Local Elections Expense Limits — Issue No. 12 — Thursday, February 26, 2015 (HTML)

Present: Jackie Tegart, MLA (Chair); Selina Robinson, MLA (Deputy Chair); Mike Bernier, MLA; Gary Holman, MLA; Marvin Hunt, MLA; Jenny Wai Ching Kwan, MLA; Linda Reimer, MLA; Sam Sullivan, MLA

1. There not yet being a Chair elected to serve the Committee, the meeting was called to order at 12:09 p.m. by the Deputy Clerk and Clerk of Committees.

2. Resolved, that Jackie Tegart, MLA, be elected Chair of the Special Committee on Local Elections Expense Limits. (Linda Reimer, MLA)

3. Resolved, that Selina Robinson, MLA, be elected Deputy Chair of the Special Committee on Local Elections Expense Limits. (Jenny Wai Ching Kwan, MLA)

4. The Committee reviewed and discussed preliminary draft Phase 2 documents including a draft regional public hearing itinerary, a draft work plan and related materials.

The following electronic version is for informational purposes only.
The printed version remains the official version.

REPORT OF PROCEEDINGS
(Hansard)

SPECIAL COMMITTEE ON
LOCAL ELECTIONS EXPENSE LIMITS


CONTENTS
Page
Election of Chair and Deputy Chair	163
Public Consultation Process and Committee Workplan	163

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Deputy Clerk and Clerk of Committees): Good afternoon, Members. As this is the first meeting of the Special Committee on Local Elections Expense Limits in this fourth session of the 40th parliament and there has not yet been a member elected to the position of Chair for this session, I’ll open the floor to nominations to that position.

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Clerk of Committees): Any further nominations? Any further nominations? Any further nominations?

J. Tegart (Chair): Any further nominations? Any further nominations? For a third and final time, any further nominations?

The third item on the agenda is to review preliminary draft 2 timelines and consultation plan.

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Clerk of Committees): Good afternoon, Members. In anticipation of the meeting this afternoon, we have circulated to you all a number of draft documents on which we would seek your input and comment.

The first item that you have in front of you is a revised workplan which simply gives a very high-level overview of some of the next steps in the work of your committee as you continue your review of local election expense limits during phase 2. We have not yet identified specific meeting dates, but it would be very helpful to get a sense from members in terms of how they would like to see the meeting schedule unfold in the next few weeks.

In addition to the public consultation proposal that has been included in your package this morning, you will note that we are anticipating that the committee will be scheduling a meeting soon to hear from Elections B.C. officials. I know that in terms of our discussions with the Chair and the Deputy Chair earlier, we are also hoping to hear early on in the process from the UBCM, the B.C. School Trustees Association and any other witnesses that you would like to particularly invite at the forefront.

In addition to those discussions, I would anticipate your committee will also be launching a public consultation process. To support that, we have provided you with a draft media release for your review, a draft advertisement which could be used in a variety of provincial newspapers and also a revised draft on-line survey which could be used to engage with British Columbians who happen to visit your committee’s website to provide their feedback to you on any variety of questions that you think would be helpful to explore.

I know that the committee has also contemplated receiving some additional data analysis to supplement the information from Elections B.C. I think members will have received from our office an e-mail a few days ago advising that on Monday, February 23, Elections B.C. did publish on its website a list — it was a searchable interface — of election expenses as they were filed from 2014 local election candidates. It is searchable to some extent, but there is an interest, I think, as well in receiving some additional data analysis, which we can discuss later today.

The final document in your package is a very preliminary draft public hearing itinerary which has a number of options for the committee’s consideration. This is based on the premise that the committee would travel to these locations not by charter flight, which is common for parliamentary committees to ensure that we have the ability to ensure all members of the committee can travel together. This is a commercial flight option.

We’re pleased to answer any questions and receive your input and feedback on any of those preliminary documents, and we look forward to working with you all in the weeks ahead.

