[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]
Tuesday, May 28, 1996
.1109 
[English]
The Chairman: I call this meeting to order. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.
On your behalf, colleagues, I want to welcome the Chief Electoral Officer back to the table, together with Ms Vézina, Mr. Léger and Mr. Girard. Welcome to our committee.
Today we are doing a discussion of main estimates for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1997. As you know, it's vote 20 under the Privy Council estimates.
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I know you've circulated a statement, but are you intending to read from it?
Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley (Chief Electoral Officer of Canada): Mr. Chairman, I can dispense with reading the statement if you wish and have it considered read into the record. It's up to you.
The Chairman: That's fine. It's just gives you more chance -
Mr. Kingsley: I've rehearsed it and I know where the punctuation is, but it's up to you.
The Chairman: It gives you more opportunity to answer questions.
Mr. Kingsley: Sure, and everyone knows the functions of my colleagues because that's in the text as well. I can easily dispense with that.
The Chairman: You're well known and well known before the committee, so it might save some time for members interested in questioning.
Can I take as read the notes and remarks that Mr. Kingsley has presented?
Some hon. members: Agreed.
Statement by Jean-Pierre Kingsley: Greetings, members of the committee.
Allow me to introduce the Elections Canada officials who have joined me today:Mrs. Janice Vézina, Director of Election Financing; Mr. Jean-Claude Léger, Director of Operations; and Mr. Jacques Girard, Director of Legal Services and Registrar of Political Parties.
We welcome this opportunity to discuss Part Three of the Main Estimates that my office has tabled for the 1996-97 fiscal year and to answer any questions you may have related to them.
As the committee knows, Elections Canada operates under two separate budgetary authorities. The administrative vote, controlled by Treasury Board, provides primarily for the salaries of a core group of full-time employees.
The statutory authority expenditures include the costs of services, supplies and additional staff required in the preparation for and the conduct of general elections, byelections and referendums. They also include costs related to our responsibilities under the Electoral Boundaries Readjustment Act and the Northwest Territories Elections Act and to special projects such as the register of electors.
For 1995-96, our administrative requirements of $3.2 million and our statutory forecast of $19.5 million totalled $22.7 million.
The additional projected statutory expenditures of some $4.5 million are included in our supplementary estimates and have been incorporated in the final projected total expenditures for 1995-96.
For 1996-97, our administrative requirements remain at $3.2 million while our statutory forecast is $20.6 million for a total of $23.8 million.
I would like to point out to the committee that in accordance with instructions received from the Treasury Board Secretariat we have integrated the outlook document within Part Three of the Main Estimates. However, because of the timing of the tabling of Part Three of the Main Estimates, we were requested to remove any information related to future years' spending. We have advised the chairman of the committee of this situation and we have provided the committee with a table detailing the resource requirements that were removed from the document. It is our hope that any question related to this information will be addressed today to save the committee from having to schedule another appearance for that purpose.
Key Initiatives for 1996-97. The 1996-97 Main Estimates will allow Elections Canada to continue the initiatives on which I have briefed the committee previously. These initiatives reflect Election Canada's ongoing efforts: to remain ready at all times to conduct electoral events; to inform Canadians about their electoral process and democratic heritage; to use information technology, integrated planning and innovative operating procedures to help us work more efficiently and effectively; to finalize the computerization of our cartographic services and other operational aspects of redistribution; to provide training for both new and experienced returning officers; and to provide support to Parliament's efforts to reform and modernize electoral legislation.
I would now like to take this opportunity to highlight certain initiatives that we believe warrant the committee's attention.
Information Technology. Elections Canada uses the tools of information technology to help plan and maintain a state of electoral event readiness to achieve greater efficiency in our internal operations and to deliver high quality electoral services.
Since October 1995, we have provided increased public access to electoral information through our site on the internet. The preliminary voting results of the Northwest Territories election were published on the internet beginning at 8:00 p.m. eastern time, on polling night, October 16, 1995. For the six federal byelections held earlier this year, we published general and riding-specific information on the internet throughout the electoral period, as well as the preliminary voting results beginning on polling night, March 25, 1996. Similarly, information about the current byelection in Hamilton East is now available on the internet and the preliminary voting results will be published on polling night.
In the 1996-97 fiscal year, we will implement a new information technology strategic plan and explore the full automation of returning office operations and their integration with our head office business systems.
Electoral Geography. In the 1995-96 fiscal year, Elections Canada entered the final phase of a major multi-year initiative aimed at producing digitally generated electoral district and polling division maps. We anticipate that the maps for all electoral districts, either newly created or reorganized as a result of redistribution, will be completed by this July, while the polling division maps will be completed by January 1997. I have been advised by the Hon. Herb Gray that the appointment of returning officers will proceed shortly.
Using the geographic information system we can produce computer-drawn maps of electoral districts as scales convenient for use by returning officers, candidates and political parties. To create this system and to avoid duplication, Elections Canada built upon work already done by other organizations, including Statistics Canada and Natural Resources Canada.
The geographic information system also creates opportunities to share lists of electors with other jurisdictions by organizing them to fit particular polling division boundaries. In this way, the geographic information system is a key component of the register of electors. It is also critical to the completion of the redistribution process.
