Debates of June 18th, 2007

Canada Elections Act

[Blair Wilson, Liberal, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Mr. Speaker, most Canadians would agree with what the hon. member has mentioned. There is an expectation that identification be at a level acceptable to most Canadians.

At the same time, we have to remember we are in an evolving democracy. We have to move in stride with the way society moves forward. We have to be aware of the fact that there are certain segments of our society where obtaining identification is difficult. We have to understand and be compassionate about people in those situations and ensure that we do not disenfranchise them from the democratic process.

It is not as clear, cut and dry as the hon. member has tried to make it. There is a grey area and we have to ensure, as lawmakers, that we walk in a gradual step by step manner. We need to ensure we walk in tangent with society. At the same time, we need to ensure we provide some leadership as to where we will go. We have to ensure we make the system better than it was when we first started.

[Wayne Marston, NDP, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to hear the member opposite talk about the disenfranchising of some Canadians. A significant number of Canadians lack the identification and access to identification. We are very concerned in this party that we protect their rights.

We heard a member refer to voting as a privilege. In our country voting is a right and it is a right that we have to guarantee to each and every one of our citizens. Would the member agree that it is the responsibility of the government to ensure that everybody has the opportunity to exercise that right?

[Blair Wilson, Liberal, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Mr. Speaker, definitely voting is a right. Many of our grandfathers have died fighting for that right and maintaining it. As parliamentarians, we have to ensure we maintain the integrity of that right as Canadian citizens to vote in elections.

At the same time, we have to be cognizant of the fact that our society is evolving and things are changing. One of the ways it is changing, and we have yet to address it in Bill C-31, is we are becoming much more of a technological age now. This is something we have to be cognizant of when we discuss the future.

People are on the Internet on a daily basis. Other organizations are using the Internet to electronically vote. We have to be thinking ahead right ow at a time when possibly elections in Canada will be held electronically. We have to ensure we have systems in place to deal with that. One item in the bill, which anticipates that coming into phase, is having the unique identification number granted to each individual in Canada.

I am going out into the future here and thinking outside the box, but someday Parliament may decide that Canadian elections can be done over the Internet, if that is the will of the Canadian people and if it is something that will enhance the integrity of our system and help to increase voter turnout.

One of the things we notice right now is young people vote in a disproportionately lower number than those who are over 60 for example. We have to do whatever we can as parliamentarians to ensure we cast a big enough net to have everybody participate in the electoral system. Some of the things the bill would offer is anticipating the future of the Canadian electoral system.

[Pierre Paquette, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel.

We are presently discussing amendments made by the Senate to Bill C-31. I would like to start off by reminding members that although we agree with Bill C-31, we feel that the Senate amendments have scuttled the efforts made by all parties, in committee particularly, to find consensus. Therefore, the Bloc will oppose the government motion that includes the amendments made by the Senate, along with some welcome changes.

We were and we still are in favour of Bill C-31 as adopted here in the House, at all stages. For the Bloc, it is extremely important to ensure that we have as many means as possible available to prevent electoral fraud and the errors that can be made in electoral lists. According to the Bloc, it is quite appropriate and desirable that electors to be able to identify themselves when required, in order to ensure that the right elector is voting and that one elector does not take the place of another.

In the past, individuals have arrived at the polling station and found that someone else had voted in their place already. That was just too bad for them; the vote had been cast. A certain complacency had set in, particularly with regard to procedures for federal elections, and especially in Quebec.

Over the years, more tools have been introduced to minimize, if not completely eliminate, electoral fraud. As I mentioned previously, we find it quite desirable that potential voters identify themselves to ensure that the right person is voting. We believe that it is reasonable for the date of birth of electors to be made available on the electoral lists in order to verify firsthand that the person voting is who they are believed to be and whose name appears on the electoral list.

It was proposed that Bill C-31 be amended to ensure that electoral lists given not only to the officials—the deputy returning officers and poll clerks—but also to the political parties, contain this information, as is the custom in Quebec. We believe that this is an additional tool to help prevent electoral fraud.

On election day, if they wish, the political parties are allowed to have representatives at the polls who follow the progress of voting and who can, if necessary, make some telephone calls. Most Bloc Québécois candidates take advantage of that opportunity. Supporters can then get out and exercise their right to vote. Perhaps they had forgotten or did not feel like it at the time, especially if they had any obstacles to deal with, such as transportation and so on.

We think it is entirely reasonable to add the date of birth to the various information needed to authenticate the identity of voters. The Senate decided to amend that, making the date of birth available to government employees, returning officers and poll clerks, but not to political parties. We feel this would eliminate an important tool in preventing voter fraud. I would remind the House that this was, and still is, one of the main objectives of Bill C-31.

In the spirit of compromise, the Bloc Québécois proposed that at least the year of birth be made available, so that party representatives at the polls could have a rather simple indication of the validity of the identity of voters. If the year of birth is 1955, for example, we know right away that this is not a young adult, nor is it an older senior. The age of 52 does not exactly make someone a spring chicken, and I should know. In any case, we thought this was a reasonable compromise.

As far as the political parties are concerned, personally, I felt during the discussions and conversations we had that there was some openness. It seems that, if Bill C-31 were sent back to the Senate with a different amendment—so that the date of birth would no longer be available to the political parties, but just the year of birth—the government was afraid that it would turn into a ping-pong match between the Senate and the House of Commons.

In my opinion, if that is the reason it is a bad reason. Indeed, the government and the majority of members in this House agree that the representatives of the political parties should have access to this information, namely, the year of birth. It is not a case of elements of confidentiality and personal information that are not available. Usually, it is rather easy to guess a person’s age.

