House of Commons Hansard #106 of the 35th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was election.

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Canada Elections ActGovernment Orders

12:15 p.m.

The Deputy Speaker

I declare the motion carried.

(Motion agreed to.)

The House resumed from November 22, 1996, consideration of Bill C-63, an act to amend the Elections Act and the Referendum Act, as reported (with amendments) from the committee, and of the motions in Group No. 3.

Canada Elections ActGovernment Orders

12:15 p.m.

Bloc

François Langlois Bloc Bellechasse, QC

Mr. Speaker, the motions in Group No. 3 concerning Bill C-63, an act to amend the Elections Act and the Referendum Act, were considered briefly on Friday.

As agreed, the hon. members for Stormont-Dundas, Calgary West and Kootenay East had the opportunity to speak at that time to help set the debate in context.

Mr. Speaker, I suggest the debate be adjourned at leisure so we have a chance to concentrate on the debate.

Canada Elections ActGovernment Orders

1 p.m.

The Deputy Speaker

The hon. member for Bellechasse has a point of order.

Canada Elections ActGovernment Orders

1 p.m.

Bloc

François Langlois Bloc Bellechasse, QC

Mr. Speaker, until such time as we can have an intelligent debate, I suggest the debate be adjourned at leisure.

Canada Elections ActGovernment Orders

1 p.m.

The Deputy Speaker

My colleagues, could private conversations please continue outside the House? I thank the hon. member for bringing this matter to my attention.

Canada Elections ActGovernment Orders

1 p.m.

Bloc

François Langlois Bloc Bellechasse, QC

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, but not for reasserting your authority, because it took less than 15 seconds to show that you were still in control.

We made progress in the debate last Friday, and the motion of the hon. member for Beauséjour, which was just agreed to, will enable us to proceed much faster, perhaps even too fast for our taste. As I indicated on Friday, there is something basically reprehensible in rushing through an amendment to the elections act. The members who will take a second look at this bill will, of course, have to take into account the circumstances of its passage.

The substance of the bill may be debated and debatable, but its form is essentially out of bounds because, in my opinion, this debate has been flawed from the start. I will address this point in my remarks at third reading.

As for polling stations' hours of operation, last spring, the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs examined various scenarios put forward and explained by Elections Canada before the committee.

Subsequently, this House passed and referred to the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs a bill proposed by the hon. member for Vancouver East and concerning polling hours, Bill C-307. I listened carefully to what the hon. member for Stormont-Dundas and the hon. member for Calgary West said about polling hours. If we look again at Elections Canada's scenarios in the official report, we can see that this proposal does not fit in with any of the scenarios in question.

This is a sui generis proposal that the government came up with and was even forced to amend at report stage, because it was not given enough thought.

Motion No. 21 proposed by the hon. member for Calgary West would extend polling hours, particularly in Alberta and British Columbia. Allowing polling stations to close at 8 p.m. instead of7 p.m. would protect what can be considered the golden hours, that is, the hours during which those who are allowed to vote can do so. This is a very important time of the day, a time when election organizations get people to come out and vote.

Having polling stations close at 7 p.m. in certain regions of the country seems to me to be extremely early. On Friday, the hon. member for Kootenay East stated his views in a very objective fashion on this legislation, which should not be subject to partisanship in any case. It is only because of the government's haste if the debate has now become a partisan exercise, although we, on this side, are trying to remain as objective as possible.

The hon. member for Kootenay East said on Friday that the problem is essentially a matter of perception, since all votes in Canada, whether in St. John's, Newfoundland, or in Langley, British Columbia, carry the same weight. This is true. It is also true that the feeling of alienation felt by many western Canadians is due to the fact that when the media can begin broadcasting the results, the outcome is already decided, regardless of how they vote. Central Canada, in which 176 ridings will be contested in the next election, will probably seal the fate of this whole exercise. The fact remains that all votes are equal, but I can understand the perception

explained by the hon. member for Kootenay East. Therefore, the amendment proposed by the hon. member for Calgary West would help improve the situation.

However, the member for Calgary West goes a lot further. He proposes that section 160 of the Canada Elections Act be amended so that the counting of the ballots would start at the same time everywhere in Canada. Whether in Newfoundland or in British Columbia, the counting of the ballots would begin at the same time, which means that people in Newfoundland would have to wait about an hour and half before starting to count the votes.

