To Travel or not to Travel, that is the Question

Anecdotal material is what is missing by not investigating election reform at the source claims Nipissing M.P.P. Monique Smith, in defence of a proposed junket for the Election Reform Committee.

“A lot of people have different views on whether the travel is necessary, and a number of people have suggested to us that it is important to talk to people who have been affected by the changes of their electoral system, and that is not necessarily information you can get by reading reports,” said Smith.

Although the decision has not been reached as to whether the team will travel nationally or internationally, Smith says the ultimate decision will be made by Queen’s Park economists.

“There are proposals going forward to the Board of Internal Economy and they have the ultimate decision as to whether or not their will be any travel.”

Smith said the committee is looking at all possible avenues while being financially prudent that are in the best interests of Ontario when it comes to gathering all the information required to formulate the best report.

“Again we have looked at a number of different options; we’re looking at how we can best become informed of all of the information that we need in order to make recommendations around electoral reform in the province, so we’re looking at bringing in experts, and how else we can get the information that we need from the various jurisdictions and still there is the possibility of travel. But again, no decisions have been made.”

Smith did say that time is of the essence for the committee as the report is due for review late 2005.

“I expect the Internal Board of Economy will be making a decision in the next week, and so we expect to have information at the end of the week our report is due at the beginning of November so decisions have to be made fairly quickly, for travel, and if there were to be it would take place in September.”