Electoral Boundaries Readjustment. Elections Canada resumed activities in support of Electoral Boundaries Readjustment in the 1995-96 fiscal year. I submitted the reports of the boundaries commission to the Speaker of the House of Commons and the representation order to the Hon. Herb Gray. The representation order was then proclaimed by the governor in council on January 8, 1996.
The new electoral districts will come into effect upon the first dissolution of Parliament that occurs at least one year after proclamation of the representation order; that is, after January 8, 1997.
Therefore, while the 301 electoral districts would be in effect for a general election called after January 8, 1997, a federal referendum or byelection held before the next dissolution of Parliament or a general election called on or before January 8, 1997, would be conducted according to the existing 295 electoral districts.
In order to maintain a continuous state of event readiness during this transitional period, we are preparing for future electoral events on the basis of both sets of boundaries. In fact, until the new boundaries become effective, we must maintain two lists of returning officers available for electoral events: one list for the 295 districts and one for the 301 districts.
Training for new returning officers and refresher courses for experienced returning officers began in February and will continue throughout 1996. We have estimated that this exercise will cost approximately $1.1 million during the 1996-97 fiscal year.
Electoral Reform. Elections Canada will continue to be a active participant in the process of reforming electoral legislation in accordance with the will of the committee.
In the 1995-96 fiscal year we provided assistance to the committee in its review of the Electoral Boundaries Readjustment Act and Bill C-319, an act to amend the Canada Elections Act (with respect to the reimbursement of election expenses). We also revised the regulation to the Referendum Act to bring it in line with the 1993 amendments to the Canada Elections Act.
Moreover, with the committee's concurrence, we prepared a report on the feasibility of the creation and maintenance of a register of electors as well as draft amendments to the legislation. These documents were distributed to the members on March 28, 1996.
In February, the annex to the chief electoral officer's statutory report on the 35th General Election was tabled with the Speaker of the House of Commons. Mr. Boudria had asked when the annex would be available when I appeared before the committee last fall.
The annex contains 122 recommendations that in our opinion are desirable for the better administration of the Canada Elections Act. The recommendations which emphasize the principles of participation, fairness, transparency and the public's right to know, are intended to initiate dialogue and to assist Parliament in its work as it relates to electoral matters. Our first priority, however, remains the register of electors.
The Register of Electors. Work to implement a register of electors will continue throughout 1996. We expect to have all the preliminary tasks completed by the end of the 1996-97 fiscal year so that the work of actually putting a register of electors in place could proceed the following fiscal year, thereby allowing savings in the order of approximately $30 million per federal electoral event to begin to accrue following the next event. My colleagues and I addressed the register of electors in detail when we appeared before the committee on April 30.
This concluded my formal remarks regarding Part Three of the Main Estimates that my office has tabled for the 1996-97 fiscal year. My colleagues and I welcome your questions.
The Chairman: Who would like to be the first questioner? Is anyone ready? Are there no questions?
Shall vote 20 carry?
Mr. Strahl (Fraser Valley East): Now, now, now.
Some hon. members: Oh, oh!
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin (Joliette): I was going to ask several questions, but I only have one just now.
[English]
The Chairman: That's fine. I'll go to Mr. Strahl.
Mr. Strahl: I'm going to start fishing for some too.
Thanks for your remarks, which I have now speedily read through. Is there one change you would like highlight from your remarks that you didn't give? What one thing has changed that you're most excited about?
Mr. Kingsley: In terms of changes about which I'm excited, everything that goes on at Elections Canada excites me -
Mr. Strahl: Is exciting, yes, okay.
Mr. Kingsley: No, I said ``excites me'', and I think it's going to start exciting parliamentarians as well. It has done that in the past.
In the budgetary process, the one item that is a $1,100,000 difference, if you look from year to year, is the amount of moneys we are allocating for the training of returning officers.
We have to do this as a major exercise. There are 31 returning officers who continue in their positions. Their ridings were not affected through redistribution and therefore they continue in their positions. It also means there are 270 returning officers who could theoretically all be replaced, because the law says that once the ridings change, the returning officer's appointment is finished. So we have to train all of these people and retrain the 31.
I'm sure the members of the committee will appreciate that the political importance of this is owing to the fact that under the law, once redistribution occurs, in order to be ready for the next electoral event the new polling divisions within the new boundaries have to be drawn. We now have software to do this, but the product of this software has to be reviewed by the returning officer. Only he or she by law can approve it.
I have sensitized the government about the timeframes because the appointment of returning officers is a Governor in Council appointment, and I have been assured through Mr. Gray, who speaks to the Chief Electoral Officer on behalf of the government, that these appointments will be proceeded with forthwith. Presumably by the end of the summer all of these appointments will be finalized and we will be able to proceed with the training.
That's the one item. I did elaborate a little further to give you the total picture because I intended to ad lib that portion of my remarks.
Mr. Strahl: That would explain why members of Parliament or anybody else cannot get the maps for the new boundaries with the polls and so on in place. You have to wait until your returning officers are in place before you give us a -
Mr. Kingsley: That's right.
Mr. Strahl: We have been asking for it, and it's just not there yet because of what you've just explained.
Mr. Kingsley: We're waiting for that. The only two atlases, which are maps of all the ridings within each province, that are left are Ontario and Quebec. We were doing all of the work simultaneously, but those two most populous provinces should be ready between mid-June and the third week in June. After that, once the returning officers are appointed, we do the polling divisions within the new boundaries.
