“If he’s said there’s fraud then I would hope that whatever he’s said can be followed up. But what I am most concerned about is the allegations about me and my team, and we’re clean,” said Conservative MP Jay Aspin, who was first elected in Nipissing-Timiskaming, Ont., in 2011 by a 14-vote margin.
“There’s nothing there. … Be specific, where did it happen?” said Mr. Aspin, adding, upon further questioning, that Justice Mosley’s statement that fraud occurred across Canada was a “broad statement.”
Said Mr. Aspin: “I can make broad statements like that, but where are the specifics?”
The Council of Canadians, on behalf of eight people, challenged the election results last fall in Nipissing-Timiskaming, Ont., along with five other ridings including: Saskatoon-Rosetown-Biggar, Sask.; Elmwood-Transcona, Alta.; Yukon; Vancouver Island North, B.C.; and Winnipeg South Centre, Man. Originally, a seventh riding—Conservative MP Joe Daniel’s riding of Don Valley East, Ont.—was also part of the challenge, but it was later dropped.
On May 23, Justice Mosley delivered his ruling. While he found the “threshold to establish that fraud occurred” had been met, he did not overturn the 2011 federal election results because there was no evidence that a successful candidate or their agent was responsible for the fraudulent activities, and because he found no evidence that “voter suppression efforts had a major impact on the credibility of the vote.”
Mr. Mosley wrote in his ruling: “I find that electoral fraud occurred during the 41st general election but I am not satisfied that it has been established that fraud affected the outcomes in the subject ridings and I decline to exercise my discretion to annul the results in those districts.”
Further, he wrote: “I am satisfied that it has been established that misleading calls about the locations of polling stations were made to electors in ridings across the country, including the subject ridings, and that the purpose of those calls was to suppress the votes of electors who had indicated their voting preference in response to earlier voter identification calls. … In reaching this conclusion, I make no finding that the CPC [Conservative Party of Canada], any CPC candidates or RMG [a telemarketing company] and RackNine Inc., were directly involved in the campaign to mislead voters.”
In addition, he said that the “most likely source of the information used” to make the calls was the Constituent Information Management System (CIMS) database “maintained and controlled” by the Conservative Party, but he was clear that, “there is no evidence to indicate the use of the CIMS database in this manner was approved or condoned by the CPC. Rather, the evidence points to elaborate efforts to conceal the identity of those accessing the database and arranging for the calls to be made.”
The Hill Times contacted all six sitting MPs whose ridings were involved in the Federal Court challenge, to ask about the fraud finding. Along with Guelph, Ont., these six ridings have garnered a heightened degree of public attention in coverage of the “robocalls” scandal which is currently being investigated by the Commissioner of Canada Elections and for which charges have been laid.
In an interview with The Hill Times, Conservative MP Joyce Bateman, who was elected in Winnipeg South Centre for the first time in 2011 by a 696-vote margin, focused on the fact that Justice Mosley found “no wrongdoing” on the Conservative Party’s part.
When asked what she thought of the fact that Justice Mosley found fraud occurred and read the applicable sentence in the ruling, Ms. Bateman said, “it’s one sentence in 100 pages.”
Ms. Bateman said volunteers in her riding “worked so hard” and “so honourably, so ethically” during the last election, and “the most important” finding in the ruling was that “the people who brought this case could not produce one voter all across Canada whose vote had not been taken as a result” of fraud.
“My opinion is that I am delighted that more people voted [in her riding in the 2011 election],” she said. “A group of people—two people in my riding decided they didn’t like the outcome and petulantly decided that they would try to overturn the election results, what happened is the judge said there is no evidence.”
Said Mr. Aspin: “I’ve read the document, it’s about a 100-page document. They said there was no wrongdoing by the Conservative Party of any of the candidates or the campaign teams targeted by these applications and the court also noted that not a single voter was produced to testify that they were prevented from voting due to alleged voter suppression, so basically what they’re saying is there’s not a shred of hard evidence,” said Mr. Aspin.
Conservative MP John Duncan, who was re-elected to Vancouver Island North, B.C., in 2008, after being defeated in 2006, and won in 2011 by a 1,799-vote margin, sent an email in response to a request from The Hill Times to discuss Justice Mosley’s finding that a campaign to mislead voters was “committed by persons unknown” in the 2011 election.