J. Tegart (Chair): Are there any questions to Kate in regards to the information that has been put before you?
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M. Bernier: Obviously, when you were talking about the commercial rather than charter, did you look at the different cost implications of that? Were there any, or does it kind of balance out?

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Clerk of Committees): We did have a detailed estimate from the charter company, which had, because of the timing of our inquiry with the companies that we contacted, a different collection of locations. We’ve had a more refined proposal that has been put forward for your consideration by the Chair and the Deputy Chair. I didn’t really cost out the charter, but at the outset it appeared to be comparable.

There are, of course, some challenges with a commercial option. We are, of course, at the disposal of flight changes and cancellations and that kind of thing. We’re hoping that the proposal provides some flexibility. As the committee will be returning to the Lower Mainland each evening, it provides some advantages for some members of the committee in terms of accommodations.

However, it also means that there are some connections out of Vancouver. If one flight was delayed, for example, hopefully, a second flight would be available to get members to the public hearing location on time.

M. Bernier: If I can continue, then, on that. Looking at the preliminary draft, how flexible can we be on those locations? We haven’t advertised, obviously, anything yet of where and when.

A couple of different things. I guess from a committee standpoint, I’m trying to figure out what the best use of travelling around the province will be and who our target audience should be. I do understand the logistics of, obviously, having to fly to larger cities because of the airlines and all that. I just think we need to recognize the fact that that really restricts who we’re going to be hearing from.

When I look at northern B.C., for instance, Prince George obviously logistically makes a lot of sense. But they’re a 90,000-person city. That’s not going to be a good representation of what northern and rural British Columbia is really going to say. And to expect the people will be coming there….

I just want to make sure that as a committee we recognize that as a challenge. I don’t think or know of a way we can really get around that. I understand we’re not going to fly to Wells, which has 300 people. I know it’s not practical. But I just want to make sure we flag that as an issue.

The other thing would be looking at how we’re looking at this. We have Kelowna, Penticton and Surrey. Personally, I’d like to see those reversed. I’d like to do the Interior and finish off with Penticton and Kelowna, not be starting there. That would be my personal preference.

S. Robinson (Deputy Chair): I agree with the member. There was certainly some discussion with the Chair and me around how we reach out to the smaller communities. To get big, larger-city input, we’re expecting a bit of the same sort of conversation. That was why, I think, when we talked, we looked at Penticton as opposed to Kelowna. It’s a smaller community. Also, in terms of proximity to really small places…. If it’s a half-hour drive, would it make it more accessible? There would be many of them.

Perhaps part of what we might want to do is make extra effort to invite those people, rather than just rely on advertising. When we go to a community to identify and target a handful of smaller communities and send an invitation — perhaps, under the Chair’s name, with my name — inviting them to come because we really do want to hear from them, that might be a way to help that.

J. Tegart (Chair): Yes. At this time, I think, if it is okay with the committee, Mike has asked that we consider looking at Penticton as the Thursday rather than the Monday. I think we’re capable of flipping that, if it’s more convenient for members.

M. Bernier: If I can just add to what the Deputy Chair said. Thank you for those comments. I think another opportunity would be to talk to — once we get these dates and everything pinpointed down — and to work with whomever the local MLAs might be as well, to really have them because, hopefully, they have the connections with a lot of those smaller communities and stress to them the importance of trying to get them to be involved as well.

J. Tegart (Chair): Okay. Any other comments or concerns in regard to the travel schedule?

S. Sullivan: I prefer the charter myself because I can control what they do to my chair. It’s in the regular flights that my chair gets banged up. You don’t have any control over how they handle it. And then for me, I’ve got this schedule that is dependent on my bladder. When I travel, I get a bladder infection almost always, unless I really handle it very well and take the breaks I need. It might tie down the committee a bit. But I just wanted to flag that.

This schedule doesn’t look as daunting as I originally had heard about. This is like one a day, pretty well? It was two or three a day at one point, I think.

