Procedure and House Affairs committee  I'm simply saying that in our British Westminster model, if the government is defeated on a matter of confidence, that is what the crown must take cognizance of. The constitutional experts can argue on that. I think the point, though.... Again I emphasize the practical versus t

Procedure and House Affairs committee  You're asking me to give an opinion on a constitutional issue, the discretion of the Governor General in a situation like that. I don't know how to answer your question, because we can start speculating: how does the Governor General know the government has manipulated? The oppos

Procedure and House Affairs committee  No, I don't think I said that.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I may have gone too far, Madam Jennings, in terms of saying it's a new paradigm. I think it is intuitive to a great extent. All I'm saying is that you have some empirical evidence—some—and I just think the reality will be that politicians will act in a certain way. That's my supp

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Mr. Chair, in my opening remarks I said the bill is incremental. It's not revolutionary and it's not going to solve all these problems. I still think it's an improvement. Particularly in the case of recruiting more minorities, women, and aboriginal people, the mere fact that pr

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Mr. Chair, I think I can only refer to what I said before. We cannot alter the legal situation. You're right, it is a bit subjective, but unless there's a national crisis or in the case of a majority government, for some reason--which is rare in our system, or almost impossible--

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Mr. Guimond, as I said earlier, there are no guarantees here. The only way you could have a guarantee is by amending the Constitution. We don't want to go down that route. But short of that, I think what you're going to find--again I cite experience--is that first ministers will

Procedure and House Affairs committee  On your specific question, Mr. Reid, I will take the assignment of making a written submisssion. I'd be willing to do that and I will undertake to put something together as soon as I can.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  One minute on this question, Mr. Chair? I'll try. Mr. Chair, Madam Jennings is absolutely right when she says that legally nothing in Bill C-16 changes the current legal situation or the conventions of the Constitution. The reason it cannot is because the only way that can be af

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I put faith in the intelligence of the electorate. With a fixed election date, if governments try to use government advertising, it's patent. The electorate will know. If a government on the eve of a fixed election date starts engaging in government advertising, it will be obviou

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Perish the thought, Mr. Guimond. I didn't have that thought at all. Are you suggesting Sunday as well as Monday, or are you just saying Sunday as the election day?

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I think traditionally, historically, for a lot of Canadians that is not regarded as an appropriate day for that kind of public political activity, so I wouldn't be favourably disposed to a Sunday date. I think that since Sir John A's day, or Laurier's day anyway, the tradition h

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I think your specific question, Mr. Guimond, is whether Sunday voting would increase the voter turnout.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  The difficulty, Mr. Chair, is that for any date you choose, there will always be potential conflicts. Of course the bill allows for some flexibility in that regard, in terms of cultural or religious events and so on. Certainly from a party operational point of view, I think the

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Mr. Owen, I'm from British Columbia, as you are, and we don't have to just speak in theory; we can look at practice. Correct me if I'm wrong, but British Columbia has gone through a full cycle of fixed election dates, and I don't believe those difficulties arose. I think British