Mr. Speaker, the fair elections act contains provisions that are in no way related to electoral fraud and that have clearly been created to prevent certain segments of Canadian society from voting. In addition, it gets rid of the Chief Electoral Officer’s public education mandate. He will no longer be able to discuss certain aspects of the electoral process, including where, when and how to vote.
The bill will eliminate the practice of vouching, which poses a huge problem for aboriginal Canadians, students who live far from home, the homeless and seniors living in residence. They are all are less likely to have a valid ID card and would make use of the practice of having someone close to them vouch for them.
Voter cards will no longer be a valid option to identify the voter. Those ID cards are essential for people who have a hard time proving their address when it comes time to vote, and that includes students, seniors and aboriginal Canadians, who sometimes have to wait months to get their status card.
I would like to say more about the first issue, getting rid of the Chief Electoral Officer's public education mandate. This is really important to me. I would like to point out that, in my previous life, I taught history, which included civic education. I know the importance of teaching.
Democracy should not be taken for granted. It does not grow on trees or fall from the sky. It is a hard-won right. We can reassert that right every time we pass our democratic experience on to the next generation through education. However, if there is no more civic education, democracy will suffer, and that is very, very serious. We think it is scandalous when other countries do not have the kind of democracy we deem acceptable. With measures like this, however, we are starting to look quite a bit like some of those countries we tend to criticize.
Right now, the purpose of Elections Canada's civic education program is to increase people's knowledge of and interest in Canadian democracy. It targets people under 30, including those who have not yet reached voting age, instilling in them a belief in the importance of voting and creating a foundation for citizen involvement. The program has two parts.
I want to talk about this today because I used the program, not just as a teacher, but as a mom, when I went to volunteer in my child's school. Several activities are ongoing. Some schools hold parallel elections. Kids really like it when their teachers bring all of the gear in so they can vote in their schools. They take it really seriously. I have seen it, and it is really something. Those kids keep talking about politics afterward.
During every federal election since 2004, Elections Canada has worked with Student Vote, a parallel election program for Canadian schools. In 2011, I was a teacher, and I can tell you that my students voted. They did not necessarily vote for me, but they voted, and that is the beauty of democracy.
During the 2011 election, almost one-third of all Canadian schools participated in the program, and over 560,000 students voted for real candidates. Their feedback showed that the program significantly improved their knowledge, raised their level of interest and strengthened their belief that voting is a civic duty.
I will make one comment. In the schools in major urban centres where I worked, the students are mostly new arrivals. Some of these families left their countries because of the lack of democracy. Thus, we can show them that it is possible to have democracy, but that it has to be protected. Education is a fundamental pillar of our democracy.
All the teachers who also participated in this program said that they became more confident about teaching civics. There is something else: parents are also affected. When you can reach out to a sixth-grader, that child is going to talk to his parents. He will say to his mother that his teacher taught him how to vote and will ask if she knows who the candidates of the political parties are. We have definitely raised the child's awareness as well as that of his parents and perhaps his grandparents, who may decide to vote. Not only do we have to reach out to the young people, but we also have to reach out to adults who feel let down by politicians.
This is a very important program. I remember very clearly when, as an MP, I participated in the program with grade six students at Wilfrid-Pelletier school. After one of the meetings, the parents of these children told me that I had spoken to them about the importance of democracy, which is a fundamental value.
We are here, we are quite happy, and we take it all for granted. However, we should realize that democracy is always under threat and it must be protected.
Another activity in Elections Canada's civic education programming is Canada's democracy week, which was launched in September 2011. In the spirit of the United Nations, this activity celebrates democratic values. We belong to the big United Nations family and we cannot shirk this democratic role.
Now I want to address another point, namely voter education resources. Elections Canada provides teachers, free of charge—and I can confirm this to be true—voter education resources that are adapted to different age groups and easily accessible online or on paper.
I can still remember when those large boxes from Elections Canada arrived at my children's school. Even the teachers were amazed. The boxes contained polling stations. The young school children lined up and showed their ID cards. It went swimmingly. I am sure the feeling of being included as citizens will remain in their hearts and minds forever. I can attest to the fact that this works. I used this educational tool in the past myself.
Elections Canada provides a host of educational programs. Why would the government want to make cuts to that? The Conservatives are saying there is a decline in voter turnout and they blame these programs for never producing any results. I apologize for reacting like a teacher, but there are quite a few people talking.
If we apply the same analysis to schools and dropouts, is the government going to start closing schools? Teenagers quit school, so we will close the school. That is more or less what the government has done by saying that it wants to eliminate the voter education programming by Elections Canada. On the contrary, if we see that there is a decline in voter turnout, then we have to find out why young people no longer want to vote. Perhaps it is because we waste a lot of time in the House talking about all sorts of things, but not things that really matter to our youth.
I will conclude with a very personal story. When I was young, I remember civics courses being taught, back in the old days in Chile. Under the dictatorship, it was forbidden to teach civics education programs. I want to protect Canadian democracy. What is more, as a teacher and citizen, keeping educational programs for our children and for future generations is important to me.
