Procedure and House Affairs Committee on May 5th, 2022

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

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

I wasn't born, just so you know.

[Stéphane Perrault]

I can certainly provide the data that we have to the committee. There are ups and downs in voter trends in the various elections. There was an increase a few years ago in youth turnout, and then a bit of a decline after that, but I'd be happy, Madam Chair, to provide the data to the committee.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Thank you. We look forward to that.

Mr. Steinley, the next five minutes are for you.

[Warren Steinley, Conservative, Regina—Lewvan, SK]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair, and thank you to the witnesses for being here. I'm going to follow up on some of the questions by my colleague Tom Kmiec.

We're getting the boundary redistribution reports, the original proposals. There seems to be a delay because they have to be translated into French. Is that one of the delays? We've heard that some should be out, but it has taken a bit more time. Is there an issue with getting the translations done in a timely manner?

[Stéphane Perrault]

I've not been informed of any problems. Obviously translation takes a bit of time. I've not been informed of concerns, but I will follow up on that if there are any concerns or issues regarding translation. Obviously the reports do need to be provided in both languages for public consultation as part of the normal process.

[Warren Steinley, Conservative, Regina—Lewvan, SK]

Would that be at an additional cost? You talked about the budget already, so was that cost for the translations built into the budget you received last year, or is it in this budget coming forward?

[Stéphane Perrault]

Again, the costs of the redistribution process are paid out of the statutory authority. There's a planned expense, but it can vary, and should it cost more, then we can vary the expenditures.

My role in that is to certify that the expenses incurred by the commissions are properly related to their work, and once that is done, they are paid. There is no requirement to seek additional funding to cover their costs.

[Warren Steinley, Conservative, Regina—Lewvan, SK]

Thank you very much.

I'm going to ask a question related to my NDP colleague's comments on changes in the age of voting.

From an election readiness standpoint, if you had to add, say, two million more voters to the voter list and registry, what would that look like? Does the organization have to scale up for that? How long would the process take to ensure that we get everything in order and have those voters added to the voter list? What would that look like from your organizational standpoint, and would you need to scale up staff and a few other extra resources?

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Mr. Steinley, I want to remind you that comments are made through the chair.

It's always good to have you here.

Go ahead, Mr. Perrault.

[Stéphane Perrault]

I'd be happy to come back and give this some more thought. I was not prepared to speak to this subject today.

Certainly, if you increase the population, you need to increase the number of polling divisions so that there's not an inordinate number of people in each poll and they'll be better served. There may be requirements to increase the number of staff, not at headquarters as much as in the field, to support that increased balance and so forth. We'd want to look at that carefully before providing a definite answer.

Processing any significant increase in the voter population requires additional work and resources.

[Warren Steinley, Conservative, Regina—Lewvan, SK]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I'll yield my time to Mrs. Block for the last minute and a half.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Yes, you have time. You have two minutes.

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Carlton Trail—Eagle Creek, SK]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

I'll give you three. Go for it.

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Carlton Trail—Eagle Creek, SK]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I have a number of questions that I would like to ask you, but I'm going to have to focus my attention on a couple of them.

Through you, Madam Chair, to the witnesses, I noted that in your departmental plan, you have outlined some of your priorities. One of the first ones that I wanted to ask you about was monitoring “the information environment in order to identify security issues that could prevent the agency from delivering on any part of its mandate or that would impact electoral integrity”.

What you see as the major threats? What are the major threats to your agency and your ability to deliver on your mandate?

[Stéphane Perrault]

Leaving aside cybersecurity here, we're basically talking about two things in monitoring the information environment.

The most important one on an ongoing basis is disinformation or misinformation about the process. This is particularly acute around the election period, but we monitor it on an ongoing basis, and where appropriate, we take action to reach out to the platforms so that they can react based on their policies. There's the misinformation on the voting process, and I insist on that.

The other aspect is during an election. What we saw, unfortunately, in the last election was an increase of incidents of violence or abuse vis-à-vis poll workers. That is quite unfortunate. We had over 100 instances in which police had to intervene. These are ordinary Canadians serving their neighbours. We've seen instances that were quite disheartening in that regard. We need to be alert to that and monitor it to get some signals as to whether instances could happen, whether additional security is required and whether police forces need to be informed of that.

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Carlton Trail—Eagle Creek, SK]

If I may, I have another question, through you, Madam Chair.

In addition to the priorities that you've outlined, you also state that Elections Canada intends to adopt a “hybrid and flexible work model” that would allow employees to work remotely. I completely understand that during the pandemic, work models needed to change in order to allow people to work from home.

Could you describe for us the model prior to the pandemic, and what the gains may be in moving toward a permanent flexible work model?

