Mr. Speaker, the debate today is extraordinarily important because it is about democracy and about the confidence Canadians have in their electoral system. During the debate we perhaps should remind ourselves that our proximity to the United States makes us forget that we already have done the most important thing in terms of election financing rules in this country, which is to limit the amount that we can spend in election campaigns.
When I was at the Woodrow Wilson school in Washington and heard about the problems women were having in running for political office, I realized that they had to raise millions of dollars for one candidate to run. My immediate reaction was that they should just change the rules and put a ceiling on the amount that can be spent in an election campaign. That would give them an even playing field, allow real democracy to take place and allow people of all walks of life to run for political office.
If part of the bill does deal with the perception problem, that money does buy influence, then we must correct that impression. We need to make the system as good as it can be. Good governance to me and to one of my heroes, Ursula Franklin, is that it must be fair, transparent and take people seriously. Ursula has said that if we do not have transparency in our small organizations, whether it is on the boards of our day care or our church, how can people expect us to apply it to government? Obviously, as one of the organizations that is most important to democracy, we must have transparency in political parties.
I believe the democratic deficit in the country is evident in four ways. One is parliamentary reform and our ability to listen to citizens between elections in terms of democracy and in terms of the resources with which to do that. Another is party reform. The final one, which we are dealing with today, is electoral reform, the financing of elections.
I think it is a game to talk about our proximity to the United States when we actually have to remind ourselves that some of those congressmen and senators spend more than half of their time raising money every week just to keep afloat. We are hugely blessed in Canada that we actually get to do our job every day and that fundraising becomes a small part of our jobs.
People must remember that if I were only allowed to spend about $60,000 in an election campaign that would have little influence on the way I voted. I have to believe that if I were not able to raise the $60,000 from the people who gave it to me the last time that I could easily go out and raise the $60,000 from a new group of people who believed in the principles on which I stood.
However it is important for people to think so and that we are doing everything possible to make it happen. I think the idea of the ceiling is still the most important thing and that we must do everything to make sure it is always preserved.
The second most important thing would have to be transparency. We must ensure that the transparency provisions in the bill are not diminished. If George Bush can put his receipted donations on the web within 48 hours of them being received, then we should not be settling for anything less. People must know immediately who is contributing to our elected representatives.
The third issue has to be the sources of the money. We again must bear true vigilance to what is happening south of the border with the Bush political action committees. As we say, if we block the toothpaste coming out of the tube we need to know where all the little pin holes are. Therefore, before we stop something we need to make sure that we have anticipated how people will get around it in order to have the influence that they think they want to have.
I have some concerns, even though the bill is spectacular in what it does for all of us in getting rid of unreceipted money in the politics of Canada. Full disclosure is an important step to deal with all aspects of political financing.
For all donations over $200 to have to be disclosed, whether that is for riding associations, nomination races, candidates' elections or leadership races, this is a hugely important initiative that the women's caucus had felt very strongly about, indeed, back to the Lortie commission, where we understood that money and nomination fights were the most important barriers to women running for office. Having no unreceipted donations to political campaigns will deal extraordinarily well with the transparency issue and I think will serve to reduce the inequities. Women candidates have traditionally had much greater trouble raising unreceipted dollars. The idea that this then brings it in under the scrutiny of the chief electoral officer I think is extraordinarily important, and in terms of the enforcement of these rules, I think it is extraordinarily important too.
In regard to the bill proposing a limit on the amount of money that could be spent in a nomination fight, we have some concerns. We in the Liberal women's caucus have suggested that it should be about 10% to 15% of what could be spent on an election. The bill puts it at 50%. We think this is still too high, although we do have to acknowledge the fact that this now would be receipted dollars, which would help a little bit. However, it would mean that in my riding $30,000 would be spent on a nomination fight and I think that is still too high.
I think that the limits on individual donations up to $10,000 and corporations up to $1,000, only to ridings, even though there are strict anti-avoidance penalties, do not prevent executive and board members from giving as individuals. It just prevents them from being reimbursed from their unions, companies or associations. I am worried that this would lead to lesser transparency, as the Elections Canada donor list would then list only the individual names and not the companies they work for or the associations they belong to. I have heard certain concerns raised by some forensic accountants that this may create more problems than it would solve. I think it is important that we move to this way of more individual support for political parties, but I do think that blurring what used to be transparent political donations, and now burying them under business expenses, is very difficult for Revenue Canada or Elections Canada to trace.
What we want is real time transparency. We are concerned that other third party contributions are not capped, other than during elections, and now in terms of the issue at the Supreme Court.
We worry that this may mean that organizations and individuals can unduly advertise and have influence on behalf of a political party without the scrutiny of Elections Canada. In fact, last month there was a full page ad taken in The Globe and Mail by Tom Caldwell, whose son happens to have been an Alliance candidate in the last election. That full page ad criticizing one party and supporting another party is indeed $33,000 that does not show up anywhere in this particular legislation.
I think that in the greater public funding of elections the $1.50 per vote obtained in the election is a good idea. I think people certainly have recourse in terms of what some of my constituents have expressed in not wanting any of their money to go to the Alliance Party or the Bloc Québécois in particular, but they certainly can give up to $10,000 to remediate that problem, as was pointed out by the Prime Minister last week.
I think the process and the timing of these reforms are very important. If this indeed is a problem of perception of influence, we must hear from citizens about what they see as the problem and therefore be prepared to tailor the solutions. This is about government continuing to be relevant and responsive to their needs and concerns, and it is indeed about regaining the trust and confidence of Canadians in our electoral system and the way that our political parties are financed.