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37th PARLIAMENT, 2nd SESSION

Standing Committee on Official Languages

EVIDENCE

CONTENTS

Wednesday, February 5, 2003

1530

The Chair (Mr. Mauril Bélanger (Ottawa—Vanier, Lib.))

Mr. Eugène Bellemare (Ottawa—Orléans, Lib.)

The Chair

Mr. Eugène Bellemare

The Chair

Mr. Eugène Bellemare

The Chair

Mr. Yvon Godin (Acadie—Bathurst, NDP)

Mr. Eugène Bellemare

The Chair

Mr. John Herron (Fundy—Royal, PC)

The Chair

1535

Mr. Denis Duval (Political Scientist and Economist, Société des Acadiens et Acadiennes du Nouveau-Brunswick)

Mr. Denis Duval

1540

1545

The Chair

Mr. Denis Duval

1550

1555

The Chair

Mr. Rahim Jaffer (Edmonton—Strathcona, Canadian Alliance)

Mr. Denis Duval

1600

The Chair

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau (Repentigny, BQ)

Mr. Denis Duval

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mr. Denis Duval

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mr. Denis Duval

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mr. Denis Duval

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mr. Denis Duval

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mr. Denis Duval

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

1605

Mr. Denis Duval

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mr. Denis Duval

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mr. Denis Duval

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mr. Denis Duval

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mr. Denis Duval

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mr. Denis Duval

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

The Chair

Mr. Yvon Godin

1610

Mr. Denis Duval

Mr. Yvon Godin

M. Denis Duval

Mr. Yvon Godin

Mr. Denis Duval

Mr. Yvon Godin

Mr. Denis Duval

Mr. Yvon Godin

Mr. Denis Duval

1615

Mr. Yvon Godin

Mr. Denis Duval

The Chair

Mr. Eugène Bellemare

Mr. Denis Duval

Mr. Eugène Bellemare

Mr. Denis Duval

Mr. Eugène Bellemare

Mr. Denis Duval

1620

Mr. Eugène Bellemare

The Chair

Mr. Eugène Bellemare

The Chair

Mr. Eugène Bellemare

The Chair

Mr. John Herron

1625

The Chair

Mr. John Herron

Mr. Denis Duval

1630

The Chair

Mr. John Herron

Mr. Denis Duval

The Chair

Mr. Denis Duval

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley (Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada)

1640

1645

The Chair

Mr. Brian Fitzpatrick (Prince Albert, Canadian Alliance)

1650

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. Brian Fitzpatrick

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. Brian Fitzpatrick

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. Brian Fitzpatrick

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

1655

The Chair

Ms. Yolande Thibeault (Saint-Lambert, Lib.)

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Ms. Yolande Thibeault

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

1700

The Chair

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

1705

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

The Chair

Mr. Eugène Bellemare

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Ms. Diane Davidson (Deputy Chief Electoral Officer and Chief Legal Counsel, Elections Canada)

Mr. Eugène Bellemare

Ms. Diane Davidson

1710

Mr. Eugène Bellemare

The Chair

Mr. Eugène Bellemare

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

The Chair

Mr. Yvon Godin

1715

The Chair

Mr. Yvon Godin

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. Yvon Godin

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

1720

The Chair

Mr. John Herron

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. John Herron

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. John Herron

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. John Herron

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. John Herron

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. John Herron

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. John Herron

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. John Herron

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. John Herron

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. John Herron

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

1725

Mr. John Herron

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

Mr. John Herron

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

The Chair

1730

Ms. Diane Davidson

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

The Chair

1735

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley

The Chair

1740

Ms. Dyane Adam (Commissioner of Official Languages, Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages)

The Chair

Mr. Yvon Godin

Ms. Dyane Adam

The Chair

CANADA

Standing Committee on Official Languages

NUMBER 008

2nd SESSION

37th PARLIAMENT

EVIDENCE

Wednesday, February 5, 2003

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

¹ (1530)

[Translation]

The Chair (Mr. Mauril Bélanger (Ottawa—Vanier, Lib.)): Ladies and gentlemen, we have a reduced quorum to hear witnesses, a quorum of four, unless I am mistaken. We have five members, plus one on the phone, who will join us shortly. So, I will officially start the first part of our meeting today, which will last one hour, from 3:30 to 4:30. We will hear from Mr. Denis Duval, Political Scientist and Economist, who is a representative or member of the Société des Acadiens et Acadiennes du Nouveau-Brunswick. His presentation will deal with today's subject, which is electoral boundaries readjustment and the notion of community of interests.

Then, from 4:30 to 5:30, we will receive the Chief Electoral Officer of Elections Canada, Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley, who will also be with us for an hour. He will be accompanied by other people, who will be introduced to us at that time.

Mr. Eugène Bellemare (Ottawa—Orléans, Lib.): On the same subject?

The Chair: On the same subject.

Mr. Eugène Bellemare: Mr. Chairman, should we end before 4:30, can we begin the 4:30 meeting earlier?

The Chair: That depends on whether our witnesses will have arrived. We'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

Mr. Duval, you have the floor. You have about 10 minutes, but we are flexible. I just want to point out to you from the outset that you sent us a document which was translated and distributed to committee members. However, you also gave us, yesterday or today, maps which are only available in one language. Our committee's policy is very strict: we only distribute documents which are available in both languages, unless there is unanimous consent to proceed otherwise.

That is at issue right now. I have to ensure that the rules are applied and unless members decide otherwise, we will not be able to distribute the maps.

Mr. Eugène Bellemare: Mr. Chairman, since we are hearing from a citizen and not an official government agency, I propose today that the committee unanimously agree that the maps be passed out.

The Chair: Moved by Mr. Bellemare. Are there any comments or questions?

Mr. Godin.

Mr. Yvon Godin (Acadie—Bathurst, NDP): Mr. Chairman, I suggest that the motion not indicate that we are proceeding this way because we are dealing with a citizen and not an agency. This may create a precedent. We should go ahead in this specific case today only, since the maps have been translated into both languages, except for the title. So, I think we should support the motion.

Mr. Eugène Bellemare: Mr. Chairman, I completely agree with Mr. Godin's amendment.

(Amendment agreed to)

The Chair: Ladies and gentlemen, the motion proposes that we suspend our policy to allow for the distribution of maps which contain notes written in only one of Canada's official languages. Are there any other questions or comments?

Mr. John Herron (Fundy—Royal, PC): The Progressive Conservative Party sees no problem with supporting the motion.

The Chair: Are there any other questions or comments?

(Motion as amended agreed to)

The Chair: We can go ahead with the distribution of the maps.

Mr. Duval, you have the floor. Please allow another 30 seconds for the maps to be handed out.

¹ (1535)

Mr. Denis Duval (Political Scientist and Economist, Société des Acadiens et Acadiennes du Nouveau-Brunswick): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Ladies and gentlemen, I was pleased to accept the invitation of the SAANB to meet with you and to present the results of research I have been doing for several years on the redrawing of federal electoral boundaries in New Brunswick. More specifically, I will talk about the federal riding of Acadie-Bathurst, as I was asked to do. I was invited at the last minute, last Thursday. With regard to the maps which were handed out to you, I simply want to say that there were two snow storms— 70 centimetres of snow fell in two days—and that is the reason why it was impossible to translate the geographical maps, which number 36. I appreciate the fact that they were handed out, since it will make my presentation easier.

Mr. Denis Duval: Before I begin to talk about the results of my research with regard to communities of interest and the way they can be identified and located in New Brunswick, I simply want to point out that the research was designed to serve as a basis for a court application against the federal government with regard to the federal electoral map of 1996. Two lawyers contacted me, Mr. Roger Bilodeau and Ms. Anne Dugas-Horsman, because they were not satisfied with the electoral map and wished to obtain an independent opinion on the issue of whether the Commission had respected the communities of interest. I submitted my research projects to them—they accepted two out of three—whose purpose was to identify existing communities of interest based on high standards of scientific rigour. They accepted my research papers as they stood, financed my work, or at least provided funding to pay for the students involved in the research, and other support, photocopies and so on. Due to illness—I had cancer that year—the court application never went ahead. It is the main reason why the legal action was delayed.

However, the report was finished and presented to the New Brunswick Electoral Boundaries Commission. The report, which is about 100 pages long, was submitted in its entirety on October 17 in Shediac. What you have before you are 36 of 72 maps and a brief summary of only one section of the report, which is about 40 pages long.

To get to the point, I present a brief summary, on page 2 of my French document—in English, it is located where you see the legal provisions—of the act which the commissioners must apply to redraw electoral boundaries. I would like to draw your attention to the fact that these are the main directives they must follow.

The first recommendation they must apply reads as follows:

(a) the division of the province into electoral districts and the description of the boundaries thereof shall proceed on the basis that the population of each electoral district in the province as a result thereof shall, as close as reasonably possible, correspond to the electoral quota for the province, that is to say, the quotient obtained by dividing the population of the province as ascertained by the census by the number of members of the House of Commons to be assigned to the province...

This basically means that you take the provincial population based on the last 10-year census, which was in 2001, and divide that number by the number of members of Parliament, 10, which gives you the electoral quotient, 72,950. This is the figure you try to aim for when you redraw an electoral boundary.

A little further on, paragraph 15(1)(b) provides the circumstances allowing for a departure from these conditions, on the condition that the riding's population reflects the electoral quotient. It says:

(b) the Commission shall consider the following in determining reasonable electoral district boundaries:

(i) the community of interests or community of identity in or the historical pattern of an electoral district in the province, and

(ii) a manageable geographic size for districts in sparsely populated, rural or northern regions of the province.

This is followed by the conditions for exceptions to the rule:

(2) The Commission may depart from the application of the rule set out in paragraph (1)(a) in any case where the Commission considers it necessary or desirable to depart therefrom (a) in order to respect the community of interests or community of identity in or the historical pattern of an electoral district in the province, or (b) in order to maintain a manageable geographic size for districts in sparsely populated, rural or northern regions of the province, but, in departing from the application of the rule set out in paragraph (1)(a), the Commission shall make every effort to ensure that, except in circumstances viewed by the Commission as being extraordinary, the population of each electoral district in the province remains within 25 per cent more or 25 per cent less of the electoral quota for the province.