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I hope the committee appreciates what it means for Elections Canada to have to be ready to dance on either foot at any time. If an event is called before January 8, 1997, we have to be ready to dance with 295 ridings and then to dance with 301 as of that date, but not if it's a by-election and not if it's a national referendum, when we still have to dance with the 295 ridings, which means we have to keep 295 returning officers and keep the whole structure going for 295 as well as for 301. If there's a by-election in July 1997 we could be running along in accordance with existing boundaries, so we have to have the old returning officer still in tow.
Mr. Strahl: How do you budget for by-elections? You have no idea how many by-elections you're going to be faced with, like this by-election in Hamilton, for example. The newspapers say it's a $500,000 ticket.
Mr. Kingsley: At this time we've budgeted $539,000 for that exercise.
In the estimates before you, we do not present any moneys owing to by-elections. That is why the Chief Electoral Officer is vested with a statutory authority to spend for these unforeseeable events. A general election and a referendum are always considered unforeseeable events insofar as budgeting is concerned. That is not in the numbers before you. We budget for them through supplementary estimates, sir.
Mr. Strahl: Because you have to be ready for an election at any time, your budget doesn't change from year to year, does it? It changes very little from what I can see. In other words, you have to be as ready this fall as you need to be in 1997.
Mr. Kingsley: Yes, as I needed to be ready when the Quebec referendum was going on, asI needed to be ready before the Quebec referendum, and as I need to be ready six months after a general election has just finished.
Mr. Strahl: You have to prepare for it and you don't try to peak at any particular time. So the budgets we see here are just the regular events. You don't get a hint as to when the election is going to be but you don't get extra excited - I know you're excited all the time about elections - and you don't try to peak this excitement in any particular year or -
Mr. Kingsley: No, we don't.
But I do want to tell the committee that we're doing what I call ``catching up'' in terms of computerization not only in the returning offices but in the head office, so I expect we will come down in terms of the general operating budget from year to year, probably after the next general election when we will have finalized or quasi-finalized the computerization of our offices and our head office.
Mr. Strahl: I think my official agent is going to be pleased to hear that. His complaint last time was the cost he incurred - and that Elections Canada must have incurred - due to the fact that everything was on an old paper trail system that just drove him nuts, and he thought it must do the same to you here in Ottawa. He put it on a common accounting system and you didn't even want that.
Mr. Kingsley: That's right.
Mr. Strahl: It's still on the old triplicate papers and so on. Is that going to change?
Mr. Kingsley: That is going to change. For the by-election that is going on now, we're offering official agents and candidates the option of filing with us in electronic form.
Mr. Strahl: That's good.
Mr. Kingsley: We're doing it as a pilot project, and based on the results, we will want to extend that to those who will be organized that way for the next general election.
Mr. Strahl: Okay.
Mr. Kingsley: This is why by-elections are so useful to us.
Mr. Strahl: We think they're useful, too -
Some hon. members: Oh, oh!
Mr. Strahl: - but it's for a different kind of strategic reason.
Thank you.
The Chairman: Thank you. Mr. Milliken, please.
Mr. Milliken (Kingston and the Islands): Mr. Chairman, I have a question about the ultimate cost of the redistribution process.
Mr. Kingsley, we've heard a lot about that from members in the other place who claimed they were saving Canadians millions and millions of dollars by obstructing the government's bill. What was the final cost of the boundaries commissions? Do you have the figures on that yet?
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Mr. Kingsley: Mr. Chairman, to answer Mr. Milliken, the information I've just been provided shows that the total bill is going to come in at approximately just over $6 million, which is definitely what we had told the committee before.
Mr. Milliken: So is everything in accordance with those estimates?
Mr. Kingsley: Yes, it is.
Mr. Milliken: There are not going to be any cost overruns.
Mr. Kingsley: No.
Mr. Milliken: The estimates for this year include an amount of $1,150,000 related to training of returning officers. Does that assume the appointment of new returning officers and their training?
Mr. Kingsley: It assumes the appointment of new returning officers in all 270 ridings where a nomination is called for.
Of course, the corollary answer to your question is that if there are returning officers who hold positions at the present time who are appointed into new positions, their training will cost much less.
Mr. Milliken: So would it reduce that figure?
Mr. Kingsley: It would reduce that figure. If one were to assume that approximately half of them were to be reappointed, you can knock off approximately $500,000 from that training. These are ballpark estimates, sir. It depends on where they are, where we have to get them from to travel to Ottawa, but that's a ballpark figure.
Mr. Milliken: So does the figure include travel costs?
Mr. Kingsley: Yes, it includes everything: the hotel, how much we pay them, and so on and so forth.
Mr. Milliken: Is the work on drawing boundaries for polling subdivisions within a new electoral district undertaken by the new returning officer on his or her appointment?
Mr. Kingsley: It starts the moment we call them into head office to be trained. We then initiate them into the process and they also go back to review the situation on the ground. We give them the output of the product with the software that does the initial drawing of these... or we will do that. When they go back they can review it on the ground to see particular areas that may not be completely clear in their minds to determine if that is where the boundaries should be for the polling divisions. That's when it starts.
Mr. Milliken: So they go back with a plan that has been drawn up at headquarters.
Mr. Kingsley: Yes, that is the general approach to it.
