Tom Lukiwski

[Questions on the Order Paper, February 10th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I ask that all questions be allowed to stand.

[Fair Elections Act, February 10th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, it is absolutely true. If we are to have confidence in the electoral system, we have to have not only impartiality but the independence of officers. Right now there is no independence. The Commissioner of Canada Elections reports to the Chief Electoral Officer. As I said a few moments ago, that means, in effect, that the Chief Electoral Officer is not only the judge and the jury but the prosecutor. It is untenable. We simply cannot have that.

We want to have confidence that the Commissioner of Canada Elections will not only be truly independent and impartial but will have the authority and the tools at his disposal to make sure that if infractions occur in any election, as my colleague pointed out occurred in his riding back in 2004-05, penalties will be severe and sanctions will be imposed, and we will put an end to the wrongdoing.

[Fair Elections Act, February 10th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I am not sure if there was a question there. Let me just point out to my friend and colleague across the way that the arguments I was pointing out that the NDP had been making in this place have been hypocritical. Members of his own caucus freely admit that.

As a matter of fact, the member for Beauséjour, the House Leader of the Liberal Party, actually has a nickname for the NDP. He calls the NDP “the sanctimony brigade”. It is a very apt nickname, because the NDP will take this holier-than-thou attitude above any piece of legislation that our government brings forward. It tries to point out that it is the only custodian to make sure Canadians are represented well in the House.

The sanctimony brigade is alive and well in the benches opposite.

[Fair Elections Act, February 10th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, again, an NDP member is trying to point out what he considers to be flaws within the legislation, yet the New Democrats were the ones who tried to curb the debate on this very matter.

Specifically to his point, everyone who wants to come in to vote has an obligation to prove they are eligible to do so. That is a fundamental tenet of our democracy. To say there would be hardship on Canadians, perhaps because they live in rural or remote areas, is absolutely ludicrous. It is preposterous.

There would be 39 different pieces of identification that one could present. That number, again, is 39. Is the member suggesting that people in his riding would not be able to come up with at least one of those 39 pieces of identification to prove who they are and their residence? That is absolute hogwash.

[Fair Elections Act, February 10th, 2014]

It was unbelievable, as one of my colleagues pointed out, because he did nothing wrong. There was an accounting dispute between the member and Elections Canada, one that was finally resolved in favour of the member. The overarching argument was that Elections Canada claimed the member had overspent in the 2011 election by tens of thousands of dollars. When the final resolution came to pass, it was agreed upon by Elections Canada that overspending was less than $500. That is what the member for Selkirk—Interlake had claimed all along. In other words, the member was right and Elections Canada was wrong, but the egregious part of all of this is that Elections Canada sent a letter to the Speaker of the House stating that because, in its opinion, the member had overspent in the 2011 campaign, that the member should not be allowed to sit or vote in this place.

Elections Canada did not have to do that. First, it was inappropriate at the very least. Second, Elections Canada should have at least allowed a full examination of all evidence, and if the member wanted to go to court for a decision, Elections Canada should have allowed the resolution to take place through the courts. That was not the case, but with this bill now it would be. So it respects the will of Canadians; the tens of thousands of people who voted for the member would not then be subject to the type of fear that their duly elected member would be removed from this place and would not be able to represent their views.

The bill addresses that. It would allow that any disputes between Elections Canada and a sitting member would have to be resolved completely, even if that meant going to court, before the draconian measure of trying to impose the severe sanction of removing the member from a seat would take place. That is called fairness, and that is why the bill is presented to the House. It is to make elections fairer for all Canadians but, at the same time, to impose strong sanctions against those who may wish to abuse the rights of Canadians in an election.

I look forward to more debate on this matter, and I very much look forward to this being presented before the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs in short order, so we can begin to conduct an in-depth examination of this very, very fine piece of legislation.

[Fair Elections Act, February 10th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to stand in this place today and speak in favour of Bill C-23, the fair elections act, for a number of reasons. We finally have a governance model that would give Canadians even more confidence that elections are being run in a fair manner, but there are also provisions in Bill C-23 that would seriously impede those who wish to perpetrate election fraud by bringing down stricter penalties and even jail time in some cases for those fraudsters who want to try to unduly affect the outcome of an election.

