Last week Ontario Progressive Conservative MPPs Ted Arnott, Lisa MacLeod, and Steve Clark highlighted Arnott’s private members bill that would ban collusion between political parties and third parties in Ontario elections.
The Banning Collusion in Electoral Advertising Act was introduced to ensure parties are not allowed to circumvent election spending limits by colluding with a third party.
Arnott introduced the bill because in the last two provincial elections, a group called Working Families spent millions attacking the Ontario PC Party, its leaders, and candidates – to the benefit of Premier Dalton McGuinty and the Ontario Liberal Party.
The Chief Electoral Officer of Ontario has called for legislative changes to Ontario’s third party advertising laws to be considered, noting that the election laws do not specifically ban collusion between political parties and third parties.
Arnott said while the Liberals and Working Families maintain there are no connections between their organizations, when his bill was debated earlier this week, Liberal MPPs had a chance to put their money where their mouths are.
If there is no collusion between the Liberals and Working Families, then Liberal MPPs would support that legislation, he said.
“The Ontario PC caucus is bringing forward a bill that ensures that there can be no collusion between third parties and political parties while engaging in third party advertising during the writ period,” said Wellington-Halton Hills MPP Arnott.
MacLeod added, “It is time for Dalton McGuinty to put his money where his mouth is. If there is truly no collusion between the Ontario Liberal Party and Working Families, then Liberal MPPs will support this legislation.”
Leeds-Grenville MPP Steve Clark said, “The activities by the union backed Working Families campaign in recent elections call for Ontario’s election advertising rules to be strengthened.”
The fourth public policy area for consideration is, should Ontario adopt stricter registration and anti-collusion provisions? Under the Election Finances Act, there is no specific provision that prohibits a third party from co-operating or coordinating its advertising with either a political party or one of its candidates, provided that the party or candidate is not actually controlling the third party’s advertising,” according to Greg Essensa, Chief Electoral Officer, who made that statement to the select committee on Elections on May 7, 2009.
The Ontario PC Party maintains that at the same time that Don Guy was McGuinty’s campaign director, he was sent email copies detailing the activities of Working Families including: “top line” survey results, a draft guide for moderators of focus groups, and substantive and cosmetic changes to the Working Families Coalition advertisements.
“The third party advertising regime is new to Ontario. The first election under that regime disclosed a number of rough edges, particularly in circumstances where there is potential for conflicts of interest-collusion between registered parties and third parties,” stated a report commissioned by Elections Ontario.