Mr. Milliken: And they're supposed to pick out problems. For example, if headquarters missed an apartment building with 350 people in it in a poll that already has 350 in single-family dwellings, the returning officer is supposed to pick that up.
Mr. Kingsley: That's right. That is the purpose of his or her involvement in the process.
Mr. Milliken: Okay.
Mr. Kingsley: And it happens regularly. That must be recognized, because our address -
Mr. Milliken: And even in an election campaign, there are changes made -
Mr. Kingsley: Of course.
Mr. Milliken: - and additional polls added.
Mr. Kingsley: Of course. The law foresees that, because apartment buildings go up like mushrooms. The law allows that to be taken into account.
Mr. Milliken: On page 22 of the estimates, you indicate that you intend to implement an ``information technology strategy''. Can you tell us what this involves? Is this going on the Internet or something?
Mr. Kingsley: Going on the Internet is part of what we are doing. But what we really meant here in terms of the information technology strategy was to ensure that before we embark on any computer application, we do a business case analysis of it. The amount of moneys for that particular aspect is not significant, but the thought is important. That is what is meant by that project,Mr. Milliken.
Mr. Milliken: Can you give me some specifics? What do you mean by application of new technology?
Mr. Kingsley: For example, if it is contemplated that for the returning office we should be moving towards electronic communications between them and us as opposed to faxes, the practice in the past, we will want to know how much the hardware costs, how much it will cost to develop the software versus how much it will cost to do the old system -
Mr. Milliken: With the fax.
Mr. Kingsley: - and we proceed only when there's a business case.
Mr. Milliken: I see.
Mr. Kingsley: That is why the emphasis there should be on strategy. The strategy is that we apply technology only when it is cost-efficient or where there are very significant advantages being bought by the extra cost.
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Mr. Milliken: This doesn't suggest that you would have engaged in any acquisition of technological equipment that wasn't cost-efficient in the past.
Mr. Kingsley: I certainly wouldn't suggest that, no.
Mr. Milliken: Now there will be a thorough investigation just in case. Is that what we're reading here in the estimates?
Mr. Kingsley: I understand what you're saying and I'm not going to reply too facetiously other than to say we have been doing it in the past, but when we do the project analysis and when we do the strategic planning, we put down some of the things we've been doing but we have it recognized. It's a bit like the strategic plan having caught up to what we were doing.
Mr. Milliken: I see. So this is really descriptive of what you're doing rather than a project.
Mr. Kingsley: That's right.
Mr. Milliken: Okay.
There's a proposal to undertake a feasibility study and, if appropriate, propose an implementation plan to train and test individuals in elections management. Can you describe briefly what that involves? Is that something new?
Mr. Kingsley: It is something new. It is a proposal that has been made within Elections Canada and we've decided to look at it. In effect, it starts to recognize that there is a need to train election officers.
When I've appeared before you in the past I have put an emphasis towards professionalism in electoral administration. We know this has occurred in other jurisdictions, in other countries, so we thought we would look at it to see if there is anything worth while of application in Canada in that respect. If there were, we would take the lead in that, but there has been no decision that we are going to proceed.
There would of course need to be establishment of a program with a university or college setting, but that's beyond where we are right now. Right now we're simply at the contemplative or consideration stage of the idea of getting some kind of university or college recognition for people who will be trained in electoral management and who could serve at not only the federal level but the provincial level or other levels in Canada.
Mr. Milliken: So this isn't intended as a kind of school operated by Elections Canada. You'd be looking at possibly having some college or university offering a course.
Mr. Kingsley: That is the only consideration. We would not consider running such a school or establishing one. It's only if there's an educational facility, if we think a case can be made that would convince them with respect to that. But that certainly is a bridge that is far from having been crossed. We haven't even built the bridge.
Mr. Milliken: Have there been discussions with any of your provincial counterparts with respect to this possibility?
Mr. Kingsley: No. We're intending to raise this at the July conference in the Northwest Territories with our provincial colleagues as part of the consideration we want to give this.
Mr. Milliken: Those are my questions for now, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman: Mr. Laurin, please.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: I'd like to go back to the topic of the appointment of returning officers, which was mentioned earlier. In the budget, $1.15 million is set aside for the appointment of approximately260 persons without experience, that is to say 260 out of 295. One might think that a lot of people had some rather special experiences and that you want to replace them. Why do you have to replace260 people?
Mr. Kingsley: In the budget, we wanted to anticipate what we would call the worst-case scenario, that is the most expensive scenario. When we prepared the budget, we thought there would be about 40 returning officers whose riding would not change. However, there were only 31. We are looking at 270 people, but the same figures continue to apply.
Personally, I hope that a large number of incumbent returning officers will be appointed to other returning officer positions in the ridings in which they live, which is where they can be appointed under the law. That would allow of course some savings in the area of training. As I indicated, if approximately half of them were re-appointed, that would mean savings of about $500,000.
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We must remember that the position of returning officer does require a certain expertise and that is why it takes eight days to train a new returning officer. If the 270 returning officers are all new men or women, we will have a problem due to a lack of expertise at that level. We cannot inculcate all of the professionalism and expertise needed through training alone.
Mr. Laurin: I know that a returning officer must be replaced if he moves to another riding. But, aside from that requirement under the law, what other reasons might cause you to replace a returning officer between elections?
Mr. Kingsley: Under the current act?
Mr. Laurin: Yes.