That's approximate. If it's 25 per cent less, you come up with about 50,000. So, you could have between 45,000 and 55,000 people in a riding.

¹ (1540)

How much is 25 per cent over 72,000? About 96,000. That's my margin.

I would like to point out something fairly important to you. The English and French versions are not the same in the act. In the English version, instead of referring to “la spécificité d'une circonscription”, the expression used is “community of identity”, which, for social scientists and surely also legal experts, has a much more specific meaning, which could be translated by “identité collective”. “Spécificité” and “identité” do not necessarily mean the same thing. Under the law, the more generous version of an act has priority before the courts. In other words, if the federal government were taken to court with regard to the latest boundary... In their application of the law, the commissioners must also refer to the more generous version. That comes back to what I just said.

I was asked to identify the communities of interest in New Brunswick. What I decided to do first was to identify the best variables. What are these variables? They must be identified because the expressions “communities of interest”, “community of identity” and “historical pattern” are all vague expressions which in social sciences are called concepts. If you want to conduct a practical study to identify the real communities of interest, you have to use measurable criteria, which are called indicators or variables.

The first thing I set out to do was to identify the most accurate variables on which to base our research. This method would lead us to conclusions deemed to be acceptable by the scientific community. We had to find the best way to render operational a fairly difficult situation, to take something vague—concepts—and translate them into something which was precise and could be measured.

This is relatively easy to do in New Brunswick because, generally speaking, language is an extraordinary variable. Why? Because in social science, language is not an indicator like any other when it comes to defining a community of interest; it is often the determining factor of the community. Language is the vehicle of a culture, an identity, a history and a collective will to live. In many studies, language, along with religion and ethnicity, help to identify the peoples living on a given territory. It is therefore possible, based on these variables, to identify human communities on a given territory which share a common collective identity, a community of interests, a specificity and a history.

Consequently, in the statistical work I did to locate and identify the communities of interest and collective identities in New Brunswick, I chose to lend more weight to the so-called ethnological variables. Many people don't like the terms “ethnic” or “ethnological”, but since we don't have anything else, we have to use them. Please understand that we go by their general definitions. The references to these indicators are contained in maps 23, 24, 27, 28, 30 and 31 of the study.

So, I began by lending more weight to this group of variables to identify the community of interests. I did not invent this method, since Gallant and Arsenault, in a study carried out in the 1980s to help redraw an electoral map, the 1986 electoral map, had also conducted a study using language as a criteria. In New Brunswick, many studies have been done using language to identify communities of interest. Among others, Adrien Bérubé used language in his work to identify communities of interest, as did André Leclerc and others.

In New Brunswick, there are two official languages, there is section 16 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms which gives both languages equal status, and there is also Bill 88 which applies to New Brunswick. It is an officially bilingual province, as I said. There is no denying that language is a good indicator for identifying communities of interest.

But even though those variables were excellent for defining collective identity, I decided not to limit myself to only those. I also decided to use other criteria. I decided to use the most objective variables available, so as not to be accused of having subjectively chosen this one rather than that one. I decided to use the entire list of indicators which had been identified by Alan Stewart in 1988 in what was commonly called the Lortie Commission.

¹ (1545)

That's why there are so many maps. All those indicators, apart from a few, were used to redraw the boundaries within a city, which does not apply to New Brunswick, because there aren't enough big cities to use that method.

I therefore decided to use these indicators, which were re-divided into three groups, based on the participation of individuals in the political life of their electoral districts, the methods of interaction among individuals in the different communities, and the shared social characteristics in the community. I will not go through all of them because I will try to conclude within five minutes.

The Chair: Three minutes at the most, Mr. Duval, since you have already exceeded 10 minutes.

Mr. Denis Duval: Yes, I see that, but remember that they took three years, so...

I therefore took all of these variables into account together with language to try to find communities of interest. My first approach was to consider them all equally, knowing that these variables were not all equal, that some were more valid than others. As I said, historically there's a very strong correlation in New Brunswick between language and social sciences—and it could have been ethnic origin or religion. This is something that distinguishes New Brunswick from other provinces. In the second stage about which I will be speaking, I took this group to try to go into my study in greater depth. However, initially, I consider them all equally, and that resulted in map 33 on communities of interest.

So you see how the communities of interest are divided in New Brunswick. In Mr. Godin's area, we notice that in the Acadian Peninsula and the Bathurst region, there are two communities of interest. This map was produced on the basis of statistical tests carried out using all of the indicators considered equally. The only weakness of this map is that the census divisions, which are commonly called ridings or constituencies in New Brunswick, are generally used extensively by the provincial government to make other administrative maps. We see that in most places, these lines appear in the communities. What I mean is that in the constituencies, which were set in the 1700s and 1800s, there are now communities that have developed on either side of these lines.

Take, for example, the village of Néguac, which really is part of the Acadian Peninsula; however, in the administrative maps and indicators I used, the federal or provincial government or Statistics Canada often used the census divisions, which makes it impossible to put these communities together.

In the second stage of my work, to eliminate this problem, I redid the same analysis, but this time I gave a little more weight to the linguistic, religious and ethnic variables, which I combined. That gave me essentially the communities of interests shown on map 35.

However, I must tell you that in the case of Restigouche, because there was no way to make it into a constituency—because it did not have the required population—I decided, as I described in my text, to divide it between Madawaska and Chaleur. Why did I do that? Because some sub-tests for map 34 had shown that Restigouche actually has two communities of interests: one that looks more westward, toward Madawaska, and the other that looks more toward the east, that is Bathurst. I decided to do that because, since 1976, they have not had the communities required to form a constituency, even if a number of indicators are combined. So this is how I produced map 35 on the communities of interests as they could be used to make electoral districts. The areas shown in yellow, blue, pink and orange are regions that would have the population required to become constituencies.

To conclude my comments on my brief, I would say that this is just a proposal, but it is the only one that optimizes the communities of interests as defined by the entire process and the various stages. I disregarded many factors, but I did use a research framework. I decided to proceed in this way, and regardless of what happens along the way, I went through the various stages so as to submit a document that would be as objective as possible.

This would be the option that would optimize the communities of interests. That does not mean that other such possibilities do not exist; however, in my view, they would not be as good. Absolutely none of the indicators on page 31 suggest that what the commission recommends should be done—namely combine Belledune, Balmoral, Durham and Colborne with Miramichi. These two regions are never put together.

¹ (1550)

This is something that completely flies in the face of all the indicators we have on community of interests.

When I met with the commission on two occasions, on the 17th in Shediac, and September 11, I believe, in St-Quentin, I asked some questions about this, and I was told that their initial objective in setting electoral boundaries was not to exceed a 10 per cent variation quota. They are actually allowed a variation of roughly 25 per cent. They sum up the situation by referring to “the numbers”. That is what counted for them. Their first priority, therefore, was to comply with the figure of approximately 10 per cent, and, second, to take into account the communities of interests.

In this is an incorrect interpretation of the act. Actually, they went even further. When I asked them why some francophone communities such as Madawaska, Denmark and more specifically Drummond had not been included, they said they wanted to keep a number of francophones in the other riding so that they would not be in too much of a minority position.

If it is true that language is a good indicator of communities of interests, but that these individuals were moved to a different riding so that the proportion of francophones would not be too low, in my opinion, the members of the commission are in violation of section 15, as it is interpreted in the social sciences.

If you are interested, it would be possible to get to you a transcript of the discussions that took place at the meeting in St-Quentin, New Brunswick. There was a clear statement to the effect that the commission would have liked to have combined ridings with the population of approximately 20 per cent francophones, that this was not possible, but that in some places, the francophones were not left with their primary community of interests but rather placed elsewhere so that the francophones in the other riding would not be in too much of a minority position.

In closing, I would like to state that the following problem exists in New Brunswick: the population of Restigouche is not large enough to be a constituency. Going back to the 1986 map might be the best solution. In 1996, Restigouche was a few people short (between 2 and 100, according to our estimates), but now, it is short far too many people, even if some are taken from the other community of interests to increase the numbers. That is not necessarily an attractive solution.

Thus, there are two possible solutions that would respect the communities of interests in New Brunswick. Miramichi could be made into a riding that would spill over a little into Sudbury and the anglophone ridings in which the mines are located. That might produce the required population, it would be in keeping with the community of interests and would therefore be a good idea. Otherwise, the commission should consider the possibility that the riding of Miramichi would not comply with the 25 per cent rule.

The population would be below this percentage, but if we do not proceed in this way, we could produce a domino effect. If, in our attempt to get the required population in one location, we move the riding boundary slightly, this can result in a domino effect throughout the region. This would mean that the communities of interests would no longer be respected, because in each location, some people who are part of a particular community of interests would be placed into a different one to which they do not belong.

That is a summary of some rather dense concepts. I would invite you to read my paper.

¹ (1555)

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Duval.

[English]

Colleagues, given that this particular session finishes at 4:30, I would suggest that we limit ourselves to five minutes, with perhaps an exception when we get down the line here.

Mr. Jaffer.

Mr. Rahim Jaffer (Edmonton—Strathcona, Canadian Alliance): My question is a very brief one. I wanted maybe a little more clarification, Monsieur Duval, on one of the last few points you made. I'm fairly familiar with New Brunswick and some of the electoral boundaries, and you were talking about the interest of the various communities. It obviously doesn't apply in the case of Acadie--Bathurst, but for instance, with Madawaska--Restigouche, the francophone communities are moving away from Tobique--Mactaquac into that riding. That's in the interest of that particular community. That riding, as I think you mentioned, is about 20% francophone, and if they're going to be moving into Madawaska--Restigouche, they're going to be represented, I think, slightly better. With Acadie--Bathurst, that wasn't the case, that sensitivity wasn't given consideration. Do you think these cultural sensitivities were applied across the board in making these evaluations, or was it just done on the number scale you referred to?