In order to avoid this game of ping-pong between the House of Commons and the Senate, we must remind the hon. senators—as the Leader of the Opposition did concerning the budget—that once a bill has been adopted here in this House, the job of the Senate is to ensure that the members have dotted the i's and crossed the t's. However, to poke around in the very content of the bill seems to me to go beyond the responsibilities that belong to an unelected Senate.

So, we very much regret this decision by the government not to insist that the year of birth be included, at least for the benefit of the political parties. That is the reason why we will vote against the government motion, which accepts the Senate's amendments as its own.

As we know, the other amendment is the one that extended from two months to eight months the deadline for the coming into force of the register with a unique and permanent identification number.

In our view, the arguments made by the Chief Electoral Officer, which led the Senate to extend the deadline for implementing a unique and permanent identification number from two months to eight months do not hold water. In that sense, we believe that we could have asked the Chief Electoral Officer—perhaps in the space of four months—to ensure that a unique and permanent identification number be used for each voter in the next election. In that regard, the six month timeframe is not suitable to us but nevertheless it could be considered an improvement over the amendment made by the Senate.

This also has a definite impact on the work that political parties could do. If there is no unique and permanent identification number, Bill C-31 will make it possible to have cards that will let political parties follow the progress of voting on election day and know who has voted and who has not.

As long as most of us know who our supporters are, we can be sure that they will vote. So this measure will be a major incentive for parties to “get out the vote”, as we say.

This can only increase overall voter turnout in the next election and in future ones. We know that the higher the voter turnout, the better the democratic health of a society. The opposite shows that there are problems. We participated in a debate on this topic in connection with Bill C-31.

Taking six months to implement this procedure is the lesser of two evils. We can hope that we will have these tools for the next election. However, we are very disappointed that the government is not pushing to keep the year of birth of voters on the electoral list, so it is available to all political parties. We succeeded in convincing the government, but unfortunately the Senate—I will not say destroyed, because that would be a bit too strong—contravened the agreements between the different parties, in a way which I think was completely inappropriate.

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Royal Galipeau]

Before we go to questions and comments I want to thank the hon. member for Edmonton—Sherwood Park for lending his steady hand during the presentations by the hon. member for West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country and the hon. member for Joliette.

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Hamilton East—Stoney Creek.

[Wayne Marston, NDP, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the person who assumed your chair did do a fine job and I had an opportunity to speak during that time.

One point that was raised during that segment of our debate today was around the Trinity—Spadina vote. I think it is worthy of reading one line that came out of that:

The findings of the audit indicate that election day registration was properly administered during the 2006 federal election in Trinity—Spadina.

There is much more but I will not read it all. I only alluded to that because it had been raised by the member. One of the concerns I have is that voter identification needs to be there to the benefit of the public. The speaker across was talking a fair length about the benefits to the party system if the date of birth is there. I do not think that is where we should be going with this. I understand that it would be to the advantage of parties but we need to be sure we are protecting the public interest.

[Pierre Paquette, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it seems to me that protecting the public interest means making sure that people who show up to vote are who they say they are.

Making just the year of birth available on the voters list—not the complete date of birth—gives political parties an additional tool to ensure that the people voting are the right ones and to minimize electoral fraud. To do otherwise would be irresponsible.

If this measure were to increase voter turnout as well, I would have no problem with that. We cannot hide out and be hypocritical, thinking that we are here by the grace of the Holy Spirit and thanks to a few prayers. Our political parties worked hard to convince people in our ridings that we were the best candidates to represent them. However, we also need tools to ensure that the people voting are the right people. I see no contradiction in what the member said.

I would like to introduce another element. The system that enables candidates to keep track of who has voted on election day, known as “bingo cards”, is not necessarily linked to the personal identifier number. The Chief Electoral Officer himself has said that it would take at least 10 months, or maybe eight, I do not remember exactly. That is why the Senate replaced the words “two months” in the original version of Bill C-31 with “10 months”. I am told that it is indeed 10 months.

We think that this is about two different things. Clearly, once we have personal identifier numbers, it will probably be easier to implement this system to provide current information on who has voted. However, it would be easy to use current voters lists to implement this system, which has already been used in Quebec for several elections, and which increases voter turnout, which is much higher in Quebec provincial elections than it is in federal elections.

Having the highest possible voter turnout is also in Canadians' best interest. Political parties have a responsibility in this respect, so they must be given the necessary tools. I see no conflict between this measure and the interest of the people—quite the contrary.

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Royal Galipeau]

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Ottawa Centre. He should know that there is a minute and a half for both the question and the answer.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, my friend from the Bloc inferred in his comments that it was the role of the political parties to verify whether a voter is legitimate. I want to ensure that is what he was mentioning because from my perspective I would wholeheartedly disagree. Scrutineers are there to ensure the vote is done fairly and to ensure there is oversight.

Would the member not agree that the role lies with Elections Canada to ensure objectivity and that there is no political partisan taint on the process, that we really should be entrusting Elections Canada to verify voters and ensure that voters are correct? I will talk about how I think that should be done if he is able to wait around for a couple of minutes, because I will be speaking to this bill. Does he believe that it is the role of Elections Canada to verify who the voters are and not us?

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Royal Galipeau]

The hon. member for Joliette has 20 seconds to reply.

[Pierre Paquette, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the law allows political parties to have representatives at the polls in order to fulfil a certain role. Of course, the primary role belongs to Elections Canada staff. It is quite possible that a representative from a political party could speak up when there is obviously a problem concerning identification. That is also part of our responsibilities as political parties and essential components—

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Royal Galipeau]

The hon. member for Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to speak following my hon. colleague from Joliette, our House leader, who explained the Bloc Québécois' position very well.

