Mr. Speaker, I opened it up for a joke, and I got one.
I want to say that the whole process was a little disappointing.
By way of explanation, it seems to me that the public pressure had been so high and so heated that changes had to be made on their part, especially on vouching. Rather than go through what one would consider the regular process of making changes and amendments at committee stage, the government did it through a pre-study, asked for by the minister and given to the Senate and the Conservative senators there. “Theatrics” is perhaps one way of describing it. However, there were some positive steps in the right direction.
My only problem is that the Conservatives did good measures to a bad bill, but unfortunately, the bill is still bad. In effect, we voted yes to the vast majority of the amendments the Conservatives proposed, but in the end, we voted against the particular clauses, and then in the end, against the bill itself because of many measures.
There is one I would like to highlight. I tried to get a question in earlier, because I wanted to ask some of my Conservative colleagues about the fact that I truly believe that in the next election, one of the biggest mistakes will be realized very quickly.
Not just on election days but on advance polling days, we are going to see a lot of seniors and students with voter information cards. Many people still call them voter identity cards. Those cards can no longer be used as a piece of identification.
Let us remember, people need three elements to qualify to vote. They have to prove that they are Canadian citizens. They have to prove that they are over 18 years of age. The third measure is that they have to prove their addresses, where they live in a riding, to vote in a particular riding. This is what could pose a problem.
I have been in four campaigns. My fifth one is coming up. I remember campaigning and going to many seniors' homes. Just prior to voting day, they would have that card sitting on the kitchen table or pinned to the refrigerator. It was always ready, right there, ready to take, ready to use when they voted. That is now going to be lost because of this. That is unfortunate, because the address on that card was actually updated more than a person's driver's licence, which is acceptable. It is one of the very few pieces of ID published by the federal government, in this case through Elections Canada, that actually has an address on it.
The way I described it in committee was that it is like a boarding pass. People cannot get on a plane without a boarding pass. In many seniors' minds, they could not vote without that card. It was a voting pass that told them that they were good to exercise their right in this democracy.
There are a lot of examples being thrown around the House about vouching, about going into a bar and vouching someone who is above the age of 19, or going across the border and vouching for a person's identity, which people cannot do, to get into another country.
Let us bear in mind that voting is a charter right we have as citizens. It is in section 3 of the charter. Some of my colleagues brought up potential challenges as a result of this. I do not doubt it, but I will not delve into that too much, because it has already been handled.
However, I would like to talk about some of the other changes.
The Chief Elections Officer is now capped at one renewable 10-year term. The opinions and guidelines were also discussed. The CEO now may inform elementary and high school students about the voting process. This is a wonderful process. Groups such as civics students run elections within the school system. These are kids below the age of majority. They go through the exercise, and Elections Canada helps subsidize their efforts to bring democracy into the classroom. It is a wonderful exercise. Although that was not allowed under the original form of Bill C-23, the Conservatives allowed an exemption to do that.
Here is my problem with that. That is good for that particular measure, but what about other measures Elections Canada hopes to invest in to further our principles of democracy by informing and teaching people about how they vote and why it is important to vote? They could be not just for secondary students but also for post-secondary students. There could be programs for first nations. There could be programs on many facets that would allow Elections Canada to bring forward democracy and to advertise in a non-partisan way. The government says that this should be left up to the parties.
I would be disappointed if the only way people could inform themselves about voting in the next election was pinned on negative advertising. We all do it, some more than others. We all partake. The problem with that is that it is not an inspirational, non-partisan way to convince people to exercise their right. I know that the fundamentals about the location and how to do it are contained in this bill, but there are certain things that have to be communicated to individuals that may not be caught up in this bill.
I will give an example. Earlier I mentioned voter information cards, the identity cards. They cannot be used to vote. It should say that on the card, because a lot of people will be disappointed. However, can Elections Canada go out and inform people specifically that they can no longer use that voter information card? These are things that were covered in this bill before. What is happening here is that we are seeing that Elections Canada is being held down in a way that is just not healthy.
Many of us travel abroad. We go for work reasons. We go to Europe. We go to Asia. I went on a recent trip to Mongolia with the Governor General. One individual said to me that they love Canada in many respects, and one of the reasons is the independence of the bureaucracy, and in particular, the independence of Elections Canada. It is a model to be used by countries that are not as experienced in democracy. Mongolia is a prime example of a young democracy. The independence of that agency is sacrosanct. This bill takes measures by which it would put it into a corner and handcuff it in a way that would not allow it to act as the agency that we so love and that many countries revere.
An example is the commissioner. We thought for sure that there was an amendment coming about this. We thought, most certainly, that there would be at least some small modicum of flexibility, but there was none, to allow the commissioner what that person asked for, which is the same type of powers contained in the Competition Act. Instead, the Conservatives have taken that position and put it into public prosecutions. This was not an exercise in independence. This was an exercise in isolation, and that is what is going to be detrimental in future investigations.
The other amendments on some of the loopholes, such as calls to raise money from people who have donated in the past, have been eliminated. That is fine.
As I said before, though, a lot of these measures have made a bad bill better, but they certainly have not made a bad bill good.
