our democracy. Elections Canada will be issuing its recommendations, including on the time frame it has to do its work. It is also important not to minimize citizens' participation in elections.

That leads me to my second concern. It has to do with technology and your position on it. The issue of cyber-attacks came up. What are you doing to ensure the participation of the next generation of voters? Even 40‑year‑olds would like another option for casting their ballots, something entirely different from voting by mail. Do you have an update on that?

[Stéphane Perrault]

A parliamentary committee studied the issue in 2016, if I'm not mistaken. The only point on which a consensus emerged, or at least considerable agreement, was that the process of voting in federal elections in Canada should remain paper-based for the time being. Electronic voting has certainly gained ground at the municipal level. I believe Quebec will be implementing it at the school district level; that work is under way. In territorial elections, electronic voting is also used.

There is progress on that front. On our end, we are watching the issue with interest, but we are not working on deploying measures to support electronic voting. Instead, we are focused on using technologies such as electronic lists to better manage the voting process at polling stations, and thus minimize wait times and make optimal use of human resources—which, to be perfectly frank, are in decline. We had 195,000 election workers, and we don't expect that number to increase, even after the pandemic. That means we need to make the best possible use of workers, and I think technology can play a really big part in that, but not in terms of the actual voting.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

That's interesting. If they don't already know, voters will find out that Parliament now uses an electronic voting system. If Parliament can do it, there must be some openness to the idea. Obviously, we don't need another pandemic or other exceptional situation to advance.

You mentioned human resources. Something else that concerns me are the privacy and security gaps. As we all know, rental space is extremely limited and housing is in short supply across Quebec and Canada. Workers, too, are hard to come by.

Are there solutions? Better compensation and electronic voting are two possibilities. Do you already have solutions in mind for the next election?

[Stéphane Perrault]

You talked about personal information and privacy. That does involve cybersecurity, but it also involves the electoral administration practices of the parties or candidates using voters' personal information.

We have been working closely with our federal partners on cybersecurity matters for a number of years. After the U.S. presidential election in 2016, cybersecurity became a top priority for election administration authorities all over the world. I have to say, we have an excellent partnership on that front. We have made significant investments in cybersecurity capacity. It will continue to be a priority as we deploy technology, not necessarily to allow electronic voting, but rather, to administer the voting process.

I should also point out that we are subject to the Privacy Act, whereas political parties are not. It's an issue I've brought up in the past. I know that the Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics produced a report on the subject a few years back, and it's something I plan to revisit in my recommendations report.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair, for letting the witness finish.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Thank you.

Mr. Bachrach is next.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'd like to start by thanking our Chief Electoral Officer and his team for their work, and for appearing at committee and answering our questions.

As the committee knows, my bill, the right to vote at 16 act, is currently at second reading.

Back in 2018, Mr. Perrault told the CBC that lowering the voting age is “worth considering”, because “Voting when you're 16 is voting at a time when most Canadians at that age are still in school, at a place where we can actually get to them and engage them.” He also said:

We know that Canadians who vote early in their lifetime will continue to vote, and those who don't vote in the first few elections will tend not to vote later on. So there's a real benefit to making sure that Canadians vote early, and voting when you're 16, there's an opportunity to reach out to them.

I'd like to ask Mr. Perrault if that remains his perspective.

[Stéphane Perrault]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I think these quotes were more separate in a conversation and were put a bit closer together than they were when I first spoke to the journalist. The reality is that they're all true, these statements. I still believe in all of them.

My main point there was that this is an important issue for Parliament to consider. It's for parliamentarians, for MPs, to have those discussions, and they're having them right now. My role is to support the work of this committee, should this issue come to the committee, by providing data and information on barriers to voting, and, should it move forward, explaining how we would implement any change relating to voting age.

I think this is fundamentally a policy decision for parliamentarians to make.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you, Mr. Perrault.

Turnout among 18-24 year olds is the lowest of any age cohort in our country. Is Elections Canada concerned?

[Stéphane Perrault]

We're concerned about turnout of all groups, but especially those who face barriers.

You're quite correct that youth do face barriers for voting. One of the main areas for us has been trying to make sure that youth can register early on. I don't have the numbers here, but we see that there is a registration gap in terms of youth under 25. When you look at the Canadian National Register of Electors, 96% of Canadians are on the register. Those who are missing are mainly young Canadians. Those are Canadians who have not received a voter information card to give them basic information about where, when and how to cast a ballot. That is certainly an area of priority for us.

As Ms. Torosian has explained, we also support groups by providing information on the voting process to groups that work with Canadians who face barriers, and those include young Canadians.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Perrault.

Through you, Madam Chair, to Mr. Perrault, what kinds of barriers do 18-year-olds face when it comes to voting in their first election?

[Stéphane Perrault]

Mainly, and I'll ask Ms. Torosian to complete this, they face informational barriers about the voting process. This is something that is foreign to them, and they're not used to it. They don't know how it works and they don't have the same level of understanding about the process as other Canadians.