Mr. Kingsley: One provision of the existing act provides that the governor in council may dismiss a returning officer from his or her position for reasons set out in the law. Incompetence is one of them, and it is the main one.
Mr. Laurin: From what I can gather, you don't have much to do with all of this as Chief Electoral Officer.
Mr. Kingsley: The role of the Chief Electoral Officer is very limited in so far as appointment authority is concerned. The Chief Electoral Officer does not have that power, and his power is almost just as limited where the dismissal of a returning officer is concerned.
Mr. Laurin: According to you, can a member of Parliament play a role when someone is appointed or removed from his position?
Mr. Kingsley: I must admit that where dismissal is concerned, the member can always write to the governor in council. That is the only procedure I know that would allow him to have an influence.
Mr. Laurin: And where appointment is concerned? If I wanted to recommend that the same returning officer stay in his position would it be my prerogative or, by doing that, would I be getting involved in things that are none of my business?
Mr. Kingsley: You use the word ``prerogative'' and I will take the question from there. You determine your prerogative and you would have to exercise them with the governor in council by expressing your point of view with regard to the appointment or re-appointment of a returning officer. But the Chief Electoral Officer is not involved in the process.
Mr. Laurin: But if the last returning officer had been on the government side, that might make it easier. But in that case it would be an appointment made pursuant to my prerogative.
Can you tell us what the new five year audit plan you refer to in your report consists of? I'm referring to internal audit at Elections Canada. What is the purpose of that audit?
Mr. Kingsley: With your permission, I will ask Ms Vézina to answer Mr. Laurin's question.
[English]
Ms Janice Vézina (Director of Election Financing, Office of the Chief Electoral Officer): Thank you, Mr. Chair.
The purpose of our internal audit plan is much like that of any other organization, particularly those in government. It is to review on a cyclical basis all of our activities within the organization to ensure compliance with legislation and government policy, and to look at efficiencies of operations, control issues. So it's an internal review of our ongoing operations within Elections Canada. The plan is to set out the priorities of the audit, what we should approach first, what the priority should be.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: I'm afraid I'll run out of time, Mr. Chairman. That is why I'm trying to ask the questions I consider the most important.
You say on page 34:
- Elections Canada is preparing a study on voter opinion attitudes and behaviour during the next
general election.
- Can you tell us what the purpose of that study is? A cursory reading of that text might lead one to
think that this is an opinion poll?
M. Jacques Girard (Director, Legal Services, Elections Canada): Essentially, Mr. Laurin, the purpose of that exercise is to evaluate our performance in various regards.
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I will give you a few examples. We have made very great efforts in the past few years to make polls accessible to the handicapped. That is one of the assessments we will be making. We will ask electors whether they had trouble exercising their right to vote.
We also want to explore certain factors involving the participation rate. We want to see whether there were things in this system that prevented electors from exercising their franchise, for one reason or another. These are purely factual data that will allow us to adjust things at our end in order to have the highest possible rate of participation.
Mr. Laurin: When you talk about a study on voter opinion, that seems very different from purely factual data.
Mr. Girard: The way in which this is expressed may not be exactly accurate. Election Canada does not carry out elector opinion surveys. We will be collecting factual data, essentially. I'll give you an example, because we did a small check recently.
I mention this because Mr. Kingsley referred to it when we last appeared here. We asked voters in ridings where there had been by-elections about the voters' list and whether they would be favourable to our putting in place a permanent voters' list. The rate of favourable replies we received indicate that that idea garners wide support. That is the type of question we ask.
Mr. Laurin: Now, in so far as non-residents balloting is concerned, can you tell us what the total advertizing costs were for the 1993 general elections? Have you found ways of making that process more economical in the future? It seems it was very costly.
M. Kingsley: We are trying to see how we might determine those figures. We should have them. I think, in fact, we did set them out in the statutory report I tabled after the general election. We are going to try to retrieve them. However, in the meantime, I will answer the second part of the question: have we found ways of making the process more efficient?
Mr. Laurin: Yes, and could you also tell me how you inform non-resident electors when there is to be a by-election.
Mr. Kingsley: When there is a by-election, we do two things. First of all, we inform the people who live in the riding; on the flyers we distribute in the riding, we ask the riding residents to get in touch with us if they know a person who lives in the riding and who has the right to vote but is currently outside the country; we provide a phone number and a fax number and people can get in touch with us so that we can send them documentation. So, we open the door and ask them to get in touch with us so that we can register the person and send him or her the ballot. I'm talking now about by-elections. Incidentally, this is new; that procedure has been in existence only since the passage of Bill C-114. Formerly, electors who fell under special electoral rule did not vote in by-elections.
Those who have already registered - there are some - are still on the voters' list. We send them a letter and a ballot and we tell them that they have the right to vote since they are residents in the riding where the by-election is being held. That is basically the procedure.
You are asking me whether we were trying to find more economical ways of doing things. Personally, what I found a bit frustrating in the case of those electors was that only 15,000 or so registered for the 1993 general election, when they could do so for the first time. We had organized a publicity campaign. We had done as much publicity as we could throughout the world. We know that there were hundreds of thousands, if not more than two million such persons outside the country. No one has the exact figure here in Canada, or even a good approximation. But we knew that there were many of them.
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We put folders in each plane that left the country, in airports, in each post office, etc. In spite of all those efforts, very few people registered, which significantly increased the cost per elector.
