Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Campaign Finance

The CEO recommends that the standing committee propose a set of principles to be reflected in the campaign finance provisions of the Act and direct the CEO to return to the Assembly with detailed recommendations to amend Part 9 of the Act. The committee agrees with this recommendation, however, recommends that the CEO undertake further research on other jurisdictions’ approaches to campaign finance and provide the results of that research to the committee in order to assist the committee in developing a set of proposed principles.

Offences

The CEO recommends that the Act be amended to make threatening a candidate and impersonating an election officer an offence. The standing committee agrees.

Tariff of Fees Regulations

The CEO recommends that the Legislative Assembly support in principle that the CEO will recommend to the Commissioner a restructured Tariff of Fees Regulations to reflect the rebalancing of duties between election officers and to remunerate election officers for the completion of specific assignments. The standing committee agrees in principle that the regulations should be amended, but recommends that the CEO provide the draft regulations to the committee for comment before recommending them to the Commissioner.

Registration of Incarcerated Electors

In order to facilitate voter registration of incarcerated persons, the CEO recommends that the Act be amended to require the deputy minister of Justice, at the request of the CEO, to provide the names and addresses of inmates who are residents of the Northwest Territories on a date specified and who have or who will have attained the age of 18 years on a date specified. The standing committee agrees.

Define ‘Sponsor’

The CEO recommends defining the term “sponsor” in the Act and proposes to work with legislative drafters to define the term “sponsor” as being: the person or organization that pays for, provides, or incurs the costs of the campaign material bearing the identification. The standing committee agrees, and further recommends that the CEO be directed to develop a consistent phrase to be used to identify sponsors on campaign material and include that in guidelines for candidates.

Mobile Poll Administration

Currently, only returning officers can conduct mobile polls, which limits capacity to deliver this service. The CEO recommends amending the Act to allow all elections officers to conduct mobile polls. The standing committee agrees.

Vouching

The CEO recommends that the Act be amended so that a person vouching for an elector without sufficient identification need only reside in the same electoral district, rather than in the same polling division. The standing committee agrees.

Nomination Papers as Public Records

The CEO recommends that the Act be amended to add candidate nomination papers to the list of public records that may be inspected during office hours at the OCEO. The CEO also proposes to convey through guides and other publications that

nomination papers are public records and that, during the campaign period, nomination papers may be inspected in the office of the returning officer; further, during the nomination period, the CEO proposes to convey to the public an unofficial list of who has been nominated and how many people have been nominated across the territory. The standing committee agrees.

Investigative Powers of CEO

The CEO recommends amending the Act to grant the CEO the same enforcement powers as a board of inquiry under the Public Inquiries Act. While the standing committee agrees that the CEO may need broader enforcement powers than currently exist in the Act, Members are concerned that the proposed amendment may make those powers too sweeping. The committee instead recommends that the CEO return to the committee with recommendations for additional specific enforcement powers and substantiation of the need for those powers.Deputy Minister to Grant Leave - Public Service Act The CEO recommends that the Public Service Act be amended so that the authority to grant leave to an employee who wishes to seek nomination to be a candidate resides with the deputy minister accountable for the administration of that Act rather than with the Minister. The Standing Committee agrees.

Housekeeping Amendments

On pages 42 to 45 of this report, the CEO proposes nine housekeeping amendments to the Act. The Standing Committee agrees with all of the proposed amendments, with the exception of recommendation 21 on the 25 metre voting rule.

The CEO recommends that the 25 metre restriction on campaigning outside of advance polling stations and election day polling stations be extended to all voting opportunities.

While the committee understands the concern about the potential for campaigning activities near other voting opportunities, Members are concerned that the proposed amendment would be difficult to enforce and would result in many inadvertent breaches of the Act. For example, a person with a candidate sign in the window of their vehicle could be committing an offence if they parked on the street outside the office of the returning officer. These offices are frequently in community buildings that house many other agencies and businesses. To expect anyone with a campaign sign on their vehicle to avoid parking in front of such buildings for an entire election period seems unduly onerous. The committee therefore disagrees with the CEO’s recommendation.

I’d now like to turn the floor over to Mr. Hawkins for the continuation of the reading of the report.