[Stéphane Perrault]

Until the pandemic, everybody working at headquarters was working from 30 Victoria Street in Gatineau. There was the possibility on an individual basis of asking for telework arrangements, but these were quite exceptional. To be quite frank, they were not in the culture of this organization much more than in any organization.

What we realized during the pandemic, after some initial adjustments, was that in fact the telework mode functions quite well for us. Over 90% of our workforce wished to continue to work remotely. Some have since moved during the pandemic to other locations, and are fully engaged in the work of the agency. We were able to deliver this election working pretty much entirely remotely. There were a handful of people at headquarters during the election. The rest were working remotely. It works quite well to engage remotely, whether you're in, for example, call centres or a task force.

That creates a lot of flexibility for recruitment. We are in a tight labour market. Young Canadians want that flexibility. We believe we can offer a very dynamic workplace with the hybrid model. We are fully embracing that.

Madam Chair, the additional point I would make is that in every election cycle, we spend a fair amount of time, effort and money—because we ramp up the workforce—finding space and setting up cubicles, desks, chairs and computers and then securing the lines. We talked about the security of those. We do that about a year before the election and carry it afterward, because closing an election takes about a year. For almost three years, we're in a ramped-up mode. Then we go down. Then we start searching again for space. It's expensive and it's not efficient.

We're not going to do that anymore. We can save quite a bit of money by having everybody work from home during the election, as we did in this election.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Thank you.

Mr. Turnbull is next.

[Ryan Turnbull, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

Madam Chair, thank you very much.

Mr. Perrault, to you and your team, thanks for being here. As always, it's great to see you, talk to you and get a chance to ask you some questions.

I've heard throughout our conversation today two themes that I want to focus on: security and public trust.

I have a concern with the rise of misinformation and disinformation. I believe it has the potential to harm and is harming the public trust in our democratic institutions and in fact in our electoral process.

Do you share my concern, Mr. Perrault, through the chair?

[Stéphane Perrault]

Madam Chair, as I have indicated, the issue of misinformation and disinformation has been a concern of the agency for several years now. It's certainly not declining. It's a much broader issue than the electoral process.

My role is limited in that regard, but certainly it impacts democracy and society in a broader way. These issues go beyond Elections Canada, but in terms of my mandate, this is something that we feel is important and that we need to address.

[Ryan Turnbull, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Perrault.

Through you, Madam Chair, I want to follow up on that. When you appeared here in February, along with me and other members of Parliament on the committee, you expressed some deep concerns that have emerged over the last two elections. In one of your last comments, I think you alluded to the increased incidence of violence and hate and the level of vitriol. We've seen it for candidates and volunteers. Obviously, it's increased for election workers or poll workers as well.

It seems like the vitriol, hate and conspiracy theories are contributing and becoming more mainstream in Canadian politics. I think it's really eroding the quality of our political discourse. I note that recent polls at the Université de Sherbrooke show that a growing number of Canadians are falling victim to online conspiracy theories. Another researcher at Queen's University, a professor who studies extremism, says that the number is massive and absolutely surprising and worrying.

The consequence during an election campaign could be extremely serious. Well-funded groups can spread disinformation and hatred, and they are influencing a growing number of Canadians through well-organized disinformation campaigns.

I don't want to suggest that it's solely up to Elections Canada to deal with this issue. I don't believe that, and I don't think anyone here would imply that. I just think that Elections Canada does have a role to play in combatting this, certainly around elections. We don't want to see it rise to a point that it erodes the public trust in our democratic institutions, which are so foundational.

Could you update the committee on the progress being made at Elections Canada to combat this type of behaviour during election campaigns? Have you asked for additional funds that would help you address this?

[Stéphane Perrault]

Thank you.

Madam Chair, I have not asked for additional funds. We do have a capacity. We've built a team over the years. We do rely to a certain degree on our statutory authority. It's an example of how useful it is to ramp up our capacity to monitor disinformation during election time.

I will be coming back to the whole issue of communications in my recommendations report. Our regime of communications under the Elections Act has been focusing primarily on advertising, because when the act was first enacted many years ago, that was the main means of communication during the campaign—apart, of course, from door-to-door knocking. Now there are many other ways to communicate during an election. I think the rules need to be adjusted to reflect that reality.

I will have some recommendations in that regard, particularly to increase the transparency of electoral campaign communications, not just by candidates and parties but by third parties as well. There will be recommendations regarding the funding of third parties.

This is one aspect, as you indicated, of a much broader issue.

[Ryan Turnbull, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

Thank you.

Mr. Perrault—through you, Madam Chair—the last time you were here, I asked you about the issue of hate groups and the potential for them to register as political parties in order to get privileged access to important legitimate tools for political parties, such as tax rebates and the list of electors, which is deeply concerning.

In response, you had said that there may be mechanisms that we can put forward that would at least allow us some safeguards against hate groups getting access to those privileges. Could you just update us on any progress that has been made on that front?