Procedure and House Affairs committee  It is not nearly as frequent as in Quebec. It's actually quite infrequent.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  There is a deadline in the Municipal Elections Act in Ontario. The question has to be approved by the council and submitted to the Chief Electoral Officer by the end of March in the calendar year of the election. Next year, Ontario will hold municipal elections in October, so the

Procedure and House Affairs committee  It would be simultaneous.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Yes, they do.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Yes, financial reports and receipts had to be submitted for Ontario. The Chief Electoral Officer worked with the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Ontario to actually develop an audit, which he passed by directive, so that those campaign organizers who had to register with th

Procedure and House Affairs committee  If there were any leftover funds, those funds were in fact turned over to the Chief Electoral Officer.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I would caution the committee on a couple of issues. I think you would definitely need to address the issues of residency, because I do understand that this does change based on the various statutes across the country. Regarding the issue of identification, all jurisdictions now

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I mean on a federal question.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I would suggest to the committee that is a suggestion that may warrant some serious consideration. When I look at Ontario's experience, some of the challenges we had, certainly by the number of not-voted ballots, there was a challenge getting the message through to the electorate

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Based on our limited experience in Ontario with referendums, there's no question that there's a significant cost savings to be incurred by running them conjunctively. The issue we really incurred in Ontario, though, was perhaps caused by the actual question asked. The message w

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Good afternoon, and thank you, Mr. Preston, members of the committee, for inviting me to speak before you today on the topic of referendum legislation in Ontario and on our recent experience at Elections Ontario with a referendum in 2007. I do want to note to begin, though, that