J. Tegart (Chair): Yes, it’s been revised, trying to accommodate the needs of members.

S. Sullivan: Well, I just book in the repairs to the chair. That pretty well will happen. Also, these are small planes,
[ Page 165 ]
I think. Kate, you were going to look into…?

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Clerk of Committees): I’m pleased to do a more detailed comparison with the charter and commercial option now that we have potential locations confirmed and timelines confirmed. The challenge with the charter was that typically they would give us a smaller plane, and on that we noted a number of challenges. The commercial planes typically are larger and can accommodate some details more comfortably. But that being said, I’m pleased to go back and just ensure that we have the best option. If we were to now re-examine these four options in light of a larger charter, we’ll do a cost analysis and make sure it does work.

One different change, as Sam noted, is that this proposal has up to four days of travel. Often with the charters, flights that we arrange, we do at least two public hearings in a day, making good use of the committee’s time. But then we’re also staying in regional accommodation, which also has a number of challenges inherent in it. So this proposal, as members will see, covers twice the amount of time — just a four-hour hearing per day — but we were hoping to find whatever works best for all committee members. I’m pleased to make any changes to the current draft.

S. Robinson (Deputy Chair): I just want to point out that it’s not Kelowna and Penticton; it’s Kelowna or Penticton. I just wasn’t sure if people understood.

J. Kwan: If the option of doing a charter is chosen, it may be an idea…. It would mean revamping the schedule quite a bit, right? But we’ve been on committees, I think, where we would fly in and actually do two locations and then that day fly to a third and then station there. Theoretically, maybe that could be arranged accordingly. That way, it would truncate the amount of time in which we were travelling, but it does mean a vigorous period. We leave early, we do one morning meeting somewhere, and then we fly somewhere and go do an afternoon or evening meeting. Then, when we’re done, we fly out to be ready for the next day.

Anyway, I’ll leave it to the Chair and the Deputy Chair to figure out. But that’s an option to consider, if we end up choosing the route to meet particular members’ needs.

G. Holman: Just looking at the timelines, the deadline for all public hearings, etc., is April 10. I’m just wondering if we should be pushing that back just a little bit. It seems like a fairly brief period. We’ve got one fairly abbreviated trip, and I just worry about the committee being criticized for kind of rushing the process a bit.

Now, I know you’ve got to kind of back up from the deadline to submit the report, and I know there are challenges there. But I just wondered about pushing the proposed deadline further into April. I think a superficial criticism of the committee might be: “Hey, this is so important. You took one three- or four-day trip in British Columbia.” I know there are very good responses to that. I know there are a number of other ways we’re trying to get feedback from folks. But just to state the obvious, we should have good answers for that kind of superficial criticism — that you only took one kind of physical trip through the province.

J. Tegart (Chair): Okay. It’s fair to note that, I think, depending on response and demand for presentations either in person or by telephone, we foresee that we may need a few more days. I expect that most of that will come from the Metro area. We’ve certainly talked about that and talked about making sure that we give the time for that.

But in regard to going beyond April 10 — Kate, can you give us a little bit of feedback on what that would mean report-writing-wise, etc.?

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Clerk of Committees): Certainly. From our office’s perspective, I’m sure we’d be able to accommodate an April 17 proposed deadline. I’d really be at the disposal of the committee. If the committee feels it needs to be even later, I’d have to consult carefully, I guess, with our Helen here to ensure that we’re able to provide you with sufficient time for your deliberations. Because the House is sitting in May, ideally we would be able to schedule a sufficient number of meeting opportunities with you all to finalize your draft report.

In essence, what the work would be is to ensure that through our office, if you’re not able to go through the details of each and every submission that’s received — on-line submissions, written submissions and information provided to you in public hearings — all that information is fully accessible to you. It ensures that the draft report that we might prepare on your behalf is well informed and links back appropriately to all of that input.

G. Holman: Thanks for that. Maybe I’m missing it, but could we, before the deadline, provide, say, one day of a phone-in opportunity, particularly for those communities we can’t visit directly?