[Translation]

Mr. Denis Duval: Generally, I think that we tried to respect the community of interests. The commission's proposal for Madawaska is quite interesting. Just take a look at the health map. St-Quentin and Kedgwick are with Madawaska, but they are certainly going too far. Let me make a little caricature: with regard to Restigouche, for instance, I can tell you that there is Restigouche west that depends on wood, a bit like the Madawaska region, but at Balmoral, there is fishing, the docks. Thus, there are two communities within Restigouche and thus, because the population is not large enough, because they want to reach more or less 10 per cent, in fact, they begin to outrageously disregard common interests. But the idea of taking a part of Restigouche and putting it with Madawaska is still positive in my mind. Unless those people cannot reach any agreement at all, if they want to stay together, and we could respect that in such a case, if that is what they want. But by looking at the indicators, we see that the western part of Restigouche is already together with Madawaska for things like waste management, recreational areas, etc. So that is a positive factor.

What was done next in the Peninsula, in Miramichi, only concerned figures, as they tried to reach a higher population level to improve the electoral quota. Communities of interests were not taken into account. Besides, regarding this, let me refer you to the big report that I gave you in Shediac. This may be the first time in New Brunswick that we have a commission with an indicator of 0.94 of one or 95 per cent of one, to round off the figures, to reach what we call equality among the ridings. If we measure this with an indicator, they reach 95 per cent, this is the Kaiser indicator. And this could be considered as good or even excellent. Previously, our acceptable indicators were always at 0.86, 0.84, 0.88, 0.61 and 0.64, and they were considered as pitiful or acceptable only with reference to equality.

Thus, the commission set the objective of having ridings with the same population, at the expense of community of interests. Besides, in the commission's interpretation of the act, in its interpretation of certain decisions, it clearly said—at least at St-Quentin—that its chief priority was to have ridings with the same population. This goes against the intention of the House of Commons. Let me remind you that the word “commune”, originally meant a town, a village, a community of interests. And the king would appoint representatives from the communes to his court.

Our system is different from the American system. In the American system, they have arbitrarily defined ridings so that there is the same number of voters in each riding. We, on the other hand, have ridings defined according to community of interests so that the common good is championed in the debates in the House of Commons. These are two different philosophies of representation.

º (1600)

The Chair: Thank you.

Are there any questions on this side?

Mr. Sauvageau.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau (Repentigny, BQ): Mr. Duval, I paid close attention to your presentation. Excuse my ignorance about New Brunswick's electoral boundaries, but I have a few questions.

Does one of your maps show what the Federal Electoral Boundaries Commission proposed? And if so, which one?

Mr. Denis Duval: Map 36.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Does map 36 show what the commission proposed?

Mr. Denis Duval: Yes.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: And as for you, are you proposing map 35?

Mr. Denis Duval: Yes.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: All right, thank you very much.

Mr. Denis Duval: The document does not cover the whole of the province since in Miramichi, I had some difficulty in obtaining specific information to enable me to draw up a Miramichi riding with a sufficiently large population.

I don't know if you can see it here but very few people live right in the heart of New Brunswick. Anyway, this area is almost all forest. There is even a park there...

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Let's look at map 35. It is incomplete for lack of statistics and given the domino effect that you alluded to earlier, is it legally and mathematically possible to have these four ridings that you have established?

Mr. Denis Duval: Traditionally speaking, geography has been used to establish the boundaries of the other ridings. Therefore, there is no problem. We could even look at solutions used in past years.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Did members of Parliament, municipalities or the regional organizations concerned also put forward briefs to the Electoral Boundaries Commission and was there unanimity or some type of consensus on the way the map should be drawn up?

Mr. Denis Duval: When I put it to the Société des Acadiens et Acadiennes du Nouveau-Brunswick, they found the proposal to be a good one. They circulated it and they found that there was very little opposition. When people look at map 35, in general, they say that it reflects the communities of interests. Indeed, what you see in pink on the map, which is referred to as the Acadian Peninsula, has been a demand dating back several years from the Economic Development Commissions.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Allow me to be more specific. Was there support for your suggestion? Did this demand come from a couple of people or a couple of groups of people, from the community or from yourself?

Let me give you an example. In the Laval, Laurentides and Lanaudière area, because of the domino effect, the 10 Liberal and Bloc Québécois members got together to draw up a map which was approved by various regional county municipalities and other bodies. The newly drawn up map was tabled and now we're waiting with fingers crossed to see what will happen. We hope that the Boundaries Commission will listen to what we have to say and understand our point of view.

I would like know what was done in New Brunswick in terms of obtaining the support of the 50 or 100 entities that you talked about.

º (1605)

Mr. Denis Duval: I'm not sure. I myself am a researcher and I am politically independent. I was asked for my opinion, and I gave it. I attempted to address the issue in as scientific and as rigorous a way as possible. That was the extent of my jurisdiction.

Now, I am aware that the map was circulated. I know that there was a certain amount of unofficial support, but this was not made public. I think the decision was made to publish the map in an attempt to get people's reactions. I had a brief meeting with the SAANB. It was the SAANB that asked me to come here today. The organization was aware that I had done some research on this issue. SAANB people saw this report this morning. As a result, I am independent and I intend to remain that way. They saw this map two months ago. They also looked at the comprehensive report, which they were more or less in agreement with. They in fact supported this map on October 17, in Shediac.

I think that there is some political wheeling and dealing going on or some support from the grassroots level, but I don't know what strategy will be put forward. That is quite out with my field of jurisdiction, because that is really a political issue.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Wheeling and dealing is another way of saying political strategizing, right?

Mr. Denis Duval: I am talking about the underlying strategy that has developed, before it was made official. I am not trying to be pejorative.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: I would never try to do that either, rest assured.

Does map 36 include ridings with a majority of francophones?

Mr. Denis Duval: Yes, of course it does. We have the Chaleur Peninsula, Madawaska-Restigouche... I have the figures if you want.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Beauséjour also?

Mr. Denis Duval: I have the information you want in my briefcase.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Do you have information on Beauséjour?

Mr. Denis Duval: Yes, indeed I do have information on Beauséjour. Therefore, we have Beauséjour, Madawaska-Restigouche and the Chaleur Peninsula.

Mr. Benoit Sauvageau: That makes a total of three, while, there are four on the other map.

Mr. Denis Duval: Yes. Let's look once again at the map showing the communities of interests in New Brunswick. All things being equal, there are more communities of interests in francophone areas than there are in anglophone ones. This is why in 1986 and during all other previous elections, there were fewer people in francophone constituencies. Historically speaking, there have always been four ridings with a majority of francophones, because there are a large number of communities of interests in the north and fewer in the south. I am referring here especially to the community which appears on map 33 as community No. 4, and also to community No. 1. Every time a new electoral map is drawn up, the people in these areas see their constituency change, when new areas are added for example. These changes have been occurring since 1966. Prior to 1966, the electoral boundaries did not change at all. Electoral boundaries were based on individual counties and that was the end of it. No attention was paid at all to the number of people in each riding. Population has only been an issue since 1966, as a result of the 1964 review.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: I have one final very brief question on the changing population situation in New Brunswick over the past 10 years. Do you think therefore that boundaries could stay the same given the population status of this province?

Mr. Denis Duval: No, the status quo is not possible for electoral boundaries because the francophone population has been moving. However, it would be possible to keep the same number of ridings with a francophone majority. It would be possible to have four constituencies.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Sauvageau.

Mr. Godin.

Mr. Yvon Godin: Mr. Duval, thank you for appearing before us here today, especially on such short notice. I am not quite yet prepared to agree to your map, even if the SAANB does support it, because I was only able to see it for the first time about half an hour ago.

I would like to get your opinion. When, after a certain number of years francophones and anglophones have learned to live together, do you think that it's really worth turning everything upside down and creating all sorts of problems, such as the ones we have seen in terms of the commission's recommendations? I would like to give you an example, because I want to get your take on this.

I want to tell you what people are telling me at home. People have been living together for years now in the Acadian Peninsula and in the Bathurst and Petit-Rocher areas. They shop in the same places and they do business together. They work together. For example, people from Allardville and Saint-Sauveur attend the same schools in Bathurst, they shop in Bathurst, they obtain care in the same hospitals in Bathurst and I could go on. People are living together. They're living in a community.

º (1610)

Mr. Denis Duval: I have referred to all these types of issues in my study. We have tried to draw up the map based on these issues.

Mr. Yvon Godin: Yes, that's what I'm talking about. When people living in the peninsula want to go to larger stores, they go to Bathurst. These communities have learned to live together. A week after the commission held its hearings in Caraquet, the Acadie Nouvelle newspaper reported that Miramichi was attempting to obtain an exemption from the provisions of the Official Languages Act on the grounds that it was too expensive. That gives you an idea of the various positions in the province of New Brunswick. Some people are saying that they don't want to have the other language community included with them, while the other language community is saying that they don't want to be included either. Don't you think then that the commission could quite simplyaccept that there are two communities which function well and that what the commission is doing is having an adverse impact on them? The only problem is that Miramichi was too small and Moncton was too large and because of that other communities are going through quite unnecessary upheaval.

Subsection 15(1)(b)(i) of the Electoral Boundaries Readjustment Act refers to community of interests:

(i) the community of interests or community of identity in or the historical pattern of an electoral district in the province:

This section refers to community of interests and to the historical pattern. In terms of the historical pattern of the riding of Acadie-Bathurst...

M. Denis Duval: On that, I would put it to you that if the commission based electoral boundaries on the historical pattern of the riding, we would have the same map as the ones that existed in 1966, 1976 and 1986, because this riding has not changed since the XIX^th century. No changes to Restigouche have been made for many years. The 1996 map led to some problems. I'm not sure that it was such a good idea to combine the inhabitants of Belledune and Saint-François. However, in order to create a community which made sense, by that I'm talking about Acadie-Bathurst, we were forced to create a rather bizarre community right next door. Indeed, people from Chaleur and people from the Bathurst region do also work together, but when you ask people from Allardville where they come from, they most often tend to say Bathurst.

Mr. Yvon Godin: Bathurst my point exactly.

Mr. Denis Duval: That has been clearly shown. We have studied all the indicators that you have mentioned and, despite that, we were forced to draw a line between the Acadian Peninsula and Chaleur. As a result, we have two northern ridings which are firmly based on the way things are structured currently. To all intents and purposes, economic development is focused on the Chaleur region.

Mr. Yvon Godin: But, are you prepared to state that...