Before I talk about specific elements within the bill, I do want to spend a few moments of my time dispelling some of the myths that have been propagated by members of the opposition, particularly the members of the NDP.

Without question, it is fair to say that the NDP has absolutely no credibility when it comes to presenting opposition to this bill. Let me give two examples.

The first example is that, the day the Minister of State (Democratic Reform) introduced Bill C-23 in Parliament, the member for Toronto—Danforth, who is also the democratic reform critic for the NDP, went outside this chamber and said that he and the entire NDP caucus would be opposing Bill C-23, but he had to admit that he had not read the bill.

The fair elections act is a comprehensive analysis, and it presents quite specific proposals on how to make the Elections Act stronger and fairer for all Canadians. However, the member for Toronto—Danforth, who is the point person on the NDP side to criticize any democratic reform initiatives, had not read the bill. He is a former law professor at Osgoode Hall Law School. I wonder whether or not that member, when he was teaching law to his students, would advocate that type of approach: to disagree with testimony in a legal proceeding without reading the testimony, or oppose contracts without reading the contracts. Of course he would not. However, that is the approach the New Democrats always take. They are simply not credible.

There is even one more hypocritical example I will point out, which is laughable, and every time I think about this I have to break out in laughter. That is the position the NDP takes with respect to the time allocation on Bill C-23.

In debate, the NDP continually states that five days of debate is not long enough to debate this bill and that somehow our government is trying to suppress the democratic rights of parliamentarians to adequately debate legislation. That is the position it has taken. I heard the member for Newton—North Delta making that very argument at the start of this debate. On Friday afternoon, I heard the member for Vancouver East advance that same argument.

The hypocritical nature of that argument is that, the day after this bill was introduced in Parliament, the aforementioned member for Toronto—Danforth, the democratic reform critic for the NDP, stood in this place and presented a motion to limit debate to five hours and then send it to committee. How can the New Democrats argue that five hours of debate is proper and good but five days of debate is somehow suppressing democracy? It is so hypocritical and so over the top that it is laughable, yet every NDP speaker who has stood up in this place makes and advances that argument. The NDP has no credibility on this issue whatsoever.

If we may, let us turn our attention to a couple of elements within the bill that illustrate why this is a good bill and a governance model that we should have had long ago in this country.

The first provision I want to speak to is the fact that, when this bill is finally given royal assent and becomes law, the Commissioner of Elections will have the tools at his disposal and the independence to properly conduct investigations of election violations. For some reason, the members of the opposition seem to think this is a bad thing. However, here is the current situation. This is why it is untenable as it stands right now.

Currently, both the Commissioner of Elections and the Director of Public Prosecutions answer to the Chief Electoral Officer. That is untenable as it, in effect, makes the Chief Electoral Officer the judge, jury, and prosecutor of all flagrant allegations of abuse, either real or imagined, and that simply cannot be allowed to continue. The Commissioner of Elections, by gaining total independence, then would have the ability to independently and impartially conduct investigations.

Frankly, any Canadian would be able to make or lodge complaints with the Commissioner of Elections, suggesting that investigations occur if they feel a violation has occurred, but they would be conducted independently of the Chief Electoral Officer. That is a good thing. One would think that the Chief Electoral Officer would welcome that because it demonstrates clearly to Canadians that his office is independent and the Commissioner of Elections, a separate arm, is independent as well. Unfortunately, it appears neither the Chief Electoral Officer nor members of the opposition feel that is an appropriate distinction. It is certainly one that I feel is appropriate.

Let me point out what the bill also would do. It would ensure that the democratic will of Canadians is respected. I point again to a recent example we have seen and talked about in the last few days, where the member for Selkirk—Interlake was subject to a lot of criticism by members of the opposition and in the media. Frankly, some accused the member of cheating in the 2011 election—

[Committees of the House, February 6th, 2014]

Once again, Mr. Speaker, I move:

That the debate be now adjourned.

[Committees of the House, February 6th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker--

[Motions for Papers, February 5th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I ask that all notices of motions for the production of papers be allowed to stand.

[Questions on the Order Paper, February 5th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I ask that all questions be allowed to stand.