Procedure and House Affairs committee  I'm Gary Rozon. I'm an independent auditor. I work, obviously, independently. I work with all parties. I think I have a client or two in this room right now. I've been doing this for over 10 years. Before that, I worked at Elections Canada, so I have a perspective of how things w

Procedure and House Affairs committee  That's why I didn't name names. To me, it's just crazy. In the one case that I'm speaking of, he got the paperwork in. He was in the Elections Canada mailroom, but they flat out refused to open it until they.... He had to go to court. The judge is like, “I went to law school for

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Too much stick and not enough carrot. Anyone who is a member here knows that you have financial agents and official agents who run your campaign. As I said, I've worked at elections, and I've worked independently in my own business. They are the oil that keeps this machinery goin

Procedure and House Affairs committee  The carrot is the money. Everybody can understand the money. No one says, “I'm going to mess up and forget to file.” If an agent makes an honest mistake, then a financial hit is one thing and going to court is another. It's cumbersome, and for a lot of people just the mere though

Procedure and House Affairs committee  We keep it out of court. We hit you in the pocket. In the case of your election campaign, the longer you are late in filing, it's just less money on the rebate coming back.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  What gets me is the inequity. Some of you have obviously well-financed campaigns and riding associations, and you can afford the money, but, for example, someone in the Marxist-Leninist Party who missed a deadline and has a $5,000 legal fee, doesn't have $5,000.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Agreed.