Mr. Denis Duval: There do indeed exist ties on many levels between these communities.

Mr. Yvon Godin: As you said yourself, throughout Canada, the commission has come close to 100 per cent. I believe that New Brunswick has a population of some 720,000. If I'm not mistaken, it takes 72,000 constituents to make up a riding. Legislation provides for 25 per cent leeway on these figures and the commission failed to take any of these factors into consideration in its report. I think that this was a huge mistake on the part of the commission.

Mr. Denis Duval: I agree with you wholeheartedly on this. I told them that they were riding roughshod over the history of New Brunswick, where, generally speaking, enormous efforts were made to keep communities of interests together. In drawing up the 1966 map, which was the first new map under the 1964 legislation, and then again in drawing up the 1986 map, keeping communities of interests together was a major concern. Attempts have always been made to leave communities of interests intact. Ample use has been made of the 25 per cent wiggle room included in the legislation. New Brunswick was the province which used this provision the most. However, in our days, we are one of the provinces which uses it the least. This approach completely flies in the face of the stability of electoral representation that we tried to conserve in the past.

Even at the provincial level, there has been very little reform of the electoral map. If something ain't broke don't fix it, because we don't want to create problems between anglophones and francophones, or between Catholics and Protestants. Historically speaking, in New Brunswick gerrymandering or wheeling and dealing did not exist. There has been no shake up of the electoral map in an attempt to maintain harmony between communities.

º (1615)

Mr. Yvon Godin: I am quoting from a March 14, 2002 newspaper :

Changes to the federal electoral boundary maps; Elections Canada hopes to avoid the mistakes made in the past. The last changes made to the federal electoral map in 1994 caused an outcry among francophones in the province. Eight years later, Elections Canada has taken steps to prevent that from happening again.

I remember that in 1994, Saint-Louis and Acadieville were put into Miramichi. Now, Saint-Louis and Acadieville are being put into Beauséjour—Petitcodiac and Saint-Sauveur, Val-Comeau and all those communities are being made part of Miramichi. It makes absolutely no sense.

Mr. Denis Duval: The commission has a choice: it can do something strange in one place and have relatively equal populations in the ridings, or it can try to make Miramichi into a bigger riding by including the mining and forestry regions of Sudbury and York. That may be one possibility. It was explored in an article published in 1984, I believe, by Gallant and Arsenault, in the journal Égalité. It could also be decided that this riding would have a special status because of the exceptional circumstances. Personally, I would give priority to Miramichi, in order to maximize respect for the communities of interests. That would eliminate the problem whereby something strange has to be done in one place, otherwise, we would not be complying with the 25 per cent variation requirement. But I am not being clear.

In other words, if we want to respect the communities of interests as much as possible, throughout the province, we could give one riding a special status. I am saying that riding should be Miramichi, but it could also be the former constituency of Restigouche. In any case, one of these two ridings must be allowed to have less than the 25 per cent variation permitted in the electoral quotient. In that way, we would avoid the domino effect we get when we change the boundary in order to try to get more people into one riding. If the community of interests is disregarded because of the change to the electoral boundary, the same will happen in the case of the other community of interests, and so on.

The Chair: Thank you.

Mr. Bellemare.

Mr. Eugène Bellemare: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I want to be sure I understood you correctly, Mr. Duval. You are saying that the New-Brunswick Commission focused only on the numbers. You speak about the communities of interests. If I understood you correctly, as you defined it, a community of interests is not a group of fishers, forestry workers or people living in urban centres, but rather a group of people who speak the same language.

Mr. Denis Duval: There is language, and over 20 other indicators.

Mr. Eugène Bellemare: You also said that the House of Commons is a tool we got from the British monarchy, which, in the past, selected representatives to the court from the commons, that is from the villages and communities. The American tradition is different, it is based purely on numbers and does not take ethnic groups into account.

Mr. Denis Duval: Absolutely.

Mr. Eugène Bellemare: Was this the common practice in Canada? I would be overstating things somewhat if I said that you had spoken about ancient times, but you did use the word “caricature” a little earlier. Was the concept of communes still part of the philosophy and practice in 1867, at the time of Confederation?

Mr. Denis Duval: That was the practice initially, in 1867. When New-Brunswick got its first members of Parliament, the riding boundaries that had been set by the province were used and kept for years, until 1966. Thus, between 1867 et 1966, generally speaking, the riding boundaries that had been set by the province were used federally. Some minor changes were made occasionally, because there was one member of Parliament more or less. It even happened that the number of ridings were increased because of an increase in the population. But, for the most part, the major regions determined by the province were used federally.

Let me give you an example. In 1867, the electoral quota was 0.5 out of 1. In other words, there was not much concern about seeing to it that each constituency had the same number of voters. If I am not mistaken, there was a riding at the time with over 100,000 electors and another that had barely 20,000. That was included somewhere in the report you were given at the meeting held on the 17th in Shediac.

So at the time, some very significant variations were allowed, precisely in the interest of having the community represented. It was only at the beginning of the 1900s, the XX^th century, that attempts were made to reduce these size discrepancies. In 1952, the quota was still 0.6.

º (1620)

Mr. Eugène Bellemare: Mr. Chairman, I do not know who encouraged Mr. Duval to come here. Who invited him?

The Chair: We invited him.

Mr. Eugène Bellemare: I am trying to understand the reason for that.

Of course, he made a very convincing presentation. Personally, I fully agree with his philosophy. However, we do have a Chief Electoral Officer. In addition, there is the body that looks at these issues in New-Brunswick. I am also well aware of the fact that we have a House of Commons Committee that deals with House Affairs, and is looking at the matter. Will Mr. Duval or others be appearing before that committee?

The Chair: Mr. Bellemare, the decision to invite people from the Société des Acadiens et Acadiennes du Nouveau-Brunswick and Mr. Kingsley was made by the committee at the request or suggestion of its members, as is always the case. The task of the committee is to insure that the Official Languages Act is enforced. I think we can take for granted that language is part of what is known as the community of interests. It is therefore our responsibility to ensure that Elections Canada is sensitive about complying with the act and about the way in which the language communities of this country are treated. That is why we have whatever latitude we require to invite whatever witnesses we choose to insure compliance with act.

As far as I know, Elections Canada is also subject to the Official Languages Act, and our job is to ensure that this act is enforced. That is the context within which Mr. Duval appeared before us, as is the case for Mr. Kingsley, who will be here in five minutes.

Mr. Eugène Bellemare: I am pleased he came. However, it is a question of results. We all know that Official Languages Act has no teeth. We pretend to try to convince people, and so on.

In strategic terms, if we are really convinced about what appears in the Duval report, how do we go about pushing for ...?

The Chair: That is up to us to decide, Mr. Bellemare. We will come to that. In the past, we have worked on various issues and we will continue to do so. We make reports or do other things. That is up to us to decide.

Mr. Herron.

[English]

Mr. John Herron: Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I want to compliment our witness for coming here and bringing the attention of Parliament to an issue that has received an immense amount of attention in our province, New Brunswick. The electoral commission's report, as tabled, has been greeted with protests from throughout the entire province. There are many difficulties with the maps that have been produced that are incredibly obvious, even to the person looking at them for the very first time.

One of the issues I want to focus on is that the commission itself had an opportunity to ensure that the community interest was protected, that historical electoral districts were respected as well, and that we had manageable geographical size to make the ridings work. The commission did only a numbers game, they used no other criteria. To illustrate these points, if you look at the same map we touched upon, map 36, if you look at the riding of Canaan--Tobique, you see the ridings are fictitious. For instance, if you go from the very north of the riding, the northwest, just south of Grand Falls, you head towards Fredericton. Then just above Fredericton there's another bulb of land. In that land above Fredericton there are only deer, moose, and raccoons living. There's no road. In order to maintain the principle of continuity and keep the numbers right, they connected a riding that takes six hours to go point to point on--if you had the road. With the riding Mr. Godin touched upon earlier as well, the same issue comes into play. There is a fictitious area of land where there is no road, where you have to go into Bathurst to return into those two parishes of Coulburn and Durham.

The commission has a myriad of problems in New Brunswick on this. First, there was an immense media leak of this embargoed information before the formal release, and the commission took an huge hit on that. It was a very fair question to ask: if certain people had advance notice of this information--and I'll get to the linguistic issue--did they have the capacity to actually shape the proposals in the first place.

º (1625)

The Chair: That would seem better put to Mr. Kingsley, if I may.

Mr. John Herron: I was going to share it with the committee, so they can ask those same types of questions of Mr. Kingsley when we have a chance to speak to him.

I see the role of this particular committee as not just ensuring that we protect the Official Languages Act. I think the role of this committee is to actually foster and enhance the linguistic duality we have in the country, so we can actually make things work. In Mr. Godin's riding, Acadie--Bathurst, we have some of the first Europeans who settled in the Acadian Peninsula in one area working with a predominantly anglophone community in Bathurst, and they make it work. They are almost an image of what we aspire to have in the country.

[Translation]

In my area, the riding of Fundy-Royal, about ten years ago, the people there did not speak the two official languages. Now, however, 14% of the population speaks both official languages. That a significant change.

[English]

When we have ridings that work historically and community interests are actually protected, where we want to ensure that we have a manageable geographical size, we shouldn't have this fictitious thing to only make the numbers work. With the riding Canaan--Tobique, to actually circumvent the electoral act, they go right over Fredericton, where there are no roads, there's no land, but they want to make sure the principle of continuity is maintained. They played only numbers, and it made no sense to actually go down that track.

Mr. Duval, if I'm correct, you concur that the only criteria the commission used in New Brunswick were numbers. They put very little emphasis on the principle of maintaining historical electoral boundaries with a community of interest or manageable geographical size, it was purely numbers. Is that your conclusion, sir?

