Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Oct. 21st, 2025

[The Chair, Liberal, Chris Bittle]

I call this meeting to order.

Welcome to meeting number seven of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. Pursuant to Standing Order 108(3), the committee is meeting in public on the actions of the longest ballot committee in recent Canadian elections.

Today’s meeting is taking place in a hybrid format, pursuant to the Standing Orders. Members are attending in person in the room and remotely using the Zoom application.

Before we continue, I would ask all in-person participants to consult the guidelines written on the back of the cards on the table. These measures are in place to help prevent audio feedback incidents and protect the health and safety of all participants, including the interpreters. There is a QR code on the card, which will lead you to an awareness video.

I remind you, although we have experienced witnesses here, that all comments should be addressed through the chair. For members in the room, if you wish to speak, raise your hand. There are no members on Zoom, but if anyone comes in, they should raise their hand on Zoom.

I would like to welcome our witnesses. We have Jean-Pierre Kingsley, who was the Chief Electoral Officer of Canada from 1990 to 2007. From Élections Québec, we have Jean-François Blanchet, the Chief Electoral Officer of Quebec.

I will turn to Monsieur Blanchet for five minutes.

[Jean-François Blanchet, Chief Electoral Officer of Quebec, Élections Québec]

Mr. Chair, ladies and gentlemen of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, thank you for inviting me to take part in the discussions on the actions of the longest ballot committee.

As Chief Electoral Officer of Quebec, I am responsible, among other things, for holding and organizing provincial elections. My mandate also includes investigating, prosecuting and monitoring the financing of political parties.

At the provincial election level, we have not experienced this type of situation.

I will therefore share with you my observations regarding the events that occurred at the federal election level. I will also share my concerns and the recommendations I will be making on this subject before the Commission des institutions du Québec, which I did last April and will do again.

At the next meeting of the advisory committee, to be held after the upcoming provincial elections, I will have another opportunity to make these recommendations. The work of this committee, which I chair and coordinate, is aimed at obtaining the views of elected officials on issues relating to the Elections Act.

I followed the federal elections with great interest, particularly with regard to the issue of multiple candidacies, which is part of a movement to challenge the voting system.

Like you, I have seen the number of candidates on the ballot reach 40 in Mississauga—Lakeshore in 2022, 91 in Lasalle—Émard—Verdun in 2024, and 214 in Battle River—Crowfoot in 2025.

I ask you this: Should election administrators be concerned about this movement?

In my opinion, the answer is yes. We have at least two good reasons to be concerned about these activities, whose main objective is to challenge the voting system, not to get candidates elected.

The first reason is that these actions interfere with the conduct of elections. They even irritate voters.

As you know, overly long ballots require special logistics to fold and unfold the ballot papers, to fit them into the ballot box, to determine the number of ballot boxes needed and to count the ballots. This lengthens the electoral process unnecessarily.

I would like to take this opportunity to commend the remarkable work and patience of the polling staff.

As election administrators, we must provide exemplary service to all voters. This service must be simple, fast and efficient.

The second reason is that these actions complicate the voting process for electors, who must identify the candidate of their choice among dozens of candidates.

As election administrators, we must ensure that voting remains accessible to everyone who is eligible to vote, including seniors, persons with disabilities and illiterate persons.

Currently, Quebec’s Election Act does not have any measures in place to effectively address this problem.

I believe that electoral laws should provide for a mechanism to limit the number of nominations filed for the sole purpose of making the ballot as long as possible.

Possible solutions exist, and some solutions are already being implemented in other Canadian electoral administrations. Here are a few examples: prohibiting voters from supporting more than one candidate; increasing the number of supporting signatures required on the nomination paper; and requiring a deposit to run for office.

For my part, my recommendation, which I reiterate before you, is to prohibit a person from being the official agent of more than one candidate in the same electoral district. Each candidate should find their own official agent, which would demonstrate the seriousness of their intention to run for office.

This prohibition would be easier to enforce than prohibiting a voter from supporting more than one candidate, for example.

In closing, Mr. Chair, I would like to thank you once again for this invitation to take part in the discussions. They are necessary to ensure the integrity of elections and to maintain the confidence of electors.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank the returning officers and their teams, the municipal election chairpersons and all the polling staff who make these democratic exercises possible.

I will be happy to answer your questions.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Chris Bittle]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Kingsley, you have the floor for five minutes.

