Electoral Reform committee  I don't think that legitimacy comes down to an option like that. It's the entire process that matters. If you have a process that has a referendum, then that would be one way of thinking about legitimacy, but as I said in my remarks, it's not required for legitimacy. My concern around a referendum is that it's not politically neutral, because it tends to favour the status quo, as we've seen in the provincial efforts at electoral reform.

Electoral Reform committee  As a lot—

Electoral Reform committee  I think the problem isn't so much that people who are participating in a referendum have made the wrong decision. It's more that...what the research seems to show in a number of studies is that there isn't sufficient education or money put into educating people in terms of what is at stake in a referendum.

Electoral Reform committee  If I understand the question, you're asking whether a referendum is required. Is that the question?

Electoral Reform committee  I think it would depend on the deliberations of this committee. If at the end of your deliberations you reach a consensus—let's say that everyone agrees to a particular proposal and everyone has signed on, and you have in fact reached as many witnesses and as many Canadians as possible—that might, as you say, be enough.

Electoral Reform committee  I guess I should clarify that in all the research you cited, the point I was making was that there must be a number of items. I'll turn to citizens in a moment, but the bigger point was that it's much better if there's consensus among the political parties. It can't just be the majority party, whatever that party happens to be at any given moment, pushing through major reforms.

Electoral Reform committee  Are you asking me?

Electoral Reform committee  I think one of the challenges with trying to come up with a substantive proposal is that you have both advantages and disadvantages for every electoral system. They all involve trade-offs of various kinds in terms of values, outcomes, and so on. I think it would be helpful to get a sense from Canadians as to what kinds of things they would prioritize over others, depending on the kind of electoral system that is chosen.

Electoral Reform committee  I think it would add to the legitimacy, certainly. I don't know that I would make it a mandatory rule. I don't know that I would make it a requirement, but if it were the case that you were able to secure a supermajority or a significant majority, I certainly think that would add to the democratic legitimacy of the vote.

Electoral Reform committee  I think it certainly does. It would be important, I think, for the committee to really flesh those prior processes out—the 2004 Law Commission report, or any other kind of report—to back up whatever recommendations the committee makes in whatever report comes out.

Electoral Reform committee  I think whether or not it's realistic depends in part on what happens in the next few months. If the process can fully vet the options and fully reach as many Canadians as possible, then that's one way of thinking about realistic. In terms of democratic legitimacy, I think that raises some concerns as to whether the perception will be that this process has been too accelerated in terms of not reaching every person or not considering all the options.

Electoral Reform committee  First of all, I think it's excellent that the committee is consulting broadly with Canadians from all parts of the country. I think that's very commendable and stands in some considerable contrast to what we saw with the Fair Elections Act. I think it's very important that Canadians feel that there is a voice for them in this process.

Electoral Reform committee  Certainly there are constitutional rules around provincial representation or distribution, and those would have to be respected and would have to be met. Most of the common proposals that are floating around, however, would not violate those distributional principles, provided they were in fact taken to account, which I assume they would be.

Electoral Reform committee  Absolutely. It rebuts the worry or the presumption that partisan self-interest is the only motivation for a particular proposal for reform. If the governing party selects a reform option that is not optimal for that party's political success in a future election, then from a legitimacy perspective that would certainly be viewed as being a more principled decision than a decision that was clearly self-interested in the sense that it would enhance the governing party's political success in a future election.

Electoral Reform committee  The constitutional question is a somewhat complex one. I don't know how much time or interest there is for hearing all the details, but I will say that until the Supreme Court's Senate reference decision, it seemed pretty clear that Parliament could actually make electoral reform decisions or changes to election laws, provided it went through the normal parliamentary process.