Elections Canada needs to reflect neutrality

Their website should reflect it. The by-elections are announced on their website in orange and red. These colours are, of course, the colours of the NDP and Liberal Party respectively.

Some bureaucrats, journalists and Liberals were concerned when the Prime Minister rebranded the government naming it Canada’s New Government and incorporated blue into the websites at gc.ca.

The new name follows criticism over what some considered a partisan remake of the official Government of Canada website, which now has bold splashes of Tory blue and prominently features photographs of Prime Minister Harper.

Of course, Elections Canada is completely separate from any federal ministry and any partisan interference.

Elections Canada used to use yellow to reflect a neutral colour. Why not stick with that model?

Which NDP and Bloc candidate filings are under review by Elections Canada?

Today Marc Mayrand of Elections Canada hinted at the Ethics committee that filings from other parties were also under review by his organization that oversees elections. Currently, Elections Canada claims that the Conservative Party has run afoul of the Elections Act by the shifting of so-called expenses from the national campaign to the local campaigns. However, Elections Canada is only focusing their brutish efforts on the Conservative Party.

I decided to look into this and found that Elections Canada actually discloses via “creative” querying of their database which candidate filings are under review. If we access the contributions and expenses database on the Elections Canada website, we can compare submitted vs. reviewed filings from all candidates. There are discrepancies between both lists suggesting that Elections Canada is actively reviewing a number of filings from candidates of the 2006 General Election.

Data as submitted:

vs. data as reviewed:

Here is the NDP in BC:
Data as submitted:

Data as reviewed:

Nathan Cullen, Libby Davies, and Malcolm James are not on the “data as reviewed by Elections Canada” list while they are on the “data as submitted list”. These NDPers seem to have election filings that are under active review by Elections Canada.

NDP in New Brunswick:
Data as submitted:

Data as reviewed:

Alice Finnamore, Neil Gardner, and Yvon Godin seem to have filings that are under active review by Elections Canada.

NDP in Saskatchewan:
Data as submitted:

Data as reviewed:

Elgin Wayne Wyatt’s name is discrepant between filings submitted to and filings reviewed by Elections Canada suggesting this candidate’s filing is under active review by Elections Canada.

NDP in Ontario:
Data as submitted:


Data as reviewed:


Nirvan Balkissoon, Olivia Chow, Ed Chudak, and Sid Ryan have submitted their filings to Elections Canada but EC has not finished reviewing them meaning they have been flagged for some reason.

NDP in Quebec:
Data as submitted:

Data as reviewed:

Robert Donnelly, Anne Lesvesque, Isabelle Maguire, Ehsan Mohammadian, and Stephane Ricard have not had the reviews of their candidate filings completed by Elections Canada.

NDP in Alberta, Manitoba, Yukon, NWT, Nunavut, PEI, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and Labrador:
no discrepancy between lists

The Bloc Quebecois only has one candidate from the last election that appears to be under active review by Elections Canada. Diane Bourgeois, according to the EC website, has submitted her candidate filing, however, its review has not been completed.

BQ in Quebec:
Data as submitted:

Data as reviewed:

Michael Ignatieff admits debt delinquency

Michael Ignatieff just sent me an email:

The email ends with a couple of links to his donation page.

What will be the consequences for Michael Ignatieff?

Will Elections Canada provide special treatment for Liberals that run afoul of its rules?

If so, what are the broader consequences for the Conservative Party’s argument that the government body is biased against them?

How much does Ignatieff owe?

Does this indicate that the Conservatives are better at raising money from their membership than the Liberals are? Why are Liberal members disengaged? Why aren’t Liberals giving?