Beat the cheats with National Observer's handy voting guide
Voting has never seemed more difficult, thanks in part to the Conservatives' restrictive Fair Elections Act.
Election fraud, ID restrictions, misleading calls directing people to the wrong polling station, inaccurate voter information cards, and long line-ups are all part of the election voting landscape now.
Consider this from a compliance review of the 2011 election:
“Serious errors, of a type the courts consider ‘irregularities’ that can contribute to an election being overturned, were found to occur in 12 per cent of all Election Day cases involving voter registration, and 42 per cent of cases involving identity vouching.”
National Observer wants you to vote. We’ve put together a guide to help fraud-proof yourself so that you can exercise your democratic right on October 19.
Before you go
By now you should have received your voter information card. If it doesn’t have your correct name or address, contact Elections Canada or check your registration at elections.ca.
Check the polling station on the card and make sure it’s the correct one. You don’t want to arrive at the polls with 10 minutes left to vote only to discover you’re not at the right place.
Duff Conacher, co-founder of Democracy Watch and a visiting professor at the University of Ottawa, says if the polling station isn’t the one you’ve gone to in the past or it’s a long way away, that you should email Elections Canada right away and then follow up with a phone call.
In Sudbury, one man received a voter information card directing him to a polling station 700 kilometres away.
Conacher says the error rate could be as high as five or 10 per cent and the Elections Canada should perform an audit cross-referencing peoples’ addresses and polling stations.
Poll station locations can change after voter information cards arrive
Some locations change based on internal reviews and feedback from voters and political participants on factors such as the riding’s geography, or for reasons of safety or accessibility.
Such changes occur after the voter information cards have been sent.
In the 2011 federal election, registering officers sent out approximately 312,000 replacement voter information cards during the event as the result of changes to polling locations, according to James Hale, a regional media advisor with Elections Canada.
“While these figures are by no means small, they still represent less than 1.5 per cent of the total 26.4 million registered voters who have received a card,” Hale says.
Check Election Canada’s website for the most current information. If a poll site location changes after the original cards have been mailed, the returning officer will issue a new one marked "Replacement Card" on the bottom right to impacted voters.
Dealing with robocalls
If you receive a misleading robocall or live call advising:
"This is an automated message from Elections Canada. Your poll location has been changed."
Don't take the message at face value.
Check the information with Elections Canada, with campaign offices, and if the information is false, report it immediately to Elections Canada. As well, you can contact the Council of Canadians’ VoteWatch.
VoteWatch is compiling incidents for the 2015 election and has received over 200 reports from across Canada so far.
The reports include people being unable to vote in advance polls in at least 10 ridings— and 100 voters being turned away at a polling station in Okanagan-Coquihalla.
“We’re advising people when it comes to election fraud to recognize it, report it and record it,” says Dylan Penner, democracy campaigner with the council.
Elections Canada does not phone, text or email you to tell you where to vote. Therefore, if you receive a phone call, text or email to that effect, it’s likely a misleading robocall and should be reported to Elections Canada as soon as possible.
Among other things, the agency will check to see if others have received similar calls, and warn people about misleading calls through local media, social media, a message on the website and through staff on the ground.
Election day
Be sure to go to the polling station early. Employers are legally required to give you three consecutive hours off to vote.
Be patient. The new ID rules under the Fair Election Act have slowed lines considerably.
Penner calls it a “chain reaction,” caused by the extra delays in processing people. In some advance polls, that’s led to people being turned away before they've had the chance to cast their ballot.
Bring your voter information card with you to the polling station. Note that the card is not a piece of ID.
Elections Canada’s website contains all kinds of information, including the ID you are required to have when you show up at the polling station.
You have three options when it comes to ID. You can show your driver’s licence, your provincial or territorial ID card, or any government card with your photo, name or address.
If those aren’t available to you, a wide range of ID may be used. Two pieces are required and include things such as your Canadian passport, health card, birth certificate, blood donor card or credit card, to name a few.
One of those two pieces of ID must have your current address. It can be a credit card or bank statement, a utility bill, or even a letter of confirmation of residence from a residence or shelter. For the entire list, check the Elections Canada website.
If you have two pieces of ID, but neither has your address, you may still show two pieces with your name on them. In that instance, someone who knows you must attest to your address. That person must show proof of identity and address, be registered in the same polling division and attest for only one person. You will be required to take an oath.
Get it in writing
If a problem occurs at the poll, the best thing to do is get it in writing, Conacher says. Ask the official to write down the questions they have and sign them, so that you have a record that you’ve been asked about anything unusual.
“That will usually stop someone from asking inappropriate questions,” Conacher says. “But it also creates evidence for you of the fact that they did this, because you’re saying, I want it in your own hand-writing and your signature on it.”
Finally if the poll closes while you’re still in a line of people waiting to vote, don’t leave. Pull out your phone, take a video and call local media and let them know what’s going on.
Above all, this Monday, be sure and get out and vote.