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley, Chief Electoral Officer of Canada from 1990 to 2007, As an Individual]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Esteemed committee members, I appreciate your kind invitation. It remains a privilege for me to appear before the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, which I have been doing with great pleasure since 1990.

I had the opportunity to review the testimony of Ms. Holly Ann Garnett and Stéphane Perrault, Chief Electoral Officer.

I should now like to elaborate on an interview that I gave to The Globe and Mail on the topic before your committee.

Not only is the long ballot initiative unjustified, in my view, but it is also exceedingly disruptive to the act of voting, with very important consequences, to which I shall allude.

Elections are the process whereby the very legitimacy of Parliament, the very legitimacy of the members of Parliament, you, is established. That's how we establish how we govern ourselves, and we must do so not only legally, but with legitimacy.

In Canada, there is only one definition of an elector, and everyone has the right to vote, except the Chief Electoral Officer in a federal election. From coast to coast to coast, there's only one definition. Every elector faces the same process when there is a general election, when they appear to vote in person. They also face the same process if they vote in advance polls or by mail-in ballot. It is the same procedure for everyone in the same circumstance.

The long ballot initiative vitiates that fundamental rule. I agree with my colleague Monsieur Blanchet, who just spoke about the disruption that has on people who vote.

We vote for many things when we vote for a candidate, and that process has to be as simple as possible—and we have made it as simple as possible in this country. We don't vote, generally, for other levels of government. We don't vote for referendums at the same time. That's why that very gesture has to be protected.

The difficulties for electors were alluded to, and I agree with them entirely. The difficulties for election administrators, I concur with as well. I will mention a few to highlight them.

You need more ballot boxes. The handling of a ballot by the electoral officials is rendered much more difficult, to the point that the Chief Electoral Officer had to design a new mode of voting at the last election in Battle River—Crowfoot. I think we forget that electoral workers work a 15-hour day, and these are people who usually don't work at all, who are called upon to do an incredible service for one day.

As for the rationale of the instigators of this initiative, who say that it should be a citizens' assembly that should be forwarding this and that MPs should not have the right to establish their own conditions of elections, I say that there exist means already under the Canada Elections Act to bring forth the proposal. If it's proportional representation, bring it forth to the electoral system as it exists, because the opportunities are there.

You can join an existing party that has, as its platform, something you feel very concerned about. You can create a political party. There were some 200 candidates in the riding I just mentioned in Alberta. With 30 more, you could have made yourself into a political party with one candidate. If you really feel strongly about something, field more candidates with that same party. That's what you need to do.

If you want to do a citizens' assembly, get citizens organized and call it an assembly, if that is important to you. In a democracy, change requires work; it is not handed to you on a plate. It is more difficult to change a law than to protect it as it exists, because it was enacted by people who represented the people. That's how it was passed initially.

In terms of recommendations for change, I agree that the signatory should sign for only one candidate. That's clear. In the place in the form where citizens attest to supporting a candidate, the form should say that they are supporting only one candidate. I want them to understand the import of what they are doing when they're signing that form. I don't want it at the top of the form; I want it in every box that has a signature coming to it, so that they don't say, “Well, I didn't see it, because it was at the top.” Have it under each signature.

As for official agents, there should be only one official agent per riding in an election. That's clear.

Another thing that I think has perhaps been overlooked over the years is the role of the witness. The witness is defined as—

[The Chair, Liberal, Chris Bittle]

Mr. Kingsley, can you wrap up? I gave you a bit more time for your opening statement.

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley]

Perhaps there will be a question about what the witness should do. I can take it very quickly.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley]

Look, the witness right now is anybody. The witness doesn't have to be a resident or an elector or 18 years of age or over. The witness should also be forced to sign their name over a statement that says, “I have exercised due diligence to verify each signature, and it's appropriate for this purpose.”

I'll deal with penalties if there are questions about penalties.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Chris Bittle]

Thank you so much.

We'll turn to the Conservatives.

Mr. Calkins has the floor for six minutes, please.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Ponoka—Didsbury, AB]

Thank you very much.

I think we'll get right to that question, Mr. Kingsley.

It's good to see you again. I might be the only one at the table who has been here.... You signed my first writ of return. It was from the 2006 election, which I think you oversaw, and it hangs in my office. I want to thank you for your years of service in overseeing Elections Canada for as long as you did.