In the best of all possible worlds, the proposal by the hon. member for Calgary West that the count take place at the same time would of course be extremely interesting. If people did not have to sleep, eat, go to work the next morning, and so on, having the count at the same time would be a definite advantage.

However, we do not live in the best of all possible worlds. We live in a world where compromises must be made. One such compromise could be to adopt Motion No. 21 of the member for Calgary West, but drop the other motion calling for an amendment to section 160 of the Elections Act, so that the count could take place immediately after polling stations officially close in a given province. This is what the official opposition will be favouring with respect to hours and count.

The official opposition presented its own amendment, Motion No. 22, asking that the four-hour period voters now have in which to vote be maintained. We are essentially proposing that these four hours be maintained, by saying: "employers must ensure that eligible employees are allowed at least four hours". This would be better than giving them only three hours.

It must be borne in mind that, under the government bill, polling stations would close at 7 p.m., Pacific time, and voters would have only three consecutive hours in which to vote. The four hours that have been traditional in Canadian history for years would disappear with this amendment to the Canada Elections Act regarding the number of consecutive hours required and allowed.

I do not think it is a move in the right direction to shorten the period allowed by one hour. It is true that if polling stations in central Canada have to close at 9.30 p.m., it becomes academic whether three or four hours are allowed. But it is with these two extremely important factors in mind, that is, the local time at which polling stations close and the effective period of time people have in which to vote, that the official opposition has presented Motion No. 22, so as to ensure that voters from coast to coast have the benefit of four hours.

This concludes my remarks on the third group of motions.

Canada Elections ActGovernment Orders

1:05 p.m.

Reform

Jack Frazer Reform Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC

Mr. Speaker, I do not think anyone really opposes the concept of reducing the election period from 47 days to 36 days in principle, although I have some specific examples of problems this can create which I will get into a little later.

With regard to the Group No. 3 motions, I refer first to Motion No. 5 proposed by the government which would make it possible for the chief electoral officer to extend the voting hours from the current 11 hours to 12 hours. We consider that this extension is costly and unnecessary and really does not achieve any particular purpose. We would suggest that the 11 hours currently laid aside for Canadians to vote is adequate. Therefore this motion is not required and we will oppose it.

With regard to the staggered voting hours across the country, as a parochial British Columbian representative, I contend that the change in the voting hours to close the polls on the west coast or in British Columbia at 7 p.m. does not do justice to the British Columbian voters and those in the Yukon. A lot of people, because of their occupations and their location away from their voting stations on voting day, tend to exercise their vote at the end of the day. Therefore the rescinding of that last hour from 7 p.m. to 8 p.m. would impact dynamically on the vote.

In my own constituency it is quite common for 87 per cent or more of the voters to come out to vote. I suspect that if this particular motion is carried we will see a lower turn out. I do not think this is what was intended by the electorate.

Alternatives were proposed that would allow for the voting to be substantially the same as it is now but that would provide for the avoidance of the perception on the west coast, or in the west for that matter, that the decisions were already taken and the government was chosen and formed before it came to voting at that time. No one to my knowledge has been able to assess the impact on the western voters of knowledge of what the eastern vote has been.

Whether people would say that the government has been formed and they are going to vote against that government or that the government has been formed and they want to vote for that government so that there is government representation out there, I do not know. However, I suspect that it does have an impact and that this should be avoided.

My own personal preference would be to have the voting hours remain exactly as they are now but to delay the count of the vote and have the count occur simultaneously. This might mean starting the count of the vote the following day. Understandably this might not sit well with the election committees, campaign workers and

so on because they get all hyped up on the day of the vote and they want to know what happened.

I submit that the purpose of an election is to select a government. It is a very important purpose which should be an overriding concern in the election process. Therefore I think it makes eminent good sense for the ballots to be taken on one day but to be counted simultaneously across the country the following day.

As I mentioned earlier, the reduction of the electoral period from 47 to 36 days with its commensurate saving of money and of the campaigning that people perhaps tire of during the actual election campaign are pretty good. There is a lot of substantiation for that. However we do feel that it would impact negatively on byelections.

For instance it is within the power of the government to make a byelection happen by virtue of promoting a member of Parliament from this House to the other place. The government would thereby have an advantage in that it would know when and in which area that is going to happen. This would leave the opposition parties and the independents scrambling to try to make up for lost time. That might not be possible.