So we decided to consider a different approach and when there is a by-election, we try to see whether asking riding residents to inform those they know abroad works well. Usually, it was someone who lived with them, or a neighbour. We are trying to focus on that approach in order to reduce costs.
We are also trying to facilitate registering through electronic means to allow as many voters as possible to register.
Have we found the figures? I will now ask Mr. Léger to answer the first part of your question, Mr. Laurin.
Mr. Jean-Claude Léger (Director of Operations, Office of the Chief Electoral Officer): The total cost of the Special Voting Rules for the 1993-1994 election was -
Mr. Laurin: For non residents.
Mr. Léger: ...$4.9 million. That amount includes the cost of registering eligible electors who are outside Canada. There were 15,192 registered, which means $911,000.
Mr. Laurin: You also said that after the 1993 election, an astounding number of complaints had not yet be settled. How do you intend to improve your process? On page 29 of your plan, you say that several complaints concerned advertising irregularities, election finances, employer failures to allow sufficient time for voting, and fraudulent use of ballot papers.
In the fall of 1995, 34 out of some 1,000 complaints were still active and 28 complaints had resulted in prosecutions. Can you tell us briefly how the law is applied in this regard?
Mr. Girard: Mr. Laurin, with regard to the 1993 election, for the election itself and the production of financial reports relating to it, which are published long after the election, we opened 1,070 files. Out of these 1,070 files, 34 were still active, and 28 of these were about cases that were before the courts, which is a relatively low number. When a case is before the courts, we have very minimal control over the development of events. The judge decides on procedure, essentially. Finally, there are six cases that are still pending.
I have a list here, and if you will give me a few moments, I may be able to provide you with more specific information on the six cases in question. Of course, I don't know all of the details by heart.
Mr. Laurin: But can you tell me how the law is applied in these cases, what it consists of, and what are the most problematic aspects?
Mr. Girard: As you know, law enforcement in this area is the responsibility of the Commissioner of Canada Elections. After the 1992 referendum and particularly after the 1993 election, the Commissioner's Office underwent an in-depth reorganization. Essentially, the result of that reorganization was that the Commissioner's investigations are no longer carried out by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, but by investigators with the Office of the Commissioner.
This was our first step in the direction that we would eventually like to take, with a view, to some extent, to decriminalizing the electoral process. The investigators conduct their investigation and report to the Office of the Commissioner, a report that is reviewed by the Commissioner himself and his legal advisors and, at the end of the day, the Commissioner decides whether or not there is sufficient evidence to warrant going to trial.
The problem cases were unusual. Very often, they dealt with specific sections of the Act. I have a few figures here. The section of the Elections Act that requires an official agent to open a separate bank account because he is dealing with election expenditures and contributions is perhaps the best example that I can give you.
Out of 1,070 files, 300 deal with situations where the officials agents did not open a bank account or deposited money into their personal bank accounts, which complicated reporting somewhat. This represents more than 35% of the files we opened.
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In addition, certain election expenditure reports were incomplete because a signature or supporting document was missing, etc. That accounted for approximately 100 files. I'm looking at the biggest categories to give you an indication of the type of case we're discussing.
[English]
The Chairman: Just as a clarification, I agree with Mr. Laurin that the title in both French and English - ``To expand knowledge of voter behaviour'' - is a bit misleading, because I think your reply and the text indicate that you want their opinions on the process as opposed to behaviour.
Mr. Speaker, please.
Mr. Speaker (Lethbridge): I welcome you to the committee.
I want to focus on the by-election question. I understand there is a minimum of funds in the estimates relative to by-elections. You project one or two or three or an average and then put that number into the estimates as such. Would that be correct, or do you respond when the by-election is called?
Mr. Kingsley: We respond strictly when the by-election is called. The only time we would foresee any amount for by-elections when we are doing the estimates is when one is already in play and will have an impact on the forthcoming fiscal year. That is the only time. Otherwise we do not try to guess how many by-elections may be called.
Mr. Speaker: You put a number on the table, saying that the current by-election in Hamilton East is going to cost us just over $500,000. I'd be interested in a gross figure for the nine by-elections that have occurred in this parliament. Do you have that number?
Mr. Kingsley: I think we can get that quite readily. We can compute it mentally right now.
Mr. Speaker: Have you an estimate of what it might be? Are we talking about $4.5 million, based on the Hamilton East by-election?
Mr. Kingsley: Without the Hamilton East by-election, it is estimated at approximately$4.7 million. So we're talking about in the vicinity of $5.2 million at this stage.
Mr. Speaker: I'd be interested in a breakdown of each of those by-elections, a more accurate figure.
Mr. Kingsley: We can provide that to you, sir, through the chair.
Mr. Speaker: Six of the nine by-elections were created by the Prime Minister. Three senators, a commissioner, a chairman of Canada Post, and an ambassador were appointed. I'd be very interested in what that cost the public taxpayer.
Mr. Kingsley: For each one we will provide you with our detailed bottom-line costs.
Mr. Pagtakhan (Winnipeg North): I'd like to pursue the question asked earlier by the Bloc about the enforcement matters. You mentioned four categories of problems: advertising irregularities, election finances, employer failures to allow enough time for voting, and the fraudulent use of ballot papers.