I'm sure you've been watching the testimony here. I've advocated several different things. First of all, I thought the government of the day made a mistake in 2017 by not appealing the decision out of the Alberta court that removed the $1,000 bond. Given the shenanigans that have happened since that bond was removed, could I quickly get your thoughts on whether you think a case could be made to reinstate that bond?

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley]

I would hesitate to do $1,000, sir. If it has to be reinstated, it could be somewhere in the lower hundreds, to act as a kind of natural barrier, but $1,000 becomes substantial.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Ponoka—Didsbury, AB]

Okay. That was the argument made by Kieran Szuchewycz at the court. He made the case that it's there to protect the integrity of the election from frivolous candidates.

I would suggest to you that this is an orchestrated campaign by the longest ballot committee, which appears to be operating entirely in the structure of a political party. We've heard witnesses here say that it has central communications and that it knows how to play the game. It knows what it's doing, and they were running multiple candidates in one riding in several of the by-elections. They were also doing this during the general election.

If we're not going to have the bond, and if you think the bond should not be there, what's the number for the signatures, then? I would suggest to you that if it's 100.... The government of the day, in the last Parliament, suggested dropping that down to 75. How many are required? How many are sufficient? Is it 250? In places like Nunavut, or in places where there are a lot of small, remote and rural communities, it might be difficult to get those signatures in a certain amount of time.

Is that the solution?

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley]

In my view, the solution would be somewhere along the lines of what I recommended: You can only sign once.

In terms of numbers, I thought the number 100 did not create a problem in most ridings, and in the rural ones, it's 50 that are required.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Ponoka—Didsbury, AB]

That's right, but now, if you have 200 candidates, each with 50 signatures—and we've heard the current electoral officer say that it's hard to even find employees to work elections—how many more staff and resources would it take to cross-reference 200 candidates at 50 to 100 signatures apiece to make sure that they're all individual? That's a lot of bureaucracy, is it not?

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley]

I agree with you. That's why I'm saying that it should be that you can only sign once. With the recommendations I've made, if 100 people want to sign one another's documents, that wouldn't fly anymore.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Ponoka—Didsbury, AB]

Okay.

Mr. Blanchet and Mr. Kingsley, I think you've both said that a person should be an official agent in only one riding. That makes sense to me in terms of a by-election, but should you be allowed to be the official agent in 343 different electoral districts?

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley]

My answer would be no, because it's a ridiculous situation.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Ponoka—Didsbury, AB]

Yes, but you did—

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley]

It's ridiculous, so therefore—

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Ponoka—Didsbury, AB]

I'm just getting clarification, sir.

Should you be allowed to be the official agent for just one candidate, and one candidate only, for the entirety of the general election, or just for one candidate in a constituency during a general election?

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley]

The reason I did not elaborate on that is that I do not know what the practices are for political parties. I don't know if political parties favour one agent for a number of candidates, 10 or 15. I said I wasn't going to go there so that I wouldn't make a recommendation the consequences of which I do not understand.

Ideally, I would have no problem living with only one riding.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Ponoka—Didsbury, AB]

Mr. Blanchet, go ahead.

[Jean-François Blanchet]

Basically, the goal is for an official agent to be able to represent only one candidate per electoral district, which would not prevent them from representing candidates in other districts.

In Quebec, some parties have a single official agent for all 125 of their candidates.

However, it would be somewhat strange for a candidate in a federal election to be represented by an official agent acting on behalf of both the Liberal Party and the Conservative Party.

In Quebec, an official agent is not allowed to act on behalf of two political parties. This would therefore limit the role of the official agent to a single candidate per electoral district, which would not prevent him or her from representing a candidate in another electoral district.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Ponoka—Didsbury, AB]

Thank you very much.

I think I'm running out of time. For my last question, I'll go back to Mr. Kingsley.

I believe that it was a travesty of the election. The longest ballot committee's actions made a mockery of our election process.

Does the election law need to be changed? I asked Mr. Tomas Szuchewycz when he was here if he'd been reprimanded or charged or if he'd faced anything like that.

Should there be some provisions in the law for those who make a mockery of our electoral system?

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley]

Yes, there should be. The commissioner of Canada elections should determine whether it's a compliance agreement, a fine or a prosecution before the courts.

I will say one thing. If a candidate, whether elected or not, wilfully participated in this, I think the solution should be in a court of law before a judge in Canada.