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Clerk of Committees): Yes. I believe the Chair and Deputy Chair had contemplated that at each of the regional public hearings we would have a phone-in option. For example, the observation that from a Prince George location — of course, we’re only really mid-province at that point — we would have an open-phone opportunity…. Interested individuals could preregister through our office, and then we would have integrated into the usual discussion in the course of that public hearing a phone conversation, similar to what we
[ Page 166 ]
did in Surrey in December when we had some inclement weather conditions.

G. Holman: So that means that, theoretically, each one of these physical meeting dates could have a phone opportunity built into it?

S. Sullivan: If we do the real heavy schedule, I will be challenged to find ways to accommodate all the things that I need to do. I was in Prince George just a short time ago, and the Ramada hotel, the big one, did not have a wheelchair-accessible washroom that I could use. I ended up using the airport. So maybe the airport is an idea, because they’re usually at least accessible. You know, to go in a major hotel and not have that accessibility was…. I don’t imagine what the other cities, smaller towns would have.

J. Tegart (Chair): Those are the kinds of things we’ll take into consideration, Sam, when we take a look at what the options are.

M. Bernier: The only thing I was going to say is just around the April 10 date. My personal feeling is that I like the workplan that we have laid out right now. The reason is that if we change it to the 17th, what’s going to end up happening is that on the 17th, as a committee, we’re going to decide: do we have to extend it now to the 25th? Just human nature being the way it is, I would far rather leave it as April 10. As we get closer to that deadline, if it looks like we need to extend it, then consider it if we think it’s going to work into our timelines. Hopefully we don’t have to, right? But at least it’s just a bit more room, I think, to work with.

G. Holman: Well, not to belabour it. I think it’ll work out fine, actually. It’s more a public perception that I’m a little more worried about than anything else. If we get to, say, April 12, and say we need another week, that just seems a little inadequate as a response. But, you know, I think it will work out, and I’m happy to go with the will of the committee.

J. Tegart (Chair): Thank you. Certainly, when we look at revising the schedule based on the comments today, the Deputy Chair and I will take your comments into consideration.

S. Robinson (Deputy Chair): I was actually just going to suggest the same thing.

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Clerk of Committees): Just on the topic of the committee’s public consultation period, we will be aiming to go live with the opening of your consultation whenever the committee feels that it has sufficient information and is well supported to proceed with that, which would, of course, extend, then…. If April 10 is the agreed-to deadline for input — the written submissions and upon review and discussion by the committee of the proposed on-line questions — we could go live with those strings of input as soon as we are ready to do so.

I guess one of the questions that we thought to seek your direction on today was…. I know that the preliminary questions have been recirculated to you all. I know there was some discussion and suggestions about those at your last meeting. We’re pleased to make any changes we can to strengthen them.

One of the questions on our minds is if we would require further data analysis on the 2014 local election expenditures — and able to prepare questions that are meaningful to the public — or if there are opportunities that we can utilize in some of the suggestions that have been put forward for your consideration that we can proceed with without the benefit of additional data analysis.

That may affect the timing of the opening of your consultations, because I think the on-line portal is a part of a meaningful consultation process.

Written submissions. I mean, we could open with that one first, for example, but many, many people find it most convenient to participate in our parliamentary committee consultations using an on-line questionnaire or survey, which is one of the objectives that we had in mind for this process.

The details of these questions are critical, I think, to having a successful on-line engagement. On that point, we may or may not be able to open up on that level unless we have a sense of if we require some extra data analysis before proceeding with that step.

M. Hunt: I think ultimately, if you don’t have some meaningful data to work with, the survey is almost useless. I’m just reading some of the questions that are here. On the second page of it, for example, asking whether the mayoralty should have more than a council, whether the council should have more than school districts and regional districts — well, to most people, that means nothing. They’re not at all involved in the mechanics of these, or they don’t understand and haven’t been a part of it. To me, those are not questions that I particularly think are beneficial to get feedback on.

