Serious Behavior !

These changes to the elections act are tantamount to a "declaration of war" or an "act of war". They will bring us back to the days when people were regularly beat up at polling stations.

Campbell knows he has to pull out all stops to be assured a victory next May 9th. We will also have to pull out all stops. It is beginning to look like we are in for a punch-em up and knock-em down election. The 6th item on the list below pretty much guarantees that each side will have to have some muscle of sorts to referee fair play at the polling stations if the NDP are to have a chance at winning.

* Tripling the number of voters needed to nominate a candidate from the current 25 to 75
* Raising the nomination deposit made by candidates from $100 to $250
* Allowing political parties to spend up to $2.2 million in the 120 days before a 28-day campaign period, and another $4.4 million during the campaign
* Excusing money spent on fundraising during a campaign from being counted as an election expense, even if that fundraising fails to raise any money
* Prohibiting candidates from accepting contributions from federal political parties and electoral district associations
* Allowing any voter in a constituency, election officials or representatives of candidates to challenge a person's right to vote.

At Least Someone Knows the SCC Decision!

However, the limits should be set based on what advertising actually costs.

The federal limits are the same as the proposed B.C. limits. That might or might not be appropriate, he said. On one hand, the B.C. law will cover a much longer period, five months instead of 35 days.

However, ads are likely cheaper in the province than they are in national media.

It's not fair to call the limits "gag" laws, he said.

Well at least Democracy Watch understood the SCC decision upholding the third party federal spending limits. DW was also an SCC intervenor in support of those same $150,000 third party federal spending limits (under Section 350 of the Canada Election Act), the same proposed for BC.

And that covered 10 provinces, not one!

Surely Alberta NDP leader Brian Mason can't be wrong when he stated that the Alberta unions et al multi-million dollar third party spending campaign was also unfair.

Of course, Oppal didn't go

Of course, Oppal didn't go far enough to ensure that only the "right people" are allowed to vote.

I remember going to vote with my grandparents in the mid 30s in Hungary, who were among the people permitted to vote. My mother wasn't.

They went to the desk, where a clerk looked their names up in a big book and asked them, "Who are you voting for?". They told him and he put the name down behind their names in the book.

In the communist days, it was compulsory to vote, but only for somebody in the same Communist party.

Now, that was real freedom and democracy, as it freed people from having to make choices and we're heading in the same democratic direction.

Now it is called the "wealth creating free movement of capital", enforced by stacks of laws, passed and signed in secret. Like the NAFTA and now the SPP.

Ed Deak.

BCGEU, BCTF, HEU or ?

Who please please provide me with a SHUT UP T-shirt? Actually, I'd like several.
I promise to wear one often.

Let's make a little list!

What changes would YOU make to election laws? Let's each contribute our own best ideas for fair democratic election rules

I'll start.

-No more political contributions allowed by anyone, under penalty of law. Such donations to be considered bribery. This must include the candidate's own money.

-All media and printers required as part of their licence to contribute access to all candidates equally. For free. This would be a public duty, like paying taxes or jury duty. No exceptions.

-All polling places to be monitored by independent observers, like the UN does in disputed post-war situations. Detailed reports to be published.

-The province to provide transportation, at taxpayers expense, by ground only, for all candidates and their aides to campaign in their ridings. Rented buses and drivers.

Anybody else have any suggestions?

Bailey

-All media and printers required as part of their licence to contribute access to all candidates equally. For free. This would be a public duty, like paying taxes or jury duty. No exceptions.

Works for me.

Bailey and Frank

It works for me as well. I don't know how a democracy tolerates people giving money for specific election campaigns without ever considering that "he who pays the piper must call the tune". Imagine the disparity in political influence between sectors of our society. Who in this corrupt system has the biggest influence on the government? How is this ever considered "democracy"?

I could go so far as to pay candidates a certain amount for every vote they get up to a set maximum that would be allowed to be spent, something like the Feds. have. But that is all. The amounts set to get them out meeting the voters and not hiding behind glitzy ads and big money.

Currently Campbell never meets with any average folk. He swings into town, meets with the Council and the Chamber of Commerce and his party functionaries and that is all. The good old RCMP are assigned duty to protect his sorry butt from any ordinary citizen that might be inclined to tell him they are unhappy.

It was never like this in the 90's.

I sense the tide is turning!

Maybe canwest global is pretending to be a news reporting outfit again but I really do sense a shift in their reporting.

Could it be that canwest global is ticked off about the ADVERTISING BAN five months before the election!

Considering that canwest global is the only game in town,if 10 million less dollars get spent advertising that could be 7 8 million dollars out of canwest globals bottom line?

Just a thought,after all advertising is where news outfits make all their money.

Change?

I hear you Bailey, but I don't agree. Those with the money will always find a way to spin the rules to their own advantage. Guaranteed access for every candidate will permit those with spurious platforms to lie with impunity, as there will be no valid response. As brian gough might say "Won't the gargler like that!"

An engaged citzenry is always the only way to affect a political process. Some argue that we have a 'dégagé' citzenry because the process is corrupt. I say we have a corrupt process because we have a dégagé citizenry.

(Dégagé was a distinct French word used by Camus in his book "L'Etranger" to signify a depth of disconnectedness with society that led the utter personal destruction of a man. It's a word that ought to become part of our lexicon. It's much, much more than just "I don't care" or "They're all liars" because it signifies awareness of the consequences of that stance.)

Yes, we don't have a fourth estate any more. Yes, we have ordinary people befuddled by the "bread and circuses" approach of most representational governments. Yes, promises are made to be broken, not kept.