[Translation]

Mr. Denis Duval: Generally speaking, yes. They placed too much importance on having a population variation of plus or minus 10.2 per cent in each riding. This was the figure the commission set for itself. As a result, it overstated the importance of the electoral quota criterion compared to the community of interests. I would remind you that on map 33, in a rigorous scientific exercise, I tried to identify these communities of interests. The proposed riding of Canaan-Tobique crosses three different communities of interests. So the argument does not stand up. I would remind you that I attach more importance to language in my study, but I did take into account over 20 indicators. I included all the indicators that people generally mention to the commissions: that the constituency correspond with the service area; that it be the same area as that served by the hospitals; that it be the same as the sports and recreational activity areas and various associations, and so on. In other words, all these indicators had some weight in determining the communities of interests. It is clear that some important guidelines were not respected in the proposal put forward by the Federal Electoral Boundaries Commission in New Brunswick.

º (1630)

The Chair: A very brief question, Mr. Herron.

[English]

Mr. John Herron: Given that the act is designed to be flexible with the 25%-rule they have in play, and given that it's very difficult in New Brunswick, because of the population we have and where the population centres are, to get 10 ridings, the work of the commission is tough. But if the two problems that exist in New Brunswick are plain and simple, Miramichi is too small, Moncton is too big, why would you want to mess with ridings where the linguistic duality and the community of interest are preserved, like Acadie--Bathurst, perhaps even Madawaska--Restigouche? Why wouldn't you just deal with the eastern swath of the province and not change things wholesale to that degree? Do you concur with that point?

[Translation]

Mr. Denis Duval: If we were to move toward something similar to what we have on map 35, we would further optimize the communities of interests. In Restigouche, there's a problem at the moment. It has two communities of interests, and they want to put both into Madawaska. There may be one part of Restigouche that would fit well with Madawaska as regards community of interests, but that is not true of the other part of the riding. The people in Balmoral and Belledune do not have much in common with those who live in Saint-François. In 1996, something strange happened. Saint-Louis-de-Kent, which is in Miramichi, has always been part of Beauséjour. These people have always looked to the southeast. So the 1996 map does present some difficulties.

I agree that the communities of interests have not been respected, as you said in your first comment. I also agree that this is very difficult to do in New Brunswick. However, I have a solution I consider quite easy: to put Miramichi with the mining area, that the population be considered large enough to comply with the minus 25 per cent rule; in order words, to give it special status as a riding that cannot meet all the criteria. If we were to allow this exception, we would be able to respect the communities of interests everywhere else. Every time an electoral map is drawn up, whether in 1996 or today, huge concessions have to be made to the community of interests in order to comply with the plus or minus 25 per cent rule.

Last time, the riding of Madawaska-Restigouche was affected. Grand Fall should be with Madawaska. These people are neighbours. They tease each other too much not to be neighbours.

The Chair: I'm going to have to interrupt you.

Mr. Denis Duval: The other place is Acadie...

The Chair: This ends the first part of our meeting. We will now hear from our next group of witnesses.

Thank you very much, Mr. Duval. We will get the maps translated so that we can distribute them.

I would now invite Mr. Kingsley and the people with him to please come forward.

Colleagues, I would like to point out that a rather rare event in the history of House committees has happened. We have with us today two officers of Parliament: the Chief Electoral Officer and the Commissioner of Official Languages. We are privileged indeed.

º (1633)

º (1637)

The Chair: Welcome, Mr. Kingsley. I would ask you to begin your presentation by introducing the people with you. The committee decided to invite you and a representative from the Société des Acadiens et Acadiennes du Nouveau-Brunswick, from whom we have just heard, on the issue of language as a criterion of community of interests in the electoral boundary redistribution process in New Brunswick. We will invite you to make some brief opening remarks. I understand that there may be some questions that are more sensitive than others, and we have complete confidence in you to decide which questions you will answer and which you prefer not to answer. However, we have a very open approach here. In fact, this is a committee that works very well. To my recollection, this is the first time we've invited the Chief Electoral Officer from Elections Canada to appear before us. So, welcome, and the floor is now yours. After your presentation, we will move to questions and answers from members on both sides of the table.

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley (Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada): Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

[English]

I usually take the opportunity to visit all the members beforehand, but on this occasion the time was not there. So to those members of Parliament whom I have not met personally before, my salutations.

[Translation]

I would like to thank you for giving me this opportunity to discuss the redistribution issue with your committee. Since you asked, I would like to introduce Ms. Diane Davidson, the Deputy Chief Electoral Officer and Chief Legal Counsel, and Mr. Carol Lesage, who is the Director, Parliamentary Representation, the branch responsible for supporting the Federal Electoral Boundaries Commissions.

I did not have time to prepare a text in the usual way, because I did receive rather short notice. I will therefore read the text as is. We did provide copies to the interpreters to make their task somewhat easier.

I'm also pleased to extend greetings to my colleague, who is also an officer of Parliament, Ms. Adam.

The new electoral map is drawn up in accordance with the Electoral Boundaries Redistribution Act, which was passed in 1964. At the time, the parties in the House of Commons were all very much in favour of the legislation. It sets out the principles governing the redistribution and emphasizes the independence of the Federal Electoral Boundaries Commissions. It also gives members of Parliament an opportunity, in addition to those provided at the public hearings, to comment the recommendations made by the commissions, through a parliamentary committee. I will come back to this in a few minutes.

It is important to bear in mind that the Federal Electoral Boundaries Commissions are independent bodies that make decisions on the proposed and final riding boundaries in their respective provinces. I will emphasize the final boundaries.

The role of Elections Canada is to support the commissions by providing the range of services they require and that are set out in the Act, including the determination of expenses—in other words, paying their bills. The support services also include getting in touch with other government agencies on behalf of the commissions. I am thinking, for example of Natural Resources Canada, to check the descriptions of the ridings, Statistics Canada, to verify the population figures, and the Geographical Names Board of Canada for advice on choosing the names of constituencies. My office provides the liaison with all these agencies.

The current redistribution began on March 12, 2002, when I got the official results of 2001 census from the Chief Statistician. The next day, March 13, I calculated and then published the number of members of Parliament for each province, in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution Act, under the new map. The chairs of the commissions are judges who were appointed by the chief justice of each province with the exception, this year, during this exercise, of the chairs of the commissions for Newfoundland and Labrador and Quebec, who were appointed by the Chief Justice of Canada. In this case, they are two retired judges.

The other two members of each commission—that is because there are three of them—were appointed by the Speaker of the House of Commons. The role of the commissions is to produce a report on the electoral boundaries of their province, as well as the name, the description, the boundaries and the population of each riding. The commissions have one year in which to do their work. To date, all the commissions have published their proposals in the Canada Gazette, as required by the Act, and have completed their public hearings.

The public hearings are open to all, including members of Parliament. Those who wish to do so may present their comments to the commission orally, in writing or both. The commissions received over 1,300 comments this time; 151 of them came from members of Parliament, including 7 members of this committee. There were more than twice as many comments made this time than last, in 1994, and more than the number received in the 1987 redistribution—when there were 928—this shows an increased sensitivity to electoral boundary readjustment and a certain degree of success for the advertising done in this context.

I will now switch to the other official language.

º (1640)

[English]

To date three commission reports have been tabled in the House of Commons, Newfoundland and Labrador, Saskatchewan, and Prince Edward Island. The remaining seven reports will be tabled over the coming few months. Included in the handouts you receive today is the redistribution calendar of events, which I sent to every member of Parliament a long time ago.

Once the reports are tabled in the House, they are referred to the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. At that point members of the House of Commons may file objections to the commissions' reports with the committee. The committee will consider the matter of the objections and return the report to the Speaker of the House of Commons, together with a copy of the objections and the minutes of the proceedings of the committee. The Speaker will then refer the committee's minutes of proceedings to me, and I transmit them back to the commissions for their disposition and return those dispositions of objection to the Speaker. When all objections are disposed, I prepare a draft representation order, which is transmitted to the minister responsible for electoral matters for proclamation by the Governor in Council. There is no judgment exercised by the minister or the Governor in Council on the content of the decisions. At each stage of redistribution that provides an opportunity for members of the House of Commons to participate in the process. I have sent a letter indicating such to each member. A chart listing the correspondence is included in the documents that have been distributed.

To acquaint them with their roles and responsibilities, Elections Canada held a conference of the chairs, the members, and the secretaries of the commissions in Ottawa March 13-15, 2002. This was the first time in redistribution history that the chairs, members, and commission secretaries were brought together. The previous time I was Chief Electoral Officer we only brought the chairs together. You can view my opening remarks to that conference on our website, where, among other things, I stressed the importance of the independence of the commissions, as well as presenting the results of the computation of the members by each province.

As well as covering administrative matters at the conference, a panel discussion on the concept of community of interest also took place, led by Professor John Courtney, Canada's recognized leading authority on redistribution. The panel discussion, lasting an entire afternoon, also included Doctors Jennifer Smith and Réjean Pelletier, both noted political scientists in this area as well. Included among the handouts is a copy of the October 2002 issue of Electoral Insight containing articles based on those representations. I might add that members of the procedure and House affairs committee were invited to that session.

Aboriginal matters and official languages were also discussed in the concept of community of interest. Mr. Phil Fontaine, Chief Commissioner, Indian Claims Commission, spoke on aboriginal matters. Dr. Dyane Adam, the Commissioner of Official Languages, spoke, obviously, on official language matters. Dr. Adam spoke on the commission's responsibilities with regard to language of service and language of work, as well as the link between the concept of community of interest and Canada's official language communities. I'm sure she would provide a copy of her presentation to the members of the committee if they were so interested. A summary of the conference proceedings is included in the handouts. That was also provided to the procedure and House affairs committee. I should mention that Dr. Adam mentioned in her annual report the positive work done with the electoral boundaries commissions by my office. I even got one of her little bears.

Following the proclamation of the representation order, Elections Canada will hold a post-event conference September 17-18, 2003. The purpose of the conference will be to review the redistribution process with interested parties. I've already invited members of the procedure and House affairs committee to decide how they wish to participate. The topic of redistribution has been broached by me on a number of occasions in front of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs.

º (1645)

[Translation]

And now, Mr. Chairman, it is time I listened closely to your questions and answered them to the best of my abilities.

[English]

The Chair: Mr. Fitzpatrick, five minutes.

Mr. Brian Fitzpatrick (Prince Albert, Canadian Alliance): Thank you, Mr. Kingsley.

