Mr. Speaker, I want to ensure we are dealing with factual statements in the House. I must correct my hon. friend. He is quite right when he read from the Chief Electoral Officer's report and from the Canada Elections Act itself that political parties currently are not required to forward information. However, he motion, as I said, is very poorly written. It reads, “to include giving the Chief Electoral Officer the power to request all...documents”. He has always had the power to request documents.
It is one thing to argue that political parties should be compelled to provide information. We agree on the compliance side of things, which is why we agreed to have an independent compliance auditor look at all of the financial returns of every political party and assure the Chief Electoral Officer that all rules were followed in the correct fashion. However, the Chief Electoral Officer has the power and has always had the power to request documents. How can we expand upon a power that the Chief Electoral Officer already has?