But wholesale alterations to the election law either the way Oppal does it or the way Bailey has suggested are only a recipe for further disaster. The poor and disenfranchised are always the last to benefit from rule changes. And as other commenters on other threads have pointed out, "who is being disenfranchised under the current regime?".

Neufeld gives us a pretty accurate recipe for correcting that. I'd say let's follow his recipe.

This issue really just

This issue really just exposes the hypocrisy in here. A business donating a small amount ($10,000 - which is around half of what the unions paid to put in just one of their full page shock ads) to a party makes the government corrupt. Yet a union embarking on a multi million dollar advertising campaign, all the while holding positions of power within the NDP organization, is perfectly fine.

"-No more political contributions allowed by anyone, under penalty of law. Such donations to be considered bribery. This must include the candidate's own money."

Something like that would be good as long and it incorporates third party advertising. There must be a complete across the board ban on everything or it should be left the way it is.

"While many unions have bylaws that restrict donating to parties, corporations often have a few directors making decisions about how to donate shareholders' money."

And union executives deciding to spend millions of their members money on third party advertising is different in which way?

That explains why unions like third party advertising so much. That way the executive can skirt the bylaws set out by their members.

Vladimir Campbell Mugabe

Several months ago when I watched on YouTube Mr. Ezra Levant and his "interrogation" at the Alberta Human Rights Commission, he mentioned that he did not need to justify the reasons why he published the Danish cartoons that depicted the Muslim Prophet Muhammad.

If free speech and democracy is important for us Canadians, we just need to exercise our rights without the need to justify to any government our criticisms against any political party or individual. We don't need to justify the costs of advertising our thoughts.

How would it look if the government and the courts decided to jail Canadian citizens for speaking freely.

Don't wait for the courts to tell you that you have the right to speak freely during an election. Just do it. Speak freely! Don't taser your own thoughts. Don't let any government taser your thoughts.

We Canadians can only exercise their right to speak freely if we choose to demonstrate this right without having to wait for permission from any government or court.

Hold on Jim.

You missed one big difference in all this. If corporations donate to the liberals and the liberals pass corporate friendly laws, who's profit margin is enhanced? Then if unions protest some government action by third party advertising, who derives the increased profit? Right, there is none, but the union members individually might actually hang on to a job they need or be able to have fair labour legislation. The third party advertising is a debate about government policy and how it effects people. Corporate donations are "bribes" if we cut the euphemisms.

By the way are you suggesting that just as many corporate CEO's or business owners do not "hold positions of power in the" liberal organization?

If you want to ban all advertising how do you get around the fact that we live in a country where free speech is one of the basic freedoms. We are to "shut up" about the liberals?

I go back to my earlier proposal. Free all politics from the people who would offer $ incentives. The taxpayer pays for the costs of a campaign. How much you get is based on your vote count on election day up to a maximum and only to cover expenses. Why not? We are paying in spades for the flawed system we have now. So much so that it is about buying a government. If you got the money, you can buy your friendly laws.

Wonder what Mr Levant would

Wonder what Mr Levant would be saying if someone who published a cartoon against his religion said they need not justify their reasons.

Cheers.

promises, promises

I think the money will always end up finding a way to parties, no matter what rules are in place, simply because whoever is in gov't (no matter what their political stripe) will jimmy the rules to make sure they have the mean$ to $tay in power.

I'd sooner see legislation that forced parties to treat election promises as contractual obligations.

Voters cast their ballot in good faith. Gov'ts clearly need to be forced to do the same, since they show little regard for the claims and promises they make to garner those votes.

Elections are now a competition in which the best liar wins.

If we are serious about re-engaging the public into the democratic process, only clear demonstrations of accountability and consequences will suffice. It's hard to believe that we need to treat our leaders like recalcitrant teenagers (they're pretty much giving us the finger and laughing at us IMO) but so it goes.

Third party "laundering"?

While the NDP get a relatively small percentage of their monies from unions, the Liberals get the majority of their money from corporate donors. If the Liberals air commercials patting themselves on the back or promoting "the best place on earth" and those are paid in full or in part by corporate donations, is that not indirect, "laundered" third party advertising? Maybe the Liberals should not be allowed to produce any advertising paid for with corporate monies? Better yet, corporate and union donations should be disallowed altogether or at least be anonymous and no longer tax deductible.

While they are at it, the Libs should ban any "glowing" editorials/ articles in CanWest publications that are partisan/ biased (as most of them are) leading up to the election because is that not in a sense third party advertising as well?

By the way

I understand that Joe Arvay, Q.C., has been tasked with messing up Gordon Campbell's little plan to finesse the electorate with Bill 42.

Readers will be pleased to note that it was Mr. Arvay, Q.C., who took the Bill 29 case to the Supreme Court and handed the CEO premier his lunch on that one.

Perhaps the caucus may have some second thoughts...of course, if they remember the Premier's reaction the last time someone questioned him they might decide to continue sitting on their hands.
You can read about it here:
http://thetyee.ca/Views/2005/04/04/CaroleTaylorsHeavyLoad/

I welcome respectful comments on my posts here at Tyee.

G West

Joe Arvay, QC

The same guy who defended the government against the 1995 $5,000 third party spending limits and lost?

Still can't believe that Arvay would write a written opinion of his own view of the defects of the proposed legislative amendments and allow Oppal receive a copy of same from the NDP.

Apparently the flaw has something to do with the definition of "candidate" prior to the writ period.

If anyone wanted to challenge the legislation in court, why would the NDP give Oppal a copy of Arvay's critique when the government can simply amend the alleged loophole so it can't be challenged?