Liberals say no changes coming for leadership race, despite risk of foreign interference

The Liberal Party of Canada will be the first federal party to hold a leadership contest since the Hogue Commission on foreign interference revealed meddling by foreign governments in previous races, and there is every reason to expect governments that have sought to meddle in the past will continue to try to influence outcomes.

The Liberal Party told CBC News on Monday that it doesn't intend to change or reinterpret rules in its 2016 constitution that Elections Canada has suggested could make the vote be at least as vulnerable to such efforts as previous leadership races.

That includes allowing international students to vote at a time when the number of people in the country who are neither citizens nor permanent residents has continued to grow, despite sharp cuts in the approval rates of new student visas.

Statistics Canada says there are now more than three million non-permanent residents living in Canada.

Chief Electoral Officer Stéphane Perrault has suggested that one way to help reduce foreign interference in such votes would be to restrict voting to citizens, based on the belief that non-citizens are more vulnerable to pressure from foreign governments. That is already the case in elections for public office, which are subject to the Canada Elections Act.

None of the parties currently require full citizenship to vote in internal party elections, although both Conservatives and New Democrats require permanent residency — a formal status that is usually a step on the path to citizenship. The Liberals and the Bloc Québécois do not.

Parker Lund, the Liberal Party's director of communications, told CBC News on Monday that "like most major political parties, the Liberal Party of Canada works very hard to engage more people and increase participation in our democratic process through our nominations, open policy development, leadership contests and more. This is good for our democracy."

Lund said "grassroots Liberals have built the most open and inclusive movement in Canadian politics, including by becoming the first major federal party to invite grassroots supporters to join at no cost, and expanding participation in our movement, both with respect to age and citizenship status. Our open and inclusive process ensures we hear from more people in the communities we engage with and helps foster civic engagement with those who may one day have the privilege to vote in a federal election."

"The Liberal Party remains committed to working with the Commissioner of Canada Elections, law enforcement or any other bodies that are tasked with pursuing election irregularities if there is sufficient evidence," he added.

Last summer, a report from the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians (NSICOP), a key Canadian intelligence oversight body, said there were "two specific instances where [People's Republic of China] officials allegedly interfered in the leadership races of the Conservative Party of Canada."

NSICOP is a committee composed of members of all major federal parties who have received top security clearance to handle secret information. Most of the details regarding the allegations in the NSICOP report have been redacted, but the governments involved were those of India and China.

NSICOP's chair, Liberal MP David McGuinty, has said information brought to the committee by CSIS revealed that internal party elections are the weakest link in the Canadian electoral system.

"We came face to face with the troubling intelligence that nomination processes and leadership races are particularly vulnerable to foreign interference," he told a Senate committee in June.

Such races are held under rules decided by the parties themselves, and are not subject to the Canada Elections Act — a situation that NSICOP suggested should change.