I also think that the reduction to a 36-day election period impacts rather negatively on geographically large ridings. Obviously there is a lot more territory to cover. The residents are dispersed and for an individual candidate to get around to visit those areas takes more time than in a congested urban area.

As an example, there are 14 large northern ridings which would be so affected. They include Skeena, B.C., Prince George-Peace River, B.C., Peace River, Alberta, Athabasca, Alberta, Churchill River, Saskatchewan, Churchill, Saskatchewan, Kenora-Rainy River, Ontario, Timmins-James Bay, Ontario, Abitibi, Quebec, Manicouagan, Quebec, Labrador, Newfoundland; Yukon, Western Arctic and Nunavut. All would be dramatically affected by the reduction of the campaign time from 47 to 36 days.

Perhaps there is some way to overcome this. However, it is important that this be remembered and taken into consideration when the election act is being changed.

It is vitally important that we also remember that the government has rather pushed this thing through. If I was a suspicious individual I might think there was subterfuge here, a dateline it wanted to meet in order to call an election. But that may not be the case.

One thing which was not considered and which should have been considered in the bill is the idea of a fixed election day. The Prime Minister in the Canadian Parliament has a tremendous amount of power in that it is his choice when Canadians go to the polls to select a new government. He can choose a propitious time for the polls, choose a time when people are distracted elsewhere. It gives him tremendous power.

I think that for the good of the country we should consider and perhaps institute a fixed election date. Of course, Reform would advocate that these election dates be every four years, on a specified date so that there is no doubt in anyone's mind when the next election is going to be.

I personally found it a little questionable in committee when the matter of allowing inmates to vote was raised. Granted, that is not a direct concern in this bill, but it was certainly discussed. It is unacceptable to me that an individual who has broken the law, been convicted and incarcerated that they should still have all the rights in elections as a normal, law-abiding citizen. I would think that anyone who is incarcerated after being convicted should forgo the privilege and the honour of being able to vote until he or she has completed that sentence and thereby paid his or her debt to society.

We think it should be mandatory that in the case of a byelection that the Prime Minister's ability to control the agenda should be constrained. We suggest that when byelections are called they should take place within six months of a seat being vacated, rather than the current time which is pretty well open to the Prime Minister. This obviously leaves some constituencies without representation in the House while the seat is vacant. That is neither right nor appropriate in the democracy in which we live.

Another point which is worthy of consideration is that of requiring people to prove their identity, either when they register to vote or when they actually cast their ballot. The permanent list with which the bill is mainly concerned is made up of things like drivers' licences, birth certificates and so on. It seems to me that it would not be inappropriate for an individual to be required to prove to the registrar or to the voting official when he or she goes to vote, exactly who he or she is and that he or she has the right to cast a ballot to elect the next Government of Canada.

The truth is that in the present day electronic world in which we live there is no way that election results from the east will not get to the west, if they have been counted, before the polls in the west close. With E-mail and the Internet there is no question that this information will be transmitted, either via the United States or other countries. Therefore, no matter how carefully we control the vote, if the ballots are counted the results are going to be known very shortly thereafter.

In conclusion, I would say that Reform is not diametrically opposed to the concept of a 36-day election campaign as opposed to 47, but we do question the wisdom of running a separate enumeration, which is very expensive, outside the normal voting process. We would advocate that the next election campaign be the normal 47-day period and that the enumeration list compiled for the next election comprise the basis for the permanent list with

which this bill deals. We find the idea of having an enumeration in April unnecessary and expensive. It would be better to put it off to the normal election call.

Canada Elections ActGovernment Orders

1:20 p.m.

The Deputy Speaker

Is the House ready for the question?

Canada Elections ActGovernment Orders

1:20 p.m.

Reform

Val Meredith Reform Surrey—White Rock—South Langley, BC

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order.

Canada Elections ActGovernment Orders

1:20 p.m.

The Deputy Speaker

On debate?

Canada Elections ActGovernment Orders

1:20 p.m.

Reform

Val Meredith Reform Surrey—White Rock—South Langley, BC

On debate? Is it questions or comments?

Canada Elections ActGovernment Orders

1:20 p.m.

The Deputy Speaker

There are no questions or comments. The question has been called. Had the member who wishes to debate been out of the House?

Canada Elections ActGovernment Orders

1:20 p.m.