First of all, I am pleased to speak on behalf of the Bloc Québécois. As the chief organizer, I would like address my comments to my hon. colleagues from all political parties in this House. As all hon. members know, but perhaps not all Canadians know this, the Bloc Québécois only has representatives in Quebec. We defend the interests of only one group in this House, that is, the interests of Quebeckers. We also defend their values. That is what we have been doing, primarily within Quebec's borders, since 1993.

This is why I would suggest that my colleagues from all the other political parties would do well to listen to the Bloc Québécois' recommendations. Indeed, the Bloc Québécois' political machinery is the most formidable of all the political parties, and this goes for elections in Quebec and at the federal level. We have the most organized political machinery.

We participated in the debate on Bill C-31, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act and the Public Service Employment Act in a spirit of openness. We wanted to share with our colleagues our knowledge, our experience and the strength of our political organization. That is why the Bloc Québécois put forward amendments, which, oddly enough, were derailed by the Senate.

That is why I find it very difficult to discuss changes to electoral legislation proposed by a Senate that is not even elected. I really have a hard time accepting that. Senators do not have to face the same situations that hon. members and the political organizations for every party in this House do.

I want to get that message across. I also want to discuss again two very important amendments that the Senate has proposed with respect to this reform of the Canada Elections Act, amendments we do not agree with. In his speech, the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons said that the Conservatives were against the date of birth measure, but that out of respect and integrity, they ended up agreeing on this. They voted against it, but they agreed to defend the birthdate amendments in the Senate.

The main purpose of including date of birth on the list of electors is to allow election workers and the political parties present at the voting tables to conduct an initial verification. Of course this is not perfect. A person's date of birth is not stamped on their forehead. Nonetheless, if people arrive to vote in someone else's place and they are not in the same age group, this allows for an initial verification. It is a first step to determining whether people are cheating and voting by assuming someone else's identity. This is the first step and all we have to do is add the date of birth to the list of electors.

This received support from the majority in the committee and was included in the bill. Now the Senate is saying that this list with dates of birth will be allowed, but that it will only be used by the election workers, meaning the poll clerk and the deputy returning officer who are employees of the Chief Electoral Officer. The list will not be available to the political parties.

So they are abandoning any concern for transparency, integrity and respect by not trying to detect people committing fraud. The political parties, the ones that have representatives, that being the privilege that the law provides for political parties, will not have access to the date of birth. The Bloc Québécois can boast of having representatives in every polling station and in the all polling divisions during an election.

Then today the Senate has decided that the representatives of the political parties will not be entitled to see the dates of birth. And the government tells us that even though it agreed when the bill was introduced, it now supports the Senate's amendments. Once again, the senators are not even elected. They have never been through an election.

There is still time for the government to realize that this is progress. This amendment was introduced by the Liberals and supported by the Bloc Québécois to improve the way elections are held in Canada.

This is an example inspired by Quebec. This is how it is done in Quebec. The voter turnout rate is 7% to 8% higher in Quebec elections than it is in federal elections. Why are we not using the approaches that have been tested and proved in other democracies, so that we can more forward? I find it hard to understand the parties that do not support this approach, which has the advantage of being more transparent.

The second amendment concerns the coming into force of the whoe polling management system: allowing representatives to provide the political parties with a list of electors who have exercised their right to vote. That list will be available every 30 minutes. That is good. Under the bill, that section of the act was to be brought into force two months after the bill was given royal assent. In a virtually authoritarian move, the Senate has now told us that it will be 10 months after it comes into force.

Once again, I find it very hard to understand how a Senate that is not even elected could tell us that part of the work done by the committee was for nothing. The bill was introduced and agreed to by a majority in this House. Nevertheless, the Senate is deciding when that part of the act will come into force. Once again, this is to facilitate voting. The point is that having this list of electors who have exercised their right to vote available every 30 minutes is useful to the various political parties. The sheet is available to all parties, and only the voter numbers are released. And there is nothing on that sheet. There is no date of birth. The sheet shows only who has voted in the preceding half hour. Using the voter numbers for each polling station, the parties' representatives who are getting the vote out can bring in people who have not yet voted.

Once again, this already happens in Quebec, and it is one reason why voter turnout in Quebec for provincial elections is higher than the turnout for federal elections. When this House had decided that this measure would take effect two months after royal assent, in time for the next election campaign, why has the Senate taken the liberty of deciding that it will take effect in 10 months, at the risk that this measure will not be in effect in time for the next election campaign? I have a problem with the fact that the unelected Senate is interfering in our election campaigns. What gives it the right? It has no right at all to make such a decision. This is none of its business. Its job is to approve this bill to amend the Canada Elections Act. The bill was adopted by the majority of members of this House and would come into effect in time for the next election campaign. Why did it do that? Maybe it is because, one day, the senators hope to be elected by universal suffrage. I hope we will get rid of the Senate before that day comes. That will save us a lot of money and give us a true, uncomplicated democracy centred on the House of Commons.

Obviously, the goal of the Bloc Québécois was to take part without political partisanship in order to improve Canada's democratic system and the system in our own nation, Quebec. It is as simple as that, and that is what we have tried to do with our strong political organization. We have told our colleagues that they must never forget that in Quebec, the Bloc Québécois has the best political organization, one that has proven itself time and again since 1993 and has sent more members from Quebec to this House than any other party.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will start with the points on which I am in agreement with my friend from the Bloc. I agree with the fact that having this come from the Senate is passing strange. I would challenge him on one point, though, in that some senators have gone through elections, some as candidates and many as backroom employees. They raised money and did good services for their party and were rewarded with a seat in the other place.

I would agree with him that it is passing strange to have amendments coming from the Senate on something that affects elections and potential concerns around voter fraud, but my concern, however, relates to the comment the member made, and I want to get this right, that because the Bloc has shown how it is done and has a good machine, and because its members have used some of the facets that are in Bill C-31, this is reason enough for us to adopt it here.