Having said that, things like the challenge of how we’re going to deal with electoral organizations versus in-
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dependence — I think those are ones where…. I have no idea how we would word a question on that, but I think those are more the kind of thing where I would like to get feedback rather than on the numbers.

That piece of it, to me, is just relatively logical and straightforward. The evidence, I expect, will show that that’s exactly happens: you spend more on the mayoralty candidate than on…. So I don’t think that question has value.

But what I would also think is…. I would hope that, for example, we take the first question there where we deal with the (b): “A small number of population transition points at which the per-capita amount would change.” Back page, top question, (b). I had to read that a second time myself to figure out what that was actually saying. If I’m having to read it a second time, Joe Average hasn’t a clue what those words actually mean, or it will take them a while to….

Again, to me, that’s where you do…. Like it says here, you’ve got to have a graph. You have to have some visual there for them to get the concept of “Oh, this is what we’re talking about,” or using the illustration that “In Ontario here is the way the numbers look. Which do you think it’s going to be?” That kind of a thing.

But again, even on that one, that question, again, to me, is much more one that…. The data should drive that. I think part of the problem with the data is the fact that, as I just flipped through some of the areas that I know of, they had all copped out to electoral organizations. They had just all copped out to it. Everybody’s was zero.

You know: “I spent no money at all. It was all the electoral….” You know that’s not true, but anyhow, that’s how they chose to put the information in. I think that’s where we’ve got to have a way of pulling it out.

By the same token, there are going to be assumptions in it. I think one of the assumptions in doing the calculation is that the limit for mayors will be higher than for councils, which will be higher than for school trustees. I think that assumption has got to get into the calculations. Otherwise, we’re going to have a real problem dividing the electoral organization’s amounts back into the individual’s so that we can actually calculate out a reasonable number for the individuals.

S. Robinson (Deputy Chair): I have one comment about a question and another more process suggestion. On the front page there’s a question: “Do you agree with a flat-rate limit for all local government elections in jurisdictions with populations less than 10,000?” The question is: my understanding is that that is the expectation, so why would we ask if we agree or don’t agree? If we get people who don’t agree, then are we going to be able to act on it? I’m not sure that would be a question that we’d want. Just a quick observation.

I would like to spend a little bit more time with these questions. If I can just make a suggestion that we sit with this for a bit and take a look. I’ve been looking at that website as well and trying to make sense of some of the data and what kinds of questions…. It’s really challenging because it’s all just scanned in, and it’s like: “Oh my god.” I have some suggestions for how to fix that, but that’s another conversation.

I would love if we even just had a week to sit with this, make some suggestions, maybe send them in by e-mail — about our thoughts — and perhaps at the next meeting be prepared to provide some suggestions.

J. Tegart (Chair): I would like to suggest that perhaps we commit to meet next week. Based on that, we would come back with the revised numbers for travel and the dates and locations, based on the comments today, and also taking a look at the questions for the questionnaire.

The other thing that comes to mind to me…. I’ve also looked at the site. We may be making some suggestion in regards to how the reporting is done. If the intention is transparency and for the public to be able to actually take a look and know in their area or other areas what people have spent, I’m not sure that the way it’s being reported right now meets that intention.

Certainly, just for us to take a look at it makes…. I don’t know how Joe Public will take a look at it and actually make sense, unless they want to know the one person, right? So it’s going to be an interesting process.

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Clerk of Committees): Certainly, I would welcome members taking their time to absorb these very preliminary questions, some of which we had prepared in-house and others in conjunction with the ministry staff, in terms of their ideas of what they thought may be helpful.

I recognize, though, that in terms of the data analysis, there could be potentially two opportunities. One, to identify the kinds of detailed information that you, as committee members, would like to know, to receive, in terms of your deliberations on your terms of reference. The other piece would be what kind of extra analysis might help inform and engage the public in terms of….

It really comes down to what types of public feedback would be helpful in support of your deliberations and, in order to have meaningful questions, is there additional information that we need to incorporate into the consultation process — hence, the timing question.