“The 2011 election was my seventh federal election as the candidate and the 2011 campaign in Vancouver Island North was run cleanly and with integrity as were all previous campaigns I have been involved in,” said Mr. Duncan. “I agree that fraud has been established in Guelph and it is in everyone’s interest to stomp out this kind of activity. I disagree with your presumption beyond Guelph and it was established that not a single voter was prevented from voting in the six ridings. CRTC is enforcing robocall discipline as demonstrated this week which is very helpful.”
Conservative MP Kelly Block, who was first elected to her riding of Saskatoon-Rosetown-Biggar, Sask., in 2008 and was re-elected in 2011 by a 538-vote margin, sent an email in response to The Hill Times’ request for interview stating that Conservative Party spokesperson Fred DeLorey “is handling all media requests on this issue.” Ms. Block did not respond to further request for comment.
Conservative MP Lawrence Toet, who was first elected as the MP for Elmwood-Transcona, Man., in 2011 by a 284-vote margin, declined an interview. Conservative MP Ryan Leef, who was elected in Yukon for the first time in 2011 with a 132-vote margin, was in England last week with the Public Safety Committee as part of their study on the economics of policing, his office said, and no response to emailed questions was received by deadline.
In his judgment, Justice Mosley said the Council of Canadians challenge had “partisan overtones from the outset,” and said in his view, “the respondent MPs engaged in trench warfare in an effort to prevent this case from coming to a hearing on the merits.”
Through the course of this case, the Conservative Party’s legal team, led by CPC lawyer Arthur Hamilton, brought forward a “considerable number of interlocutory motions,” which Justice Mosley listed as reasons “to explain why this case has taken so long to be completed.” Among those motions was a request to have “an increased security for costs, totaling $260,409.00, paid into court by the [Council of Canadians].”
Justice Mosley awarded the Council of Canadians “a modest fixed amount for the costs of the hearing.” The Council of Canadians said last week that it will not appeal the decision at the Supreme Court of Canada, but did call for a public inquiry into robocalls made during the 2011 federal election campaign.
Meanwhile, Chief Electoral Officer Marc Mayrand appeared before the Procedure and House Affairs Committee on May 28 to speak to the recommendations he made in his March 27 report titled “Preventing Deceptive Communications with Electors,” and to discuss Elections Canada’s 2013-14 main estimates.
Mr. Mayrand told MPs that Democratic Reform Minister Tim Uppal (Edmonton-Sherwood Park, Alta.) has not yet consulted him in drafting the government’s anticipated legislation to address robocalls, which Mr. Uppal has said will be “comprehensive.”
The House of Commons unanimously passed a motion calling on the government to introduce legislation to address the robocalls scandal “within six months” on March 12, 2012, but legislation has still yet to be introduced.
This past April, Mr. Uppal said after discovering a “last-minute issue in the proposed Elections Reform Act,” the legislation has been postponed, according to various media outlets. In response to a question concerning when the bill will be tabled, in a May 30 email to The Hill Times, Mr. Uppal’s spokesperson said, “we committed to introducing legislation, and we will introduce legislation.”
Mr. Mayrand told the committee that a bill would need to be passed and receive royal assent by spring 2014 in order for Elections Canada to put new measures in place for the next federal election, anticipated in October 2015.
“We are up against the clock. We have a fixed date and we need to know the rules of the game well ahead of the game,” said Mr. Mayrand.
Mr. Mayrand said the three key issues the commissioner of Canada Elections faces are the “lack of timely information being accessible,” the fact that “there is no standard for retention of information,” and the fact that the commissioner “has no authority to compel testimony.”
Mr. Mayrand said media reports “point out there were some delays” in Elections Canada’s still ongoing investigation centered on allegations of misleading and harassing calls placed to voters in Guelph, Ont., on election day, and said it’s “public knowledge” that three people “refused to meet with investigators.” Mr. Mayrand said the changes he’s proposed “would eliminate that.”
Mr. Mayrand said Canada “really” needs to “modernize” its election legislation, and said “we are out of sync with the times.”
“We need to start looking at the way the voting process is designed. We need to introduce technology to the system. Right now I need signatures, document papers, that are not aligned with the times. Canadians don’t want to deal with paper, they want to deal with us electronically,” said Mr. Mayrand.
Original Article
Source: hilltimes.com
Author: LAURA RYCKEWAERT
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