My concern is that when we look at things like sharing birthdate information, I could not disagree with him more.

When I talk to my constituents about this, and I wrote about it in one of my householders, people are shocked to learn that we actually would share birthdate information not only with Elections Canada, which means throughout the ridings and throughout the country--and that paper could fall off the table and into in the wrong hands--but with political parties. The fact that political parties would have this information shocks people. This came about through the amendment from the Liberals and the Bloc at committee.

People are extremely shocked. They do not want their birthdate information shared with Elections Canada in a public way, and they sure do not want it shared with a political party. They were shocked to learn that the Bloc and the Liberals had joined together on this and then the icing on the cake was having the Conservative Party allow this amendment to go through. People just do not understand.

That is what my question is about. I have a letter from the Privacy Commissioner, who did not have the luxury of presenting her case before committee. I had to write to her after it was fiated through committee. She argues against doing what the member suggests would be helping the system. How can he argue that sharing birthdate information has anything to do with increasing voter participation?

In fact, what increases voter participation is trust in the system. There seems to be a disconnect. People see this as what I call a big brother bill. What we are doing here is making citizens' privacy vulnerable in legislation. Some of the people who have called have said they would remove their names from the voters' lists because this is an invasion of privacy. Then the effect will be that we will have fewer people voting.

I would like the member's comments on this birthdate information and how he connects it with a higher rate of voter participation.

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Royal Galipeau]

The hon. member for Ottawa Centre, who will soon have 20 minutes to speak, took four minutes to ask his question.

The hon. member for Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel has one minute to respond.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to say to my NDP colleague that this measure is in effect in the province of Quebec and has not caused any public outcry. I realize that the NDP likes to brandish scare tactics; that is its political style. Security is the main reason. When you have a date of birth and the individual approaches, the first step is to compare, have a look and avoid fraud. That is not to say that our date of birth is written on our foreheads. That is the first tool used to detect fraud. It is one way of going about it and it is not anti-democratic and it does not infringe on rights and freedoms.

In Quebec, our citizens have accepted this measure, which has been in force for several elections and has proven to be effective. The rate of voter participation in Quebec provincial elections is 7% to 8% higher than in federal elections. It would be very beneficial for them to listen to what we are attempting to introduce in order to have the democratic system in Canada evolve. In Quebec, our democratic system is working well. Means are always being sought to perfect it, but we also try to pass on ideas to others. If they do not wish to accept them, that is the NDP's problem. We will see what happens in the next election campaign.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak to the bill.

I want to start by referring to the comments made by my friend from the Bloc. His answer in response to my question underlined the problem with the bill. Opening up people's privacy has nothing to do with voter participation. He established that with his non-answer to my question.

More people do not vote because their birth date is on the electoral list or shared with political parties. I made it very clear that many people who have contacted me about this big brother bill have said the reason they would not vote in the next election would be because of this bill. It is counterintuitive to have people's privacy put on the altar and say that it will somehow increase voter participation.

It is important to look at the origins and the trajectory of Bill C-31. This bill is the result of a report by the procedure and House affairs committee, which I have in my hand. The report was very general in nature. The committee looked at the previous election to see if voter participation could be improved, how the machinery of government could be improved to allow elections to run more smoothly and to ensure that as parliamentarians we could improve elections by design to increase the number of people participating in elections.

It was interesting that after the committee report was tabled, very quickly there was a response from the government. That is not unusual, but the part that was strange was that the government cherry-picked from the Commons committee report. It came up with suggestions and lo and behold, after the response from the government, Bill C-31 was before us.

I point this out because Bill C-31 was not part of the Conservative Party platform. It was not a suggestion that had been made by grassroots organizations. It was not something that had been on the radar in general for people who are looking at how elections are conducted.

It was very interesting when I heard at committee the witnesses' concerns around the bill. They had concerns regarding the privacy issue. For anyone who is watching, listening or reading the transcripts, what the bill would do is it would require when voters presented themselves to vote, to have voter identification, government issued photo ID. When a voter did not have photo ID, there was a series of conditions regarding other documentation that would be allowed. Finally, if a voter did not have identification, there would be a process by which another person could vouch for the voter.

We heard from people who deal with the homeless, first nations, aboriginal peoples and people who represent students. They have said that this was a bad bill. Notwithstanding, and I am sure we will hear this from the government in response, there is a method for people who do not have proper ID to be vouched for.

The problem heard at committee was that the government is proposing in the bill that one person can vouch for another person as long as they are on the voters list. I underline this because people who are advocates for the homeless, first nations and students said that this is not necessarily an option for the people they represent, because they might not be able to find someone who is on the voters list or who resides in the riding, which is required in the bill.

The other critical issue, of course, is the privacy issue. I raised it at committee. It is worth noting that according to the bill every voter's date of birth will be published on the voters list for Elections Canada to verify that the person before an elections official is the person who is eligible to vote. That sounds fine, except when we look closer at the bill, there is also a verification number for every voter.

Photo ID is required. There is a verification number for every voter. The birthdate of every voter is on the electoral list. I opposed the inclusion of the birthdate and the NDP opposed the inclusion of birthdate information on the electoral list because of its dissemination. Every riding has hundreds of polls. There are 308 ridings. That is a lot of information being floated around. This is not anything against the good people who work as poll clerks during elections; it is just obvious that this information could fall into the wrong hands.

What has shocked me the most was the amendment by the Bloc, supported at committee by the Liberals and eventually by the Conservatives in the House, that birthdate information would actually be shared with political parties. I want to underline that all political parties, not just the ones in this House, but every single registered political party would have the day and year of birth of every single voter.