The other piece, recognizing that as members you will have your own areas of interest — those we can convey, I’m sure, to Elections B.C. when they appear next before you. We can schedule that meeting at your earliest convenience.

But I recognize now that there are two distinct areas, potentially, of additional information required.

J. Kwan: I just want to flag, for committee members, to think about this as well. I think Vancouver is probably unusual in this context, because we also elect a park board. It doesn’t exist pretty well anywhere else. The category of elected officials in the question is also a little bit limiting. It would be good for us to think about how to sort of encapsulate broader categories in that way. So I’ll just flag that.

M. Hunt: I’m just wondering if we can come up with a better word than “outliers.” I never heard that word until Linda started using it after her being exposed to the Ministry of Community. I’ve never heard that word before. It’s one that, to me, is a verbiage that is an in-house verbiage for those who are….

It’s not a common term. The common person wouldn’t have a clue what that actually meant. Well, it would take them a while. If we can just use some easier language for people to understand.

G. Holman: Just in the spirit of making sure we do flag that question about the flat rate limit, I agree with the comments being made. Why is it a question if we’ve already decided that’s going to happen?

If that is the case, if we take the question out, it might be worthwhile explaining why that was put in — for purposes of simplicity, say. “Population under 10,000 — it was agreed….” That kind of…. Just to give people a sense.

I’m not sure if I do agree with Marvin about the question on the top of page 2, that it needs to be clearer and that a visual would help. I’m not sure if you necessarily need a visual for all of the questions, but that one…. There’s a suggestion right there about a graph.

Am I missing it? I don’t see electoral organizations mentioned in here and the notion that they would be included in the candidate limit or something along those lines.

G. Holman: Has that been decided by government, or does it represent a consensus of this committee at this point, or is that still an open question?

G. Holman: But it’s not a direction from government at this point, necessarily.

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Clerk of Committees): In the committee’s report in December, we noted in the executive summary, “In relation to the principle of neutrality, the committee concluded that an approach of no separate, additional expense limits for elector organizations was desirable” — so by candidate only, in essence.

We will ensure that that’s well reflected within the next iteration of the possible questions.

Based on the discussion today, I’m going to suggest that we schedule a meeting for late next week, which will give Selina and myself time to meet with Kate to go over some information and also give the Clerk’s office time to put some numbers together in regards to travel plans.

In the meantime, I would ask members to look at the questionnaire, to feel free to give input in regards to questions and what you think should be included, and we’ll bring that back to the committee meeting next week.

I’m going to suggest a possible lunch meeting on Thursday of next week, if that works for everyone.

M. Bernier: Just to let you know that there is a YVR luncheon that day that most of us have committed to. Just so you know we’d all have to back out of it on Thursday.

J. Tegart (Chair): I think it’s critically important that we get it done. Thanks, Mike.

Okay, so next Thursday. Everyone has an obligation to do a little work on the reviewing of questions for the questionnaire. We will come back to you with the information that was requested today.

I want to thank everyone for coming today and for the work that you’re doing. I really appreciate it. It’s pretty important.

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Chair:	Jackie Tegart (Fraser-Nicola BC Liberal)
Deputy Chair:	Selina Robinson (Coquitlam-Maillardville NDP)
Members:	Mike Bernier (Peace River South BC Liberal)
	Gary Holman (Saanich North and the Islands NDP)
	Marvin Hunt (Surrey-Panorama BC Liberal)
	Jenny Wai Ching Kwan (Vancouver–Mount Pleasant NDP)
	Linda Reimer (Port Moody–Coquitlam BC Liberal)
	Sam Sullivan (Vancouver–False Creek BC Liberal)
Clerk:	Kate Ryan-Lloyd

REPORT OF PROCEEDINGS(Hansard)

SPECIAL COMMITTEE ON LOCAL ELECTIONS EXPENSE LIMITS

REPORT OF PROCEEDINGS
(Hansard)

SPECIAL COMMITTEE ON
LOCAL ELECTIONS EXPENSE LIMITS