I did have occasion to read the Supreme Court of Canada decision dealing with provincial boundaries that came out of Saskatchewan. On my understanding of that case, the key in deciding boundaries is to ensure fair and effective representation for people, and it takes into account a whole lot of issues. It has occurred to me that an issue that comes out of the case in New Brunswick is leaving a language minority in a disadvantaged position. That's a potential problem. They may not get fair and effective representation. This leads me into another area that gets us outside New Brunswick too. There are seven provinces that are in this process, and they all have significant language minorities; Manitoba and Quebec are two of them. Have you any idea, sir, when the reports are going to be filed on these other seven provinces, so that the other provinces can also start dealing with the issue of fair representation in respect of official language matters?

º (1650)

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: Within two months all the commissions will have reported, at least according to the work plans they have established so far.

Mr. Brian Fitzpatrick: Another area we have some concern about is that the boundaries are all going to be redrawn after June 2004, and under the existing boundaries they're redoing the polls. According to information I have, we are talking about something like 55,000 polls, which seems to me an immense task that could involve a whole lot of waste. It has to be done in both official languages too, and we're getting into renaming them and so on. In a lot of ways, a person really has to be questioning why we're doing that, in view of what's going to happen after June 2004. For what purpose are we wasting all this time redoing all the polls within existing boundaries? The follow-up question is, if we're going to do all this renaming and redrawing of polls, when will it be completed?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: Only the names of the ridings may change. The polls are numbered under our system, so that is not quite as burdensome, and there's no need for translation of anything. Several years after every general election Elections Canada looks at the polls, whether or not there was redistribution, to make sure we continue to apply what the law requires, which is 350 electors per polling division, so that it's possible to handle the electorate that shows up at the polls when an election is called. Otherwise, we wind up with very disgruntled candidates.

Mr. Brian Fitzpatrick: So when would you expect that to be completed?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: We have an exercise starting now that is supposed to be terminating by the end of this summer. Redistribution sets in legally, I think, mid-July 2004, if the present calendar is respected by all the commissions. The work we're doing is what we would do normally anyway for a general election, and if one is held before July 2004, that work will have been very useful. Once we know what the new ridings are, we will also undertake, on a parallel course, redrawing the boundaries of the polling divisions, but keeping effectively the same profile as at the present time, except where the new boundaries will cut across polling divisions, in order to face an election that could be held after July 2004. We have to be ready on those scenarios.

Mr. Brian Fitzpatrick: I have a very short question that gets to fair representation again. I guess it pertains to New Brunswick. If you create seats that have a significant minority language component and there isn't a whole lot of community of interest, are those folks really going to get fair representation in respect of official languages components and factors along that line?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: I think the chair initially indicated that some of the questions might be difficult, and that is a question I find difficult to answer as the Chief Electoral Officer. As Chief Electoral Officer, my role is to sustain the commissions in their efforts, it's not to pass judgment on their judgment. I do want to say I think the present system is a very good system, but it is not my job to get involved in their work, and I do not get involved in their work in any way.

º (1655)

The Chair: Thank you.

Madame Thibeault.

[Translation]

Ms. Yolande Thibeault (Saint-Lambert, Lib.): Thank you. Good afternoon, Mr. Kingsley, ladies and gentlemen.

During the past hour we have heard about New Brunswick. I realize that New Brunswick must present a particular challenge to the commissioners in charge of defining new ridings. What I have understood from this is that the redistribution is done on a numerical, or mathematical basis. In terms of Quebec, I think very few of my Quebec colleagues would contradict what I am about to say.

In Quebec one has the impression that the ridings have been redistributed strictly on a mathematical basis, not always with happy results. I think that in some cases community and history have been completely forgotten, at least certainly in my riding. Imagine that in Quebec there are also anglophone minorities that have been completely sliced in two. I at least spoke to that when I appeared before the commission in Quebec.

I don't know if you can answer me here. To your knowledge, in provinces that have linguistic minorities, for example Alberta, or Manitoba, have similar issues been raised? To your knowledge, are there many linguistic minority communities who feel they have been wronged?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: I am not aware of that, Madam, because I have not been following the presentations before the commissions. I am not aware of who has been making presentations to the commissions. I know how many members of Parliament have done so because I asked, but I do not know who they are—you've just told me that you are one of them—for the simple reason—and I know this will be difficult to accept—that I do not become involved in any way in the work of the commissions.

I think I have fulfilled my responsibilities in organizing the conference and in giving them the opportunity... These are judges, and many of the other members are lawyers, professors or people who are familiar with legislation. I gave them the opportunity to agree, through discussion, on what “communities of interests” are, on what they have to do, on the importance of numbers, etc., and I also let them know what tools are available to them, but I could not go further than that. So I did not see the advantage of keeping up-to-date on who was appearing and what they were presenting. I didn't do it last time, nor this time. And if I am still here, I will not do it the next time.

Ms. Yolande Thibeault: In Quebec and New Brunswick at least, people really feel that the decisions only take numbers into account. I don't know what has happened in the other provinces, but I think it is rather surprising that commissioners appointed in different provinces by different people seem to have all reached the same conclusion, that is that numbers, numbers, numbers are the most important factor.

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: Allow me to add something that I should have perhaps said earlier. One must remember that the first job of the commission is to make a proposal and to then provide people with the opportunity of speaking to that initial proposal. You mentioned that you yourself appeared before the commission. The commissions have had the opportunity to see what people think of their proposal. And now we will see what the outcome is. From what I understand from the results of the three commissions who have already made their second-phase reports, there seems to be a much higher degree of acceptance now than when the proposal was put forward. Now we will see what will happen with the second proposals coming from the commissions of the various provinces. We will see what will happen after presentations have been made. I don't know whether or not the Société des Acadiens et Acadiennes du Nouveau-Brunswick appeared before the commission in New Brunswick.

I know that you went because you told me this. Now we'll see what will happen with the second round.

If there is no agreement, once again members will have an opportunity to speak to the proposals, but this time the process will take place within Parliament, in a committee. The members have the added advantage of being able to express their opinions again.

In the end, the commissions will make their decisions, and I should say that I feel this is the best way to proceed, that is, to put the decision-making in the hands of independent commissions, rather than those of the federal Chief Electoral Officer, or those of the members, with all due respect to the democratic process.

» (1700)

The Chair: Thank you.

Mr. Sauvageau.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Mr. Kingsley, ladies and gentlemen, I'm having a hard time understanding why you think it is right, or normal, that an independent commission be responsible for distribution. Given that you and your team are ultimately responsible for applying the Electoral Act out in the field, would you not like to be able to say occasionally that certain decisions, or distributions, are complicating the life of Elections Canada, complicating the public's right to vote? Would you not like to be able to oversee certain decisions in order to make Elections Canada's work easier?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: Not for a moment, sir. No, not at all.

When Parliament was studying Bill C-69, I had the opportunity of expressing the Chief Electoral Officer's opinion on the redistribution overhaul, and it never occurred to me to suggest a broader role for the Chief Electoral Officer of Canada.

I think that in 1964 Canada came up with a model far superior to anything else in the world, and even anything else in the country. Even though Bill C-69 introduced new elements to the process, allowing more participation on the part of the public, etc., insofar as that was possible, it never occurred to me, even with all my experience in redistribution, to ask for one more ounce of authority than I have regarding commissions.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: With respect to returning officers in each of the ridings it's different. But in terms of defining ridings, wouldn't you... You don't appoint returning officers.

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: Absolutely not. I have a completely different opinion than the one I just gave regarding that, but I am being absolutely consistent with myself.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Yes, yes, I just wanted to remind myself of that.

In theory, if all goes well, the best case scenario will have this map coming into effect in July 2004. Is it possible, in theory, that there could be elections in May or June 2004, and that all the reports will have been accepted? In other words, would it be possible for me to be elected in my riding knowing full well that three municipalities will no longer belong to my riding during the next elections?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: Absolutely.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: But that's rather unrealistic, no?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: You have to remember that the whole system has one year to prepare for the changes. In July 2003, the process will become official but it will not come into effect until July 2004. If there is an election that falls between those two dates, the current map will be used. If there is an election after July, 2004, the new map will be used. That has been the procedure ever since redistribution has existed in this country.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Has there ever been an election two or three months earlier, with members already knowing that certain municipalities would no longer belong to their riding in the next election? One would think there would be a little less motivation.

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: I would have to check our history. I never asked myself the question. We could check and let you know.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: That would be rather paradoxical.

I see in the document that you gave us, that in its 1994 report, the Electoral Boundaries Commission of Quebec pointed out that it had tried to take into account the existence of each main region of the province and of their unique characters. I don't know if you can or want to answer this question, but does that include the RCMs in Quebec and Quebec's administrative regions? When they say they took into account the existence of each main region, for example, Lanaudière, Laval, Montérégie, what did that mean? How are we suppose to interpret that?

» (1705)

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: Sir, I would have to put the question to the Electoral Boundaries Commission for Quebec. I could do that and send you the answer, if you wish.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: I would appreciate that, if you could first ask if a main region can be an administrative region, like those in Quebec, and second, if RCMs are part of the region.

I do not have any other questions. Thank you.

The Chair: We now have Mr. Bellemare, Mr. Godin, Mr. Herron. At the end, I would also like to ask a few questions, and then that will be all.

Mr. Bellemare.

Mr. Eugène Bellemare: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

When electoral boundaries are being drawn, what do you think should be the main factor? Should it be numbers or should it be communities of interest?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: I will ask my colleague to help me answer that question because it involves interpreting legislation, but I think the text should be followed as is. It starts with numbers and then lists other factors, such as communities of interests. I will ask Ms. Davidson to expand on that, with your permission, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.

Ms. Diane Davidson (Deputy Chief Electoral Officer and Chief Legal Counsel, Elections Canada): Thank you. If you look at the act, because it is the act that describes the procedure that commissions must use in their decision-making or in making their proposals, the factor that is considered first is in fact the number, the electoral quotient. However, if the commission considers it necessary or desirable—and the act does say “desirable”—then it also takes into account communities of interests, communities of identity, the historical pattern of an electoral district, and geographical dimensions, for example size. More sparsely populated, rural or northern regions are also taken into account. That is all included in the act. The commission may take those factors into account and depart from the electoral quotient established for each province by up to 25 per cent.

