Wednesday, January 22, 2003

OTTAWA -- Today, leading up to the Liberal Party of Canada executive's meeting this weekend to finalize rules for the Liberal leadership race, Democracy Watch called on the executive to ensure that the fundraising rules for the race will be democratic and at least match the standard of the proposals Prime Minister Jean Chrétien has promised to implement. According to media reports, the Prime Minister will soon introduce a bill to change the federal political finance law to partially ban corporate donations, to fully ban union and interest group donations, to limit individual donations to $10,000, and to require increased disclosure of donations.

Democracy Watch believes that while Chrétien's proposals would take some steps forward, they are not strong enough to ensure that wealthy interests can't use money to unduly influence politicians. Given that the Liberal leadership race will elect the next prime minister, and that at least some Cabinet ministers will likely be running for the party leadership, it is even more important that the party's fundraising system be democratic.

"If the Liberal Party does not democratize its leadership race fundraising rules, it will allow the next prime minister and any Cabinet minister candidates to be bought off by wealthy interests, putting them in serious conflicts of interests," said Aaron Freeman, board member of Democracy Watch and Chairperson of the nation-wide Money in Politics Coalition.

National surveys in the past few years have shown that Canadians are very concerned about the influence of wealthy interests on government. Democracy Watch called on the Prime Minister, and the Liberal Party, to address Canadians' concerns by implementing a fundraising system that includes the following measures (all of which are supported by the nation-wide Money in Politics Coalition, made up of 50 citizen groups with a total membership of 3 million Canadians):

• a complete ban on donations from corporations, unions and other organizations (as in Manitoba and Québec);
• a limit of $1,000 on donations from individuals (similar to Manitoba and Québec);
• regular disclosure of the full identities of original donors, and disclosure of the amounts of all donations above $100, as well as disclosure before the vote for party leader (similar to the U.S.);
• enforcement by Elections Canada, with all donations available in searchable format on the Elections Canada website.