It is important to underline that because the Senate wants to make an amendment. While I welcome that, it does not go far enough. This bill at its foundation is flawed for reasons I have already mentioned about those people who might not normally have access to proper identification.

I brought forward these concerns at committee. At the time the Bloc and the Liberals got together to pass this amendment to share the date of birth information with political parties. Members should try to explain that to their constituents. I could not, I would not and I refused. I fought it at the committee. The Conservatives at the committee opposed this amendment, but when the bill came to the House, we heard from the government House leader that in the spirit of cooperation to get the bill through, the Conservatives would not fight this amendment.

I am sorry, but when it comes to issues of privacy, protection and integrity we do not just look the other way. That is exactly what members of the Conservative Party did. They looked the other way on privacy. I have a letter in my hand from Ms. Stoddart, the Privacy Commissioner of Canada. The letter suggests that this is a problem for her as well.

There are two parties, the Liberals and the Bloc, that got together to benefit themselves to give birthdate information to their political organizations. Clearly, the political parties see this as a bonanza. They can target voters. For the Liberals I am sure it is helpful because they can do some fundraising. The Liberals have to look to new sources for their fundraising. They will have to fill the void after having relied for so long on big donors. With this information, they will now focus their attention on citizens. It is very tempting for political parties to have this information.

People should not buy the idea that somehow this is going to help with verification of voters. There is already in the bill a verification number and photo ID is required. The idea that we would actually sell out privacy and the government would look the other way in order to get the bill through does not wash.

The amendments from the Senate are in front of us. I will establish that not only do I have a problem with the inherent contradiction with the Senate sending us amendments on elections legislation, but also the Senate amendments do not go far enough. They do not deal with those who, we heard at committee, will be disenfranchised, the homeless, aboriginal people and students.

There is a Globe and Mail editorial that talks about the whole issue of privacy. It says:

As Privacy Commissioner Jennifer Stoddart explained in a recent letter to [myself] whose party was the only one to oppose the bill, “One of the basic rules of data protection is that personal information should be collected and used sparingly and in proportion to the problem it is intended to address.” But the bill, which sailed through final reading in the House of Commons last evening, pays no heed to her legitimate objections.

Not only is the Privacy Commissioner against the bill, but from this editorial it would seem that Globe and Mail editors are against it as well. They underline the importance of why is the bill in front of us, what is the issue, what is the problem?

The government has put forward a notion that there is a huge problem with voter fraud. To be fair, it has been careful to underline it as potential voter fraud. If that is the issue, then I have no idea why the government did not look at other common sense solutions to deal with potential voter fraud. We put forward ideas at committee, at amendment stage, and made suggestions as to what the government could do.

We all know that voter cards are ubiquitous and often are left lying around in many apartment buildings. There is the potential for voter fraud. The NDP suggested in committee, and received the nod from the Chief Electoral Officer, that those voter cards should be in a sealed envelope. That would make sense. It is not exactly a high tech solution, but it would ensure that voter cards were not left lying around and instead would be sent directly to the voters. That was our first common sense solution.

The second common sense solution we put forward was to have universal enumeration at every election. When the Liberal government brought in voters lists, it was not to make the list more accurate, but rather to save money. In our democracy, if there is one thing we should invest in over anything else, it is the integrity of our voting system, and that means the voters list. That means having universal enumeration.

There used to be enumeration. People would go door to door to make sure that everyone had a chance to get on the voters list. Verification was done and the voters list was more accurate. I do not know a person in this House or in this country who would say that since we have had the centralized computer voters list that we have had more accurate representation.

Those two common sense solutions should have been adopted before we sold out people's privacy, before we put up barriers to the franchise to the most vulnerable, and before we got into this taffy pull between the Senate and the House. I agree with the Bloc and the government that it is passing strange we are waiting on the Senate to tell us how to run elections.

The bottom line is that this is a flawed bill. It is a big brother bill. The fact that it sailed through committee should not pass it off as being a valid bill. In fact, it is vapid in terms of what it is trying to do.

I want to underline what this bill claims to do and what the results will be if it passes. Not only will there be problems with privacy, but I believe the bill will be challenged on two fronts.

In testimony before the committee, the Chief Electoral Officer said that because of the new requirement for photo ID, more than 5% of eligible voters will not be able to vote. They will show up at the polling station perhaps five or 10 minutes before the polls close without their ID and will be told to go home. Therefore, they will not have the opportunity to vote. Others have mentioned this. I think of Duff Conacher, who has written about this extensively.

We might end up with a situation akin to what happened in Florida in one of the U.S. elections. This is not my submission. It is the submission of others. Others will call into question the validity of the election because people will not have been able to exercise their franchise. There will be situations where there are close votes. Those votes will be challenged. In a minority Parliament, that might decide which party did or did not form government.

Elections Canada will do a good job in promoting the required changes, but if we do not have a safety valve like the statutory declaration that the NDP put forward, which works in provinces with high voter turnout, then people will challenge the outcome of the election. That could lead to some unintended consequences.

I am putting everyone on notice that others have looked at this and they are saying that they will need to challenge this bill in court, some for civil libertarian reasons, some because of the private aspects and others because they believe that this kind of legislation is inherently wrong.

In summary, what we have in this bill is a Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs report that looked at elections in general and how to improve things. The report was tabled in Parliament soon after and, this is the part about the Conservative play book, the Conservatives used the committee report to cherry-pick and back a bill they had intended to put forward because that is exactly what happened. There was a response to this committee report very soon after and, more quickly than I have ever seen, a bill was in front of us based on the government's response to a committee report.

