Council skipped chance to fix election laws
September 7, 2006

City council was urged to change election financing rules two years ago, but put off a decision until it was too late to act.

The mayor and some council candidates are currently rejecting calls for reform of election donations as too late, arguing that “you can't change the rules midstream”. But a review of agendas and minutes shows the issue was on the council's table for nearly a year in 2004 and 2005 before being abandoned.

West end councillor Brian McHattie started the process when he brought a motion to council in September 2004 about the report of a city of Toronto task force on election finances. McHattie asked city staff to determine “the feasibility of the City of Hamilton undertaking its own municipal election campaign financing review.”

The staff report was subsequently provided in December 2004 but it recommended against a Hamilton task force. Staff argued that "it is questionable that there is enough time (it is unlikely that the Ministry would act on any suggested legislative amendments received after the fall of 2005) or sufficient resources available to commit to an exercise that may amount to nothing much more than reinventing the wheel in light of the Toronto Task Force findings.”

However, the report offered other options for councillors, including “that council endorse any one or a number of the [Toronto] Task Force recommendations”. These included a ban on corporate and union contributions that had been approved by Toronto City Council the previous October.

The staff report was debated at the January 19, 2005 meeting of the corporate administration committee which decided to urge the provincial government to take responsibility for monitoring and enforcement of the elections act – a task currently left to citizens like Joanna Chapman.

But on a motion from Chad Collins, seconded by Maria Pearson, the committee decided “that the balance of the recommendations of the Toronto Election Finance Review Task Force be tabled pending further discussions.” The item then sat on the outstanding business list for 8 months, finally being considered on September 7, 2005 – almost a full year after McHattie's original initiative.

At that meeting, city clerk Kevin Christenson informed the councillors they were too late to make a decision that would affect the 2006 elections. “March of this year [2005] was the deadline for 2006, so the deadline for the next election would be March 2008.”

That led Ancaster councillor Murray Ferguson to move, and Collins to second, a motion “that no further action be taken with respect to the recommendations of the Toronto Election Finance Review Task Force” and that the item be removed from the outstanding business list.

The issue of corporate donations was subsequently raised with councillors on March 6 of this year in a presentation Joanna Chapman gave to the meeting that subsequently decided to lay charges against Mayor Di Ianni and two defeated candidates. Di Ianni had launched his re-election bid earlier that day.

“I believe there need to be some changes in the Municipal Elections Act,” said Chapman. “The main ones are to end corporate donations, so that all contributors can be clearly identified.”

In the same month the Hamilton and District Labour Council called for a ban on corporate and union donations and sent a letter to council to that effect. Two months earlier, Toronto mayor David Miller announced that he would voluntarily refuse corporate and union donations in his 2006 re-election bid – a position also taken by his main opponent.

The Toronto Election Financing Review and related documents are available at http://www.votetoronto.ca/reform.html.

Hamilton's staff report on the issue can be viewed at http://www.myhamilton.ca/Hamilton.Portal/Inc/PortalPDFs/ClerkPDFs/
Corporate-Administration/2005/Jan05/CL05002%20-
Toronto%20Election%20Finance%20Review%20Task%20force.pdf.