My recommendation was to ensure that the hundred signatures that are currently required—it's fewer for some of the remote ridings, the low-density ridings—be unique signatures. I believe that is the philosophy of the legislation, though not the letter: that a person who endorses the nomination of a candidate endorses the nomination of that particular candidate and not just any candidate, whoever that candidate may be. I believe that the approach of the longest ballot committee signatories is that they endorse anybody and everybody who wishes to be part of the long ballot initiative, so I don't think that's aligned with the spirit of the legislation.
I also caution, however, that, should it be implemented, the requirement to have unique signatures should be something that may carry a fine. For example, it could be a few hundred or a few thousand dollars, but it should not be cause to invalidate a nomination. The candidate, a good-faith candidate, would not know that somebody has signed on to somebody else's nomination paper. The last thing we would want is returning officers having to verify 100 signatures and to chase down the potential double signatures, which may be in good faith—they may be somebody who was confused, wanted to be supportive or didn't understand the rules. However, we certainly don't want a candidate nomination to be questioned just because one of the hundred names happened to be on somebody else's nomination paper as well.
My recommendation was that there be a prohibition on double signatures and a prohibition on inducing or encouraging people to do that, accompanied by sanctions—again, it could be a fine—but without such a rule invalidating the nomination of any candidate, unless the candidate did the inducing himself or herself.