In that report we had the requirement for photo ID and then a cascading requirement, for those who did not have photo ID, to use other forms of ID. At the end of the day, people who are most disadvantaged, be it the homeless, aboriginal people or students, would be vulnerable.

It is interesting that a couple of weeks ago the government announced, with great fanfare, democratic reform week. If we were to believe the advertising, the government was doing everything it could to ensure that more people had access to the franchise. They need to look at this bill because what I have just outlined are barriers to franchise.

The Conservatives talked recently about having more young people vote by having an extra day to vote, which they had no scientific proof for. They had a nice photo op with some people in front of the Centre Block and somehow we were to believe that because of this extra day of voting we would have higher voter participation.

What they need to do is examine Bill C-31 and tell me honestly, when they look at the privacy provisions for allowing one's birthdate to be included both on the voters list and shared with political parties, notwithstanding the amendments, the fact that more young people will be required to show ID that they might not have access to, people concerned about privacy telling me they will ask to be taken off the voters list because they do not want big brother and the government, which is kind of strange coming from what used to be a party of libertarian dimensions, they do not want that to happen. They will take their names off the voters list and at the end of the day what we have is a bill that would undermine voter participation and not buttress it.

When we put this all together, we should keep in mind that the government did not want to listen to common sense, which was to have voter ID cards put into envelopes to prevent the concerns around voter fraud because people are using these cards or could, and the fact that there were four cases of voter fraud during the last three elections. In fact, there was more candidate fraud than voter fraud when members crossed the floor, which we remember, after they advertised that they would run for the Liberal Party or the Conservative Party.

Everyday people are more concerned about that fraud than the potential for voter fraud. They are more concerned about their privacy rights being trashed than they are about having these kinds of provisions put in. At the end of the day, they see that this bill would not improve our democracy. It would undermine it.

I would ask all members to keep in mind that when they go to their constituents or when this becomes a court case, because I believe it challenges the franchise, and many lawyers have said it, that the Conservatives were the ones who sat by and rubber stamped this process.

I urge all members to stand up against this bill, stand for democracy and more voter participation, and ensure we have a democracy we can all be proud of. I urge all members to vote against this bill and send it back. The Senate has made some minor improvements on the birthdate information but at the end of the day this is a flawed bill, a big brother bill and does not deserve to be passed.

[Gary Goodyear, Conservative, Cambridge, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his speech on these amendments made by the Senate. I know the member was present at some of those committee meetings and did an outstanding job in understanding the issues with respect to the bill.

However, I think the member has forgotten how things turned about and I would like to ask for his opinion on this fact.

Originally, the amendment to use birthdates was brought forward by the Bloc members and at committee that amendment to the bill was actually supported by the Liberal Party and ultimately made it into the final version.

I recall that the NDP suggested, as the member is suggesting, that the birthdate be not used at all. However, the committee's original recommendation was that the birthdate be simply used inside the polling station only on election day as a means of helping folks who may not have photo ID as a second or third way that voters could identify who they were, again trying to help folks who may not have photo ID.

I wonder if the member feels that the middle ground was what the original bill by the government said and that was birthdate inside the polling station only and only on election day as opposed to the amendments made by the Bloc and supported by the Liberals.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is worthy of repeating that when this was brought forward originally, the birthdate information that the member suggests was only for the use of Elections Canada to verify voters. He is correct in reminding us that the Bloc had brought forward an amendment to have that date of birth information shared with political parties.

I was vehemently against it, as the member will recall. The Liberals backed the Bloc. His party voted against it in committee but, as I said in my comments, sadly, it turned away from that concern when the bill was at third reading and allowed that amendment to stand, even though I had provided an opportunity for the government to withdraw that amendment. It said that it was in the spirit of cooperation to ensure the bill was passed.

I would point out that when we are talking about issues of privacy, we can never turn the other way. Therefore, the member is right in reminding us that the provision of the birthdate was for Elections Canada employees to verify voters.

My preference would have been not to have the birthdate information at all. He will know that in the bill there is a voter verification number assigned to each voter. The birthdate information was not to replace the photo ID. To be clear, it was felt that it was needed in addition to. Therefore, we have the verification number, photo ID and birthdate information, which, for me, is away too much and is not necessary.

I ask all members of Parliament to look back at the reason for this bill in front of us. It was to deal with potential voter fraud. I underline for any of those who were not at committee to know that there were more cases of candidate fraud, people crossing the floor and saying that they were with one party and ending up in another party, than there were cases of citizens misusing their franchise. That is really evidenced based.

We need to ask ourselves why we have the bill at all. If it is the way it is now, there is no way we can support it because it does not allow for more voter participation. In fact, I have made the argument that it will do the opposite.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am having a hard time understanding my NDP colleague. He is against the Senate, but when the Senate introduces an amendment he approves of, he likes the Senate. That is how the NDP operates, and that will never change.

My question might give him an opportunity, because he has a problem. He is alone in his thinking on dates of birth. One of the reasons that the Bloc supports this is that Quebec's permanent voters list—which is also used by municipalities for municipal elections—includes dates of birth, and so far, no Quebecker has complained about a breach of rights and freedoms. We were giving the government a chance to add dates of birth, which would make it possible to integrate Quebec's voters list into Canada's so that all voters could be on the voters list. There is a problem. Some voters are not on the voters list. There is a problem with the federal voters list, and we are trying to help. That is our message.

I will give the member one last chance. The NDP just recruited a candidate in Quebec who was a minister in the Quebec government. He has a chance to call him. He should pick up the phone and ask how things work in Quebec. I do not think that he has talked to him. If he had a chance before voting to talk to the candidate they recruited in Quebec, who was in the Quebec government, he would understand the Bloc Québécois' position. He might then try to help our democracy move forward in the same direction as us, in the interest of Quebeckers and Canadians.