Could you briefly tell us the breakdown of the 2.6% remaining or under prosecution into the categories, which are vague?
[Translation]
Mr. Girard: Twenty-eight cases are or were before the courts. This is a bit time consuming, but I will give you an idea of the type of infraction prosecuted and eventually the type of conviction that resulted.
As you know, there is a black out period, when political parties are forbidden to advertize. However, the case is not yet before the court.
There were also three cases where it was alleged that election workers had tried to find out for whom somebody had voted, thereby violating voter secrecy.
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Legal proceedings have also been initiated against an employer who apparently refused to give his employees the four hours provided for under the Elections Act to go vote.
Two cases deal with election expenditures that exceeded the limit.
In addition, legal proceedings were started in the case of some official agents who neglected to open separate bank accounts for election funding.
There are two cases of legal action against candidates and their agents who neglected to forward the audit report as required by the law.
Four cases deal with errors, and we will leave it to the court to decide whether or not these errors were made deliberately or not or whether false statements were made in the election expenditure report.
Three cases deal with what we refer to as improper behaviour with respect to ballots. Essentially, these cases deal with people who had left the polling station carrying the ballot with them, which is against the law.
One person was prosecuted for trying to vote twice and another tried to pass himself off as someone else.
You know that the Act requires that election advertizing indicate the name and designation of the official agent. In two cases, despite warnings, advertizing did not include this information, the matter was therefore brought to court.
Finally, there were six cases, and I would say that these things happen at every election, where people destroyed the election advertizing of the candidates.
These are the 28 cases that went to court.
[English]
Mr. Pagtakhan: With this experience from the 1993 election, do you still feel the present election law is excellent and needs no further amendment?
[Translation]
Mr. Girard: We cannot claim that there are laws that do not need to be changed. In this respect, changes are required and this is why we published, last february, an appendix which recommends 122 amendments to the Act.
On the whole, I have observed that, for the most part, people who contravene the law do so because they truly are not aware of the provisions of the Act. This is a very complicated act that requires a great deal from those who must enforce it during a very limited period of time every four years. It is not the same as when you work continuously with another law and you get a chance to become familiar with it. I think it's a matter of education, and we are taking action at this level by trying to provide the official agents and candidates with the tools that will help them to abide by the Act.
[English]
Mr. Pagtakhan: Do you have any estimate of the cost of these investigations and prosecutions in the budget?
[Translation]
Mr. Girard: Yes. The budget for the Office of the Commissioner - I will give you some round figures - was $600,000 for the general election of 1993. For the two subsequent years, the budget was between $250,000 and $300,000. That includes the investigations, the salaries of the Commissioner staff and legal proceedings.
[English]
Mr. Pagtakhan: Mr. Chairman, I'd like to go on to the international activities, if I may.
The Chairman: Colleague, I'm afraid you're out of time.
Mr. Pagtakhan: I defer to the chair.
The Chairman: Okay. Mrs. Catterall.
Ms Catterall (Ottawa West): I wanted to ask about the Electoral Reform Commission. Its recommendations and so on have still not necessarily been completely or finally dealt with. In your estimates, have you provided for any additional work on that project?
Mr. Kingsley: In effect, no, because we did do our bit to follow up on that through the annex to which the director of legal services just referred.
With 122 recommendations, we effectively tried to pick up on everything the royal commission said, and, quite honestly, we did modify some of the recommendations to make them - in our view - more practical, not in the sense that the others were impractical but they may have been viewed that way, certainly by parties and candidates. We were more sensitive to that.
But we've done that, and of course, if there's ever a need for follow-up - because the committee may wish to call us one day to follow up on that - we do have some staff whose work would then go in that direction. They work mainly in Mr. Girard's area because he's in charge of policy development.
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Ms Catterall: If Parliament were to decide that it wished to pursue other reforms pursuant to the Lortie commission, what would the timeframe be?
Mr. Kingsley: By law, should the committee decide on it, and should Parliament enact legislation, I have a maximum of six months to implement it.
Ms Catterall: Is that following passage by Parliament?
Mr. Kingsley: That's right.
But at Elections Canada we have done something about which I'm very proud. Bill C-114 was a massive revamping of the electoral law in terms of giving access to the electorate, and within six weeks we turned around and told Parliament through the Canada Gazette that we were ready to fully implement everything that had been changed under C-114.
So it would obviously depend upon the nature of the change, but we now have machinery in Elections Canada where we - in one way I hate to say it, because it sounds like bravado - thrive on change.
Go ahead, make my day! We thrive on change. We look forward to it. If it will be the cause of better elections in Canada, we're going to work day and night to make it happen. I'm not promising you six weeks; it would depend on the nature of the change, but once we see where the changes are going we can start gearing our thinking and start doing some pre-planning. That's what we did for Bill C-114.
Ms Catterall: The bottom line of what you're saying is that if there were any changes Parliament wanted in place before the next election, it would need to give you six months before an election to implement them.
Mr. Kingsley: That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying we can do better than six months on practically anything. The moment I have an idea of what it is you wish to change, I can tell you how much time I'll need after enactment. It wouldn't be more than six months.
Ms Catterall: I wonder if you could spend a few minutes giving us a brief outline of the difference between your statutory expenditures - I understand the amounts - and those expenditures that require a vote and come under the authority of Treasury Board and of how you allocate costs to one or the other.
