Chief electoral officer defends veil policy
CanWest News Service/The Gazette
Published: 1 hour ago

OTTAWA - Canada's chief electoral officer, Marc Mayrand, today defended Elections Canada's policy to allow veiled women to vote without showing their faces by saying he is simply enforcing the law and that the legislation itself doesn't require voters to show their faces.

"I don't set standards, I administer the act as it is drafted," he said in an opening statement in French.

He noted not all voting methods require verifying a person's identity by comparing the face with a piece of photo identification, such as when people vote by mail.

"It can be observed, therefore, that there are various methods provided for by this legislation allowing people to vote and that some of these measures do not require visual identification of the voter and it's the voter that has the choice of which method to use," Mayrand said.

The recent controversy over the issue erupted last week when Elections Canada issued a statement with its requirements for voters who wear face coverings in advance of three federal byelections being held next week in Quebec.

The guidelines stated that a woman who wears a burka or niqab has the choice whether to lift her veil or not to prove her identity at the polling station. If she chooses not to unveil, she has several options.

She can prove her identity with a second piece of government-issued or Elections Canada-approved identification. Or, another voter from the same polling district who shows satisfactory identification and proof of address can vouch for the woman's identity. Both the voucher and vouchee would be required to make a sworn statement under oath.

The Elections Canada decision was criticized by the prime minister.

Stephen Harper accused Elections Canada of overstepping its boundaries and urged Mayrand to reconsider the policy that does not require women to lift their veils, saying it contravenes a law passed by Parliament in the spring.

"I profoundly disagree with the decision," Harper said yesterday after wrapping up a summit with Pacific rim leaders in Australia.

"We just adopted this past sitting in the spring, Bill C-31, a law designed to have the visual identification of voters. That's the purpose of the law. That was the law adopted, I think virtually unanimously by Parliament, and I think this decision goes in an entirely different direction."

Harper had also suggested if Elections Canada doesn't reverse its policy, Parliament might have to force it to do so.

Mayrand responded Monday by saying the legislation doesn't explicitly state that voters are required to show their faces. He went further in his response to the criticism by saying that if politicians don't like the law, or feel changes need to be made to it, it is up to them, not him, to change the rules.

"My responsibility as the administrator of the Canadian elections system is to ensure that the legislation is followed properly and I would therefore invite Parliament to re-examine the law and if they feel it necessary to change the methods, to do so given the many comments made by political parties and the citizenry," Mayrand said in French. He added that he is not trying to usurp the power of Parliament and it's not in his mandate to rewrite legislation.

Mayrand said that as far as he knows, it is a very small number of Muslim women that would choose not to unveil when voting.

"It is up to the voter to decide what procedure to use," Mayrand said.

For his part, Bloc Quebecois House leader Michel Guimond accused Mayrand of misinterpreting the will of parliamentarians and called on him to follow the lead of Quebec's chief electoral officer and use his powers to require that all voters who show up at polling booths reveal their faces. Guimond also announced the Bloc's intention to table legislation when Parliament resumes sitting to require all voters to show their faces to vote.

Pimp j'en ai vraiment rient `foutre que tu sois conservateur où pas ! et je ne suis pas en colère.

Toute cette histoire est d'un ridicule consommé. Personne n'a demandé de pouvoir voté voilé et le DGE du Canada fait ce communiqué quand même? Pourquoi pense tu?

Ce n'est pourtant pas compliqué à comprendre que toute cette histoire n'est qu'une autre tentative pour brasser de la marde pour diviser les Québecois de souche avec les nouveau Québecois. Pourquoi dans qu'elle but?

Le sentiment que j'en ai est que les gens ordinaire vont s'écoeurer de toute c'est histoire ridicule et vont passer à autre chose. Mario à déjà taper sur ce clou pendant un an et l'intéret des gens sur ce sujet commence à baisser.

Allez A+

Le Bloc will do anything for votes. Gilles Duceppe est un ostie d'hypocrite....... Unlike the coward F'ing PQ. They waited for the people's opinions thru polls until they prononced themselves.