Voter turnout in Quebec elections is 8% higher than in federal elections. The member and his party should reconsider. They should talk to the people they have recruited in Quebec.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would love to talk at great length about Mulcair. He is an excellent candidate and will be an excellent member, I am sure, but that is not the subject today.

I will talk to him about this because I think he would believe, as a social democrat, that there is no connection between giving up one's birthdate to whatever election body, Élections Québec or Elections Canada, and voter participation. There is no logic there. If I give my birthdate and put it on the list, how does that affect voter turnout? If anyone listening or watching or reading this transcript can provide me with the logic, I would welcome it, because there is none.

Let me be clear. We will not be supporting this recommendation from the Senate because it does not go to the extent we wished it to. I agree with him on the concerns we have about the source of this and therefore we are not in favour of this motion from the Senate.

I say to my friend from Quebec that we have something called asymmetry as an idea here. They love to use asymmetry, or at least the proponents and principles of it, that when things are in the rest of Canada, they should not always be adopted by Quebec. May I ask for the same logic, extension and provision in this case?

The member has a case where this birthdate information on the voters' lists is shared with political parties in Quebec.

That is fine for Quebec.

Maybe it is different for the rest of Canada in this instance. Is that something to divide us over? I would think not.

It is called asymmetry and it is a principle the NDP believes in. I would like to see my friend see the logic and the light in that as well. I still have not heard from him the connection between birthdate information and voter participation and I wait patiently for his response.

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Royal Galipeau]

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Vancouver East would be interested to know there is a minute and a half for both the question and the answer.

[Libby Davies, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I just want to thank the member for Ottawa Centre because he has brought to light the serious flaws in this bill.

I would like to ask him to maybe put forward some information. I am aware that the former chief electoral officer actually did not believe that there was a significant problem with voter fraud. Whatever problems do exist, they undertake investigations, and in his opinion this bill was never warranted in the first place.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague from Vancouver for the question and her work on this.

When this bill came in front of us, we had to look at it carefully. I would have to agree with her that this bill is not required. There are facets of concerns around potential voter fraud, which was the language used, but that has more to do with the voter cards I mentioned and the fact that we do not have proper enumeration.

In fact, in committee, when we asked the chief electoral officer, an officer of Parliament, if this was a concern of his, he said that it was not. He had to be put into a corner to comment on the bill as we went through its different facets.

However, on her question as to whether there was evidence for this bill, no, there was not.

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister for Democratic Reform]

Mr. Speaker, I stand to speak in support of not only Bill C-31 but the majority of the amendments that we have seen coming back from the Senate.

First, I would say that while Bill C-31 is important, it is only one in a suite of democratic reform initiatives that the government has brought in. We have seen, for an example, very important democratic reform initiatives such as fixed election dates which is Bill C-16. It passed and has come into force. It states that the third Monday of October 2009 will be the date for the next general election unless of course by some strange occurrence the combined opposition determines that it wants to have an election before that date.

That was the first initiative that we brought in to try to ensure Canadians that there would be some consistency and regularity in the timing of federal elections. Far too often we saw political parties in power manipulate the voting system to their advantage. In other words, we saw parties in previous years take a look at the polling numbers and if they determined that it would be to their advantage to have an election earlier rather than later, because the polls happened to be advantageous for them, they would call an election at that time.

Subsequently, we saw both federally and provincially from time to time governments of the day go well beyond a traditional four year voting window because the polls were not quite a favourable for them during that four year cycle. What we are doing with Bill C-16 is ensuring that all Canadians will have some certainty as to the timing of federal elections and I think that is a good thing for democracy. I think it is a good thing for Canadian voters.

Also, however, we saw several other initiatives with respect to democratic reform. We saw bills come forward dealing with expanded voting opportunities in an attempt to get more and more voters to turn out at the polls. As I said in that debate, we have seen over the course of the last two decades or so a decline in voter turnout year after year, or at least election after election.

I think that is a reflection of many factors, the overall probably being the cynicism that most Canadian voters have with the political process per se. What we are trying to do, by presenting a bill that will give increased and expanded voting opportunities for all Canada, is attempt to raise the level of voter turnout because.

I think that we all agree, regardless of our political affiliations, that it is incumbent upon all Canadians to express either their opinions come election day or at least exercise their franchise because if we ever got to the point where we had less than 50% of the people in the country who were eligible to vote electing a government of the day, that would be truly a sad day for the democratic process.

We have also seen other examples of our democratic reform initiatives. Just today in committee we dealt with Bill C-54 on political loans and how we can ensure that all loans given to candidates over the course of an election are done in such a manner that we can ensure accountability and transparency. I think that is a very important initiative, again, one of a suite of initiatives we brought in.

There will be further democratic reform initiatives as we go forward in the course of the government's life cycle. Today I want to speak specifically to Bill C-31, the voter integrity bill. I think there is no greater fraud that could be perpetrated on Canadians than that of an individual voting in a federal or provincial election who pretends to be someone that he or she is not. In other words, I think there could be no greater fraud than someone trying to influence the election results by fraudulent manners. That is what the bill deals with.

In committee, we dealt with many of the things that we felt needed to be corrected to ensure that there was greater accountability, transparency and greater integrity in the voting system. Primarily we talked about things around identification where all voters now, once the bill becomes a law of the land, will be required to show sufficient identification at the polling station to ensure that they are who they purport to be because we have heard on many occasions many examples of individuals fraudulently voting in individual elections.

Anything that we can do, as a House and as individual members of Parliament, to stop that abuse of the voting system is extremely well intentioned and I think will be well received by the voting public. We dealt with that and many other issues of which my hon. colleagues who proceeded me in this debate spoke about.