Mr. Kingsley: The difference between the two is not easy to arrive at in the sense that the administrative vote is the vote that has been recognized over the years as the one where there is the possibility of Treasury Board review. That is the one that has been subject to cuts. When the government announces a cut and Elections Canada has to comply, that is where matters are reduced. Effectively, it has covered essentially our permanent staff.
The statutory authority is the authority under which we pay for the direct costs related to the holding of an electoral event, be it a referendum or an election or, for example, the redrawing of boundary maps.
I'll give you an example. There are only three people covered under the administrative vote who do the mapping. There are fourteen or fifteen others - and I may be wrong by one or two - who are covered under the statutory authority and have been for twenty years. My predecessor established that, and I've maintained it, because that is associated with getting ready for the next electoral event, so -
Ms Catterall: Can I interrupt?
You've totally changed the way you approach the mapping.
Mr. Kingsley: Yes.
Ms Catterall: So are you telling me the same administrative structure that was in place fifteen or twenty years ago is still in place even though you've totally changed the process?
Mr. Kingsley: No. It's not the same administrative structure. I'm responding directly and solely to your question about where people get charged to and how we make the distinction. I'm saying we make it with difficulty. I want to be very honest with the committee.
Usually we charge the permanent staff under the administrative vote. The rest of the staff are term employees at Elections Canada for all intents and purposes, so that we have the ability to terminate the term of someone who has been there twenty years whenever it comes up. There are people who have been there as term employees for twenty years.
Mapping is the one example that comes out, because with only three people it's impossible to do all the mapping of this country, even with computers.
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The Chairman: We are almost out of time, but I will take two short direct questions, one from Mr. Strahl and one from Mr. Laurin.
Mr. Strahl: You say that on your election officer accreditation, you're going to investigate that and see if it's feasible or not. Is that for the returning officer? Are you thinking at the returning officer level or are you thinking at the 250,000 worker level? What training are you thinking of there?
Mr. Kingsley: Effectively, we are thinking in terms of people who would hold positions within the head office. There's only one office in Canada for Elections Canada, that core group. In terms of returning officers, eventually it could be considered as part of a pre-requirement before one can accede to that. I think you have to see this in light of the recommendation that is made in the annex, where effectively I recommend that the Office of the Chief Electoral Officer be made responsible for appointments and selection.
Mr. Strahl: As it is right now, the government appoints the 301 officers.
Mr. Kingsley: Yes.
Mr. Strahl: They choose the criteria out of whatever they want, I guess; they pick the people.
I'm just interested in this. When you're dealing with international assistance and activities, do you recommend that returning officers be appointed by the government, or do you recommend a neutral, public service type of approach? I'm just wondering whether we're following what we recommend internationally. Right now the government picks its own people. Internationally do we recommend that or do we recommend that you have a more arm's length approach?
Mr. Kingsley: I will answer very briefly because I know the chair is anxious, and quite rightly so.
There are two types of international activities. One is electoral observation. Elections Canada is not involved in selecting people. The other one is electoral assistance, capacity building. Elections Canada is involved in that. When Elections Canada is involved, the Chief Electoral Officer selects the people who go, period.
Mr. Strahl: So the government does not.
Mr. Kingsley: No.
Mr. Strahl: Thank you.
The Chairman: Mr. Laurin, you have the last question.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: Mr. Kingsley, does the current act allow the Governor-in-Council to select the returning officers by means of a public competition, for instance, or do we have to amend the law in order to have such a process?
Mr. Kingsley: No amendment to the act will be needed. The Governor-in-Council can chose and appoint people on the basis of any criteria of its own choosing. In its defense, I must say that the Governor-in-Council has asked us to suggest some selection criteria. We have offered to do so and we have offered a video that explains the nature of the position to the people. During the training of these individuals, we realized that many of them did not expect to have to work so hard in such a position. It's quite an undertaking.
Hence, it is up to the Governor-in-Council to set the criteria, but these criteria were based on our recommendations.
Mr. Laurin: To appoint the returning officers.
Mr. Kingsley: Yes but I must repeat that my office has never been involved in reviewing the case of the individuals that are being considered.
Mr. Laurin: In Canada, is it necessary to have observers during our elections? Do you foresee amending the act in order to permit such a thing?
Mr. Kingsley: We do not foresee international observers wanting to come here to make sure that our process is being carried out correctly. In order to assist countries on the road to democracy to gain some experience, we have been asked, in the past, to allow people from these countries to come here in order to observe how elections are conducted. According to the current legislation, I cannot allow these people to enter the polling stations. Given the situation, we are recommending that the act be amended.
[English]
The Chairman: Merci.
Colleagues, on your behalf I want to thank the witnesses for a stimulating presentation, as always. I'm sure we'll be seeing them on a more frequent basis, as we hopefully will be disposing of other matters our committee has been seized with. I want to thank all of you for being with us today.
Colleagues, are you ready for the question? Shall vote 20 under the Privy Council carry?
PRIVY COUNCIL
- Chief Electoral Officer
Vote 20 agreed to
The Chairman: Shall I report vote 20 to the House?
Some hon. members: Agreed.
The Chairman: Thank you.
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Mr. Kingsley: Mr. Chairman, there was a question about the international front and there may be other questions by members. We're open all the time for your questions. Please give me a call. Thank you.
The Chairman: Thank you.
We're adjourned.