In circumstances viewed by the commission as being extraordinary, the commission can depart by more than 25 per cent but that is the exception, I must point out.

Mr. Eugène Bellemare: I understand that. But when the cases go all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada, there is often a need to interpret the act and therefore to go back to when the act was written, and to research the very philosophy or reasoning underlying the act, which is quite different from reading it literally, and interpreting each word. When a section of an act is being challenged, one often needs to look at the thinking behind that particular section and ask oneself what was the philosophy or concept or thinking or circumstances at the time that led the government to draft that legislation.

And so I come back to the basic question. What is most important here? Is it the numerical factor or is it communities of interest? You have quoted the wording. We know all that by heart and we live with it constantly. But I would like to know what led to those words in the very beginning.

Ms. Diane Davidson: I think the answer is articulated quite clearly in the Supreme Court ruling that was mentioned a moment ago: the Saskatchewan case that was sent to the Supreme Court. The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Canada, Judge McLachlin, stated that in the end, effective representation must be the main principle underlying any exercise in redistribution. Effective representation, as I said—and one must read the text; commissions must do that—includes demographical dimensions, and also factors such as communities of interest, communities of identity...

» (1710)

Mr. Eugène Bellemare: If what you are saying is true—and I think you strongly believe in this—what kind of flexibility does a provision giving a 25 per cent margin provide? Does this not involve the basic principle and does it not send the message to people who want to read the act that numerical factors are considered first because we don't want to end up with some ridings with a population of 2 million people and other ridings, unless we're talking about Prince Edward Island, of 12,000 people?

The Chair: I will let Mr. Bellemare finish, this is his last question.

Mr. Eugène Bellemare: We have a provision with 25 per cent flexibility. To come back to the principle I wanted to raise, the reason for this section is that communities of interest cannot be secondary to the point of being brushed aside, but they have to be recognized to the point of allowing 25 per cent flexibility on the required numbers.

The Chair: Mr. Kingsley or Ms. Davidson, comments?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: Not really, Mr. Chairman. This is obviously an issue that the committee is preoccupied with, but if I had the answer at my fingertips, I already would have shared it with everyone. I can't really answer it anymore than the others can.

The Chair: Mr. Godin.

Mr. Yvon Godin: Thank you for accepting our invitation. I know that we have already met several times and that you are quite active in Elections Canada, but I must say that I do not agree with you when you say that you do not have the answer or that it is not 25 per cent, that it is the number, etc.

I find that the message from Elections Canada is not clear. I may not be a lawyer or a doctor, but I have always believed in human nature. How do the people feel about all this? As for you, Mr. Kingsley, I have always known you as a person who, I think, wanted to ensure that Canadians have a chance to vote and be represented. That is the objective of our country. The act is clear about this point. It says that we must take the numbers into account, but that we must be flexible, for instance when it comes to percentage. And then, we move on to the community of interests.

When we deal with common interests—I am trying to go fast, but we've already debated so much that there is not much time left—if we look at what the act says, it defines common interests. That is clear. There is also the 25 per cent, and for a good reason. If we go by the numbers, it eliminates the common interest. When I appeared before the commission, I was told that the numbers were the determining factor. If that's the way it is, let us forget everything else.

Then I come here with all that background, and let me tell you what is happening, for instance, in Acadie-Bathurst. Let me quote you some excerpts from newspaper articles: “Elections Canada wants to avoid repeating its past errors”.

Do you know what these past errors are? It was an error for the francophone communities to go to Miramichi.

If we look a bit further, we read: “The redistribution of the electoral map is very unpopular.” The article mentions what the interest of the people is. A bit further on, we read:

Gildard Chiasson, President of the Mayors' Forum, an organization that includes 14 municipalities in the northeast of the province, believes that the commission's proposition will divide the people living on the Peninsula.

So much for the francophones. And it continues:

We are affected by those who try to divide us. We do not accept that a sizeable part of our francophone population be taken away and put with the anglophones, said Mr. Chiasson.

He said that to the commission. And it goes on:

We have a culture, a language. Anglophones from Boiestown, Doaktown and Miramichi do not have the same culture and the same interests as we do. How do you expect a francophone to go...

I will not go any further into this because we could hear all kinds of things, but everything is said respectfully. Further on we can read: “Miramichi wants to be exempted from the Official Languages Act”, and this was one week after the commission had met the people at Caraquet.

Can you see the problem we are having? And it goes on:

On the other hand, the Official Languages Commissioner, Dyane Adam, says that she is also satisfied with the measures proposed by Elections Canada. Besides, she will be giving a lecture to the commission members today.

I think the Official Languages Commissioner was going there to talk about common interests and francophones. I do not think that she simply went there to waste her time. So, that is what we have. That is what common interests mean to us. And it goes on:

The SAANB, in its brief presented to the commission, believes that we should not commit new errors in order to repair the errors of 1994. In that year, the commission had ignored the requests of the Acadian community.

Let us look at the process. You say that it is a good process, that it works and that you believe in it, but in fact, the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs can only make recommendations to that commission, and the commission can maintain its decision. So, what other avenue can we choose, besides the Supreme Court, to really make any progress?

Besides, you say that the system is good. As far as I'm concerned, I find that it is not working at all, and all the evidence is there. In another article, we can read: “Boundaries Commission would do well to listen to the people.” You are a people person, you believe in people. I told the people in St-Sauveur that if we were put together with Miramichi, we would not even go to vote. People in the area told me that they were going to go on using the name Acadie-Bathurst, as the people from Rivière-du-Portage and Néguac are already doing; they are already with Miramichi and they call the Acadie-Bathurst office to get services in their language. This is no small problem.

You say that the commission will submit its decision to the Speaker of the House on February 12. Let us suppose that there were an independent commission. Last year, we already had what we call a lead on what the commission was about to do.

» (1715)

Ten persons showed up before the commission in Caraquet to object, they had all come to talk about the common interest issue. A resident of Bathurst, Claude Boucher, the former President of the Bathurst Liberals, made a presentation in Miramichi and he agreed with the commission. Around 6:00 p.m., when the media were no longer in the vicinity, the commission members said that the best brief they had seen was Mr. Claude Boucher's brief. Hey, give me a break! Do you know what the brief said? It said that the commission was not going far enough and that it should also include Robertville with Miramichi. Do you know something? There is already somebody there who is going around saying that he already knows what the February 12 report will say, namely that Robertville will be put together with Miramichi. The commission is not changing its position. Moreover, it will follow Claude Boucher's suggestions. And he will stand for the next elections.

The Chair: Mr. Godin, I do not want to stop you from doing party politics, but you've already gone over your time. So, if you have a question...

Mr. Yvon Godin: I should not have said “Liberals”; I am sorry, Mr. Chairman.

The Chair: If you want to put a question, you should put it.

Mr. Yvon Godin: My question is very clear. With our Constitution and with our Official Languages Act, doesn't Elections Canada have any say with regard to common interests? Could you not tell the commission that it must take this into account in the 25 per cent?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: Sir, when newspapers and journalists quote Elections Canada as a participant in the process, they are making a mistake. We are not involved. Elections Canada is not involved in the process, let me repeat this. The commissions are independent. I do not get involved, as Chief Electoral Officer and as an individual, I do not interfere in any way with their work. Thus, what the newspapers say about Elections Canada has nothing to do with reality.

With regard to the success that MPs have when they make a request, two-thirds of the comments from MPs have resulted in direct changes made by the commissions in the past. What will your success rate be this year? I do not know. All I can say, is that it is the same success rate that I remember. Thus, I can only encourage MPs, when the new proposals come out, the second-to-last ones, to express...

Mr. Yvon Godin: What is your position on the Official Languages Act and communities of interests?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: Mr. Godin, the commissions' task consists in reconciling all those things, in trying to reconcile all those things which are very difficult to reconcile. They do not have an enviable task. It is very difficult to see how this will be done in British Columbia as opposed to New Brunswick, Ontario, Prince Edward Island. It is very difficult to reconcile those things, those values that are expressed in the legal text that Ms. Davidson quoted earlier and that she also clarified. It is not easy to reconcile those things.

» (1720)

The Chair: Thank you, sir.

Mr. John Herron.

[English]

Mr. John Herron: Thank you, Mr. Chair.

There is a proposal in New Brunswick to put all first nations people into one riding, the riding of Miramichi. So regardless of where they were in New Brunswick, they would be in the Miramichi riding. I know you have to be aware of that point.

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: I am aware of that point. That was in the initial proposal of the commission.

Mr. John Herron: Did the commission ask for interpretation on whether that concept would be worth exploring? Did they ask before they did that?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: I am aware that they sought constitutional advice on the matter.

Mr. John Herron: Through your office?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: No.

Mr. John Herron: They sought external constitutional advice?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: That's right.

Mr. John Herron: Okay.

My second question is this. I believe you would concur that the system works well if the integrity of the process is beyond reproach.

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: Beyond reproach in everybody's mind in Canada, or beyond reproach in certain minds?

Mr. John Herron: Beyond reproach in respect of the element of fairness, with all people having access to the same playing field.

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: It is impossible for any commission to come out with a report in any province that will satisfy every fair-minded person in that province.

Mr. John Herron: I'm not referring to the content of the report itself. The work of this commission in New Brunswick was leaked to the media before the formal publication, which I know you're aware of, because you've commented on that in the media. Would you concur that if certain individuals had access to this information before the formal release, as Peter Adams, the chair of the procedure and House affairs committee has stated, it could put certain individuals at an advantage in being prepared for the commission's proposal? Would you concur that it would create a difference in playing field in New Brunswick?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: I would have difficulty in concurring with that, sir, for the simple reason that the commissions put out their proposals and then ask people if they are interested in presenting themselves before the commission. As I understand your question, you're asking me if someone was favoured or could be advantaged because there was a leak. In my view, the process is such that when it was formally engaged, everyone who wanted an opportunity was provided with the same opportunity before the commissions across the land.

Mr. John Herron: So the leak is of absolutely no concern to Elections Canada?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: That is not what I'm saying. I'm saying it is, in a sense, not the concern of Elections Canada, in that we are not responsible for the work of the commissions. This is a really difficult concept to explain for some reason: I am not responsible for the commissions and their work.

