Previously, there were elections in one quarter of municipalities every year. I'm sure you remember that, Mr. Laframboise, from the time when you were mayor and President of the Union des municipalités du Québec. One day, the government changed the rules. Now all the elections are held at the same time in every municipality. In some cases, for 45 days prior to the elections, the municipal council cannot take any action whatsoever, except in emergencies. During the election period, no decisions are made.
When the new council is in place, even if the former council has been re-elected, a week or two is needed to count votes, as the case may be, swear in new council members and appoint new executive committee members in the large cities. All of that leads to delay. After that, the work starts up again. Overall, this makes for a period of between six and eight weeks which is not particularly useful. It is in terms of the democratic value of the process, but not as far as the conduct and continuation of programs are concerned. If that is not taken into account, Quebec will be penalized because it chose to hold elections in 2009. However, that was prescribed by legislation.