Primarily, we came up with what we thought was a bill that would accurately reflect the intention of the committee. The committee worked long and hard on the bill and at the end of day when we reported back to this House, we felt that we had a bill which would capture all of the suggestions and recommendations of committee members who dealt with the bill over a period of several months.

However, as is normally the case, and it seems at least these days it is normally the case, when our bill went from our place to the Senate there were additional discussions and additional amendments. While some of the amendments from the Senate are ones that we have some question about, I am pleased to report that the vast majority of the amendments that were made in the Senate will be agreed to, at least by this government.

We are doing so in a manner which we believe we can get the bill passed into law before we rise for the summer because in a minority situation, the length of a minority government is tenuous at best. If we happen to have an election within the next six months or so, we want to ensure that we have a bill that deals with these very important issues, so that we can ensure that voter integrity is at the utmost, that we dispel and dispense with any kind of attempted fraud in the next election that will be held, whenever that may be.

I want to speak for a few moments on the amendments brought back from our colleagues in the Senate. There were about 12 amendments in total but they fit into about five broad categories. The first one deals with what is generally known as bingo cards. Most of us in this House and any politician who has ever run for elected office is familiar with the concept of bingo cards. For those Canadians who may be somewhat confused about what a bingo card has to do with an election, let me explain.

Every political party, certainly every candidate, wants to track their supporters and whether or not they are supporters that they have identified during the preceding number of months leading up to the election and actually come out to the polls and vote. From time to time there are very close election races throughout Canada. When I was first elected in 2004, I was elected by a whopping majority of 122 votes.

One of the elements that really helped my election in that very stressful time was the fact that we had a very good voter identification program within my riding association and within my campaign team. On election day we had a very good “get out the vote” team which tracked people who came into the polling station, find out which of my supporters had not yet made it to the polls, and we brought those people for the most part to come in to vote. Close to 80% of my identified vote actually cast ballots in that election of 2004.

The use of bingo cards is a mechanism by which we can track the voter turnout. As the name suggests and anyone who has every gone to a bingo hall and played a game knows there are cards with numbers from 1 through 400. When scrutineers go into an election or polling station they are able to mark off on the bingo card the number of the voter assigned to them on the electoral list to ensure that everyone in our campaign team, or get out the vote team, understands who has, and more importantly, who has not voted.

From time to time during the day our scrutineers would go in and pick up these bingo cards from the inside scrutineers, take them back to GOTV headquarters, and phone voters who had not yet made it out to the polls in an attempt to make sure that all of our supporters understood the importance of their vote in that election.

What we are saying in this provision, at least what Bill C-31 purports, is that the bingo card concept be formalized and that Elections Canada be tasked with the responsibility of developing a standardized bingo card that would be available for all political parties and all candidates, so they could use the same get out the vote techniques that most candidates and most political parties have been doing informally over the course of the last number of years.

We see this being an asset to the political process because it helps engage all or potential voters by getting them out to vote. Yes, some of them might need a slight kick in the rear end from some of the GOTV members, but if we can at least increase the voter turnout we will have done a great service for the democratic process. So the amendments that the Senate brought back in with respect to bingo cards are ones that we agree with.

What are those amendments? Primarily, they say that in the original report coming from this place bingo cards should be available and updated every 30 minutes, so that candidates and political parties would be able to go into polling stations every 30 minutes to pick up the bingo cards and take it back to their GOTV headquarters and start their phone backs.

What the Senate has amended is that during advance polls these bingo cards need only be picked up once a day. That makes perfect sense to me. The time a candidate wants to know is on election day what the voter turnout is like. So that every 30 minutes during an advance poll is almost a bit of overkill. It is certainly not required. Therefore, I think it was a very useful, a very serviceable amendment to suggest that bingo cards during those four or five days that advance polls are open need only be picked up once a day and we agree with that.

That segues nicely into the second major classification of amendments and that deals with coming into force provisions. Primarily, we only have one problem with any of the coming into force provisions as amended by our colleagues in the Senate. That again deals with bingo cards.

What it suggests is that electoral offices be given 10 months to develop these bingo cards themselves and come up with a standardized format that would then be available for use by all parties and all candidates.

We feel that 10 months is too long. We believe that this bingo card format can be structured, developed and printed within a six month period. Therefore, we will be putting our new amendment that we will send back to our colleagues in the Senate, and we hope that they support it, suggesting that the only amendment we wish to make on its amended bill is that the coming into force provision for bingo cards would be six rather than 10 months.

I think that is a very legitimate and reasonable amendment for us to be making. We say that because again in a minority government one never knows how long such a government will last. In other words, if this bill is given royal assent before we rise for the summer, that means if we have an election before December bingo cards would not be available, but if any election is held from 2008 on we will have bingo cards available for all candidates. We think that is reasonable.

Again, the only change to the amendments that the Liberal dominated Senate has made is that we will have a six month window rather than a 10 month window for the bingo cards.

The third provision that is captured by amendments in the Senate deals with casual election workers. Again, as we know in a minority government situation we need a lot of casual workers who work from election to election to election on standby because there can be an election held at any time.

Currently, the Public Service Employment Act contemplates that casual workers and the broad category of casual government workers could only be classified as such if they work 90 days or less in any calendar year.

We felt that was too tight of a time line because if there happened to be two elections in one year, clearly 90 days would not be enough time for a casual worker to do both elections. Thereby, they would fall outside of that 90 day classification.

What the Senate committee had discussed and amended was that the provision now read that 165 days be the length of time that casual workers would be classified still as a casual worker within the Public Service Employment Act. We think that is reasonable and we are certainly willing to agree to that amendment and recommend that the amendment be passed in this House.

The fourth provision is one that I know will take a fair amount of time. I see that the time—