“I don’t have a number to update you, but I can tell you that at this point we know that the majority of the contacts, because we’re still calling them contacts, have been made via automated forms or online form letters. These would include political action groups like Leadnow.ca, [political] parties were doing it, as were media outlets,” Elections Canada communications director John Enright told The Hill Times Monday.
Mr. Enright said the electoral agency has hired 14 new “frontline” staff to go through the mass mailings, as well as new individual complaints from voters who were sparked into contacting Elections Canada by the two-week old controversy over allegations of fraudulent automated calling in the riding of Guelph, Ont. The calls purported to be from Elections Canada, and allegations of harassing calls or other phony Elections Canada calls occurred in separate electoral districts.
Mr. Enright said the concerns of the mass-mail online forms varied.
“It depends on what that form is, sometimes you express your displeasure or express your concern, that’s the majority of them,” said Mr. Enright.
“Others were electors wanting to express a complaint. I don’t have a number, but they wanted to submit a complaint or provide information regarding existing complaints."
Mr. Enright declined to comment on a new aspect of the controversy that broke out Monday, over allegations from Conservative MP Dean Del Mastro (Peterborough, Ont.) that Liberal MP Frank Valeriote (Guelph, Ont.) re-elected in the hotly contested Guelph battle, violated the Canada Elections Act when his campaign unleashed a robocall assault itself before election day—with a woman’s voice urging voters to vote “strategically” to prevent Conservative Marty Burke from being elected.
The call claimed Mr. Burke was an ardent anti-abortionist, based on a local newspaper article before voters went to the polls. “I’m appalled by what I read in the <em>Mercury</em> today," the woman, who identified herself as Laurie McDonald of Guelph. “The race in Guelph is very close. Vote strategically on Monday to protect our hard-earned rights from the Conservatives and Marty’s extreme views.”
If the robocalls were considered an advertisement opposing Mr. Burke’s election, it would have required a “tag,” or acknowledgement, that it was paid for and approved by Mr. Valeriote’s campaign.
“We wouldn’t make that interpretation,” Mr. Enright said.
“If a candidate, campaign were to contact us during an election for example and say, ‘Is this ad Okay?’ we don’t vet advertising. We would simply point them to the sections [of the Canada Elections Act] and say, ‘These sections will guide you, and you make the decisions as to whether or not you, candidate, campaign, determine these to be election advertising or not and act accordingly. So we don’t vet. Can you imagine if we did?” Mr. Enright said. “The definition is explicit, and if it is deemed to be election advertising, it’s got to be tagged.”
The Canada Elections Act says election advertising means “the transmission to the public by any means during an election period of an advertising message that promotes or opposes a registered party or the election of a candidate, including one that takes a position on an issue with which a registered party or candidate is associated.”
The definition excludes material concerning “the transmission to the public of an editorial, a debate, a speech, an interview, a column, a letter, a commentary or news” and the personal political views of an individual.
Liberals said privately they did not believe the robocall from Mr. Valeriote’s campaign was advertising.
Liberal Leader Bob Rae (Toronto Centre, Ont.), dismissing Mr. Del Mastro’s claims that the robocalls from Mr. Valeriote’s campaign were illegal, called for a royal commission of inquiry into the affair.
“Unless you have a full judicial inquiry with all the powers of a public inquiry, you’re not going to be able to get all the evidence in, you’re not going to be able to do the kind of research that has to be one,” he said.
Mr. Rae smiled at the thought Prime Minister Stephen Harper (Calgary Southwest, Alta.), might like the idea of a royal commission of inquiry, a rare but established investigation procedure in Canada, because it includes the word royal.
“That thought occurred to me,” Mr. Rae said.
Original Article
Source: hill times
Author: TIM NAUMETZ
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