Mr. John Herron: I'll simplify the question. The leak is a concern, yes or no?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: In what sense, sir? It's not my business.

Mr. John Herron: To ensure that the public respects the integrity of the process.

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: It is not my business, sir.

» (1725)

Mr. John Herron: It would clearly be the business of Elections Canada from the perspective of maintaining the integrity of the process to build public confidence. To ensure that the spirit of the act is maintained is every Canadian's business, in particular that of Elections Canada. That's the point I wanted to make.

I was heartened by your comment with respect to ensuring that the spirit of the act is maintained. We also know continuity, whereby the ridings have to be coherent, is an issue, so you can actually get from end of the riding to another. Consider the riding of Canaan--Tobique. This is a position that's shared by the New Democrats, the Liberal Party, and the Tories, and we don't always agree. There is no road or even a house in this whole area until you get right about here. You have to drive about 40 minutes before you get to the other part of your riding. By the letter of the law, the continuity might be there, but the spirit of the act has been clearly circumvented in that particular case, because the only criterion we heard about was the numbers game. It ignored the act, for the most part, on the principles of community of interest and historical electoral districts. The riding of Canaan--Tobique is an example, and in the riding of Mr. Godin you have to actually drive through Bathurst in order to add this to the Miramichi, and there are no houses, trailers, roads. There are just, as we said, moose, deer, and raccoons in that area. They circumvented the spirit of the act.

Linguistically, here is the issue. New Brunswick's community of interest is that we embrace the linguistic duality we have in our province. I come from an anglophone bastion in New Brunswick. In my southern part of New Brunswick 14,000 people have the capacity to speak both languages. You can live in French in Fundy--Royal. Ten years ago you probably couldn't have. So by playing this numbers game, we have abandoned the community of interest and the harmony that exists. When we have the anglophone community of Bathurst working in cooperation with the Acadian Peninsula, we have abandoned that principle of community of interest from a linguistic perspective.

In New Brunswick we've torn down barriers linguistically. Don't erect them again just for the sake of numbers. The community of interest, where people live, shop, eat, those are the issues. The historical thing has to be taken into account. That is not the case in New Brunswick, and that's what the commission has heard throughout the province. I am encouraging Elections Canada, where they are permitted, to make interventions, to make suggestions, to compile these recommendations, to listen to the people, as Mr. Godin mentioned.

[Translation]

The Chair: Have you any comments or any reactions, Mr. Kingsley?

[English]

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: I just have a lot of difficulty understanding why I'm not getting through. I have nothing to do with the work of the commissions. There is no way I can influence them, sir. There is no way I will seek to influence them. It's not possible. I would refuse to do it.

Mr. John Herron: The process--

The Chair: I'm sorry.

[Translation]

It is my turn.

Mr. Kingsley, I also have a few questions. Am I wrong in saying that Elections Canada is subject to the Official Languages Act?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: You are right; we are.

The Chair: Is this by virtue of section 41 in part VII of this act, which says that the canadian government's agencies and departments are responsible for fostering the development and progress of official languages communities?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: Yes, the whole act.

The Chair: All right.

Are the commissions in charge of redistribution subject to the Official Languages Act?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: I have been informed that that is, in fact, the case.

The Chair: Yes, Ms. Davidson?

» (1730)

Ms. Diane Davidson: Absolutely.

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: Ms. Adam says that she agrees.

The Chair: I have not read your speech, Ms. Adam, but I am sure that you will hand it out to us. You spoke about the March 2002 speech, or about the presentation made to the commissioner and his people. Have these people been told about the importance of section 41 of part VII of the Official Languages Act, which deals with linguistic communities and related responsibilities for entities that are subject to the act?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: I believe so, but we should perhaps put this question to Ms. Adam. That would be much better than putting it to me.

The Chair: We will invite Ms. Adam afterwards.

That was my first question.

Secondly, Mr. Kingsley, you said three times that you had invited the members of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs to the March 2002 conference. Am I right?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: Yes.

The Chair: Is there a provision in the act or some regulation that states that only MPs who sit on that committee are invited?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: Absolutely not.

The Chair: Who decided to invite only members of that committee?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: I made that decision because with regard to the activities of Elections Canada, the committee through which I answer to Parliament is normally the Committee on Procedure.

The Chair: Regarding that, with your permission, let me make the following comments: first, the Official Languages Committee is specifically responsible for ensuring the proper application of the Official Languages Act to all the activities of the ministries and agencies of the Canadian government. For this reason, it might be appropriate to invite the members of committees other than the Committee on Procedure and House Affairs.

Secondly, because of the way our committees work, it often happens that members of one committee are replaced by others, and thus there is a turnover.

Third, even if generally—as is the case with the Committee on Procedure—the members of a specific committee, because of their more specific knowledge of certain issues, are the ones who focus on them, it is not abnormal for agencies or ministries to advise all the MPs about certain events.

Consequently, with your permission, I would propose that you broaden your invitation list. They may not turn up at the meetings in any larger numbers, but at least, in this way, all the MPs will be informed.

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: Let me make a comment on something I said earlier. I did not restrict the invitations only to the MPs who sit on the Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. I mentioned to the committee that I was inviting MPs, but that it was up to the committee to decide who should come.

With regard to the post-mortem, if the committee sitting here wants to attend it, I will be pleased to let you know when it takes place; all MPs will be invited...

The Chair: You can see that the people on this committee are keenly interested in this issue. Coming back to what Mr. Godin said, let me note that in cases where there is dissatisfaction with the application of an act, various measures can be taken, among which is a review of the act or of a process described in the legislative text. These are possibilities that are open to us as MPs and parliamentarians.

It would be good to follow-up on this question. Thus, if either individually or through the clerk you decide to invite members from this committee, you are free to do so. If you go through the clerk, we will make sure that the invitation is sent.

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: That is perfect.

The Chair: I did not have the time to read the whole document you gave us. Does it include a list of dates for following the recommendations made by the commissions of the seven other provinces? If not, could you send it to us?

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: We have not published the commissions' working plan which gives a final date for filing the recommendations. I will ask them to specify these things and I will send you the dates that they will give me. All right?

The Chair: As far as I am concerned, this is all right with me for now.

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: But as I said earlier, they cover the two coming months.

The Chair: I have taken note of this.

For the benefit of committee members, more than for your benefit, Mr. Kingsley, given that you have certainly read and reread the complete document and that you may even know parts of it by heart, I have here a copy of the Lortie report.

Let me quote a paragraph from volume 1, on page 154, which deals with community of interests.

Similarly, the efficacy of the vote of members of these communities is enhanced because they have a greater chance of collectively influencing the choice of a representative. This promotes political participation: individuals are more likely to vote when they believe their vote may influence the outcome of an election. When a community of interests is dispersed across two or more constituencies its voters' capacity to promote their collective interest is diminished accordingly. Their incentive to participate is likewise reduced because the outcome has a lesser relevance to their community of interests. When this occurs, especially if it could have been avoided, the legitimacy of the electoral system is undermined.

Finally, one of the recommendations of the Lortie report, namely recommendation 1.4.6(b), recommends that:

...electoral boundaries commissions justify their proposals and final decisions with reference to these community of interest considerations and contextual factors.

Excuse my lack of knowledge about these matters, but I would like to know whether the content of these documents is reflected in the presentations made before these commissions.

» (1735)

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: With regard to the part that deals with official languages, we could once again ask Ms. Adam.

The Chair: No, official languages was not specified. Our concern as parliamentarians... You can feel it, I believe; we respected the fact that you are not directly involved, except as a go-between seeking information. That said, our hearings, our questions, are intended to raise the level of awareness both at Elections Canada and among the public who may be listening or the Official Languages Commissioner, and we reserve the right to continue to look at these issues. In my opinion, that is part of our parliamentary duty.

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: I welcome that message with open arms and I appreciate the interest that the Official Languages Committee is showing for the first time in the work of Elections Canada. I have been in this position for 13 years and this is the first time that I have been asked to appear before this committee.

The Chair: And it may not be the last time.

Mr. Jean-Pierre Kingsley: I hope not, but I hope that it will be to deal with electoral issues that come under my purview rather than issues outside my mandate.

The Chair: Very well. Thank you, Mr. Kingsley, Ms. Davidson and Mr. Lesage, for coming to the committee today.

Mr. Kinglsey, you and Ms. Adam are colleagues. It is our custom to invite Ms. Adam to ask questions and make comments if she wishes to.

Ms. Adam, would you like to say a few words right now? If so, I would invite you to move to one of the microphones.

» (1740)

[English]

Ms. Dyane Adam (Commissioner of Official Languages, Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages): The only comment I'd like to make is that when we participated at the conference for the commissions, we did stress that the commissions were all subject to the act and that they had to meet all parts of the act, and the point of their duty and responsibility with respect to official languages communities was clearly made.

[Translation]

We congratulated Elections Canada on organizing that meeting, which was aimed at preventing problems rather than resolving them. So we see today that there are still...

The Chair: Would you allow our colleague, Mr. Godin, to ask a brief question?

Mr. Godin, go ahead.

Mr. Yvon Godin: My question is a very quick one. Ms. Adam, the Official Languages Act and the Canada Elections Act talk about a level of 25 per cent in terms of community of interests, which can be even higher in some cases; would you say therefore that community of interests should be given priority over the number?

Ms. Dyane Adam: In my presentation before the commissions, I talked about reconciling different values and objectives, which is the role of commissioners. The Chief Electoral Officer also talked about working to reconcile various objectives.

I cannot make any judgment about a situation like New Brunswick without actually investigating. Up to now, I have not received any formal complaints that would enable us to look into the issue to see whether the commission would have...

The Chair: Thank you very much, everyone. We have gone over our time somewhat. Thank you for coming.

I want to apologize to Mr. Sauvageau. The next meeting is scheduled for Monday at 3:30 p.m., since we are still working to figure out what the time spot will be for our meeting at the beginning of the week. Unfortunately, the next meeting will be on Monday. At the request of a member of the committee, the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency will be appearing.

So have a good weekend, everyone, and the members of the committee will see one another on Monday.

The meeting is adjourned.