Reform

Val Meredith Reform Surrey—White Rock—South Langley, BC

Yes, Mr. Speaker, I want to speak.

Canada Elections ActGovernment Orders

1:20 p.m.

The Deputy Speaker

We normally extend courtesies to members. The question had been called. The hon. member, obviously, would like to speak to the issue. Accordingly, the Chair will give the hon. member the right to speak.

Canada Elections ActGovernment Orders

1:20 p.m.

Reform

Val Meredith Reform Surrey—White Rock—South Langley, BC

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. There was a slight bit of confusion. I stood when you were calling for debate. You were looking over to the side and did not notice me. I appreciate you recognizing me.

I would like to speak on behalf of British Columbians and I do not necessarily agree with my colleague.

This bill proposes to stagger the times that the polling stations are open. I do agree with my hon. colleague who just spoke that staggered times would not be conducive to the voter in British Columbia if the polls are closed at seven o'clock as opposed to eight o'clock.

Most of the people who live in the constituency of Surrey-White Rock-South Langley work in Vancouver. The commuting time from Vancouver to Surrey-White Rock-South Langley is anywhere from one hour to an hour and a half. Many people work in businesses which are open from nine to five. However, some people work until 6.30 p.m. or 7 p.m. to miss the rush hour traffic. They would not have the opportunity to exercise their right to vote. It would be terribly unfair to the constituents in my riding who commute to Vancouver. Closing the polls an hour before the normal time would be an undue hardship to them.

I know some allowance was made in the bill to change the number of hours, but I believe it was to reduce the number of hours that an individual could take off from business to make sure they were back at their place of residence for voting. On that point I would agree with my hon. colleague from Saanich-Gulf Islands. However, I do not think the object is to count the votes the next day. It is unfair to Canadians to expect them to vote and then wait for 24 hours before finding out the results of their voting privilege.

I do feel that allowances can be made to stagger the hours, keep the voting hours in British Columbia with the polls closing at eight, but perhaps the votes could be counted at a later date. With modern technology in voting where the votes are actually counted at the same time as the ballot is deposited, or at least they were in the municipal election, there is no reason why the results of those votes taken could not be released at a reasonable time in the evening even though the polls might close at eight o'clock in British Columbia.

Perhaps opening the polls later in the morning in the maritimes would not be as a great a hardship to the voters as it would be closing the polls earlier in British Columbia.

The cost of having an enumeration will be there, whether it is done in April or laterally when the election call comes. I think it is important to have a permanent voters' list for convenience sake and even just for accuracy. This is a very important issue that has to be addressed.

If the time is taken at enumeration to clarify the people who have the right to vote and are duly Canadian citizens is followed through on a permanent list, the end result is that people who have a legitimate right to vote and who are Canadian citizens and exercise their vote would probably clarify a lot of confusion come election day across the country.

In my riding, election day poses numerous problems because of the large number of new immigrants who are coming to the lower mainland area. They do not understand that in order to exercise their right to vote they must be Canadian citizens.

I also believe that having a permanent voters' list will make it much easier for new immigrants who do take Canadian citizenship to be added to that voters' list in a manner that is efficient and up to date. That would certainly solve a lot of the confusion that happens when we try to rush through citizenships in order to allow people to have the vote. That process is often looked on with a little bit of misunderstanding and sometimes suspicion.

If we have a permanent voters' list, one that has been updated in a routine fashion, those kinds of situations where one brings to question why things are being done would not be quite so blatant.

The concept of a permanent voters' list is a good one. Staggered voting hours are reasonable but the times could be put into effect that would respect the needs of the various regions of the country. I certainly believe this legislation goes in the right direction but still could be improved.

Canada Elections ActGovernment Orders

1:25 p.m.

The Deputy Speaker

Is the House ready for the question?

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1:25 p.m.

Some hon. members

Question.

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1:25 p.m.

The Deputy Speaker

The vote is on Motion No. 5 in GroupNo. 3. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

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1:25 p.m.

Some hon. members

Agreed.

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1:25 p.m.

Some hon. members

No.

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1:25 p.m.

The Deputy Speaker

All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.

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1:25 p.m.

Some hon. members

Yea.

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1:25 p.m.

The Deputy Speaker

All those opposed will please say nay.

Canada Elections ActGovernment Orders

1:25 p.m.

Some hon. members

Nay.