At least 796,000 Canadian voters have applied to vote by mail this year. The popularity of this procedure is such that the announcement of the winner of the election could be delayed for a few days.
In the 2019 election, some 50,000 people exercised their right to vote remotely. This year, excluding Canadians who vote from abroad, more than 675,000 people have so far applied for a voter kit by mail, according to the latest data from Election Canada.
The high volume of these postal ballots could cause “delays of a few days” in the unveiling of the name of the next prime minister, confirms the spokesperson for Election Canada, Pierre Pilon.
“Voting by mail requires an additional operation of validating the envelopes to ensure that people will not have voted twice,” he explains. “It’s a fairly rigorous process, because the moment you signify your intention to vote by mail, register and receive the package, your name will automatically be removed from the voters list. During the counting, this adds to the task of counting the votes. And it may be that, unlike usual, we do not learn the name of the winner that evening. “
Voters who wish to vote by mail have until Tuesday evening to request their ballot.
Shortage of electoral staff
Election Canada is also concerned about the shortage of staff at the polling stations. The independent body only met 58% of its workforce needs for D-Day.
“The objective is 215,000 [employés] and the figures dating from last week showed that we have reached 125,000, ”explains Pierre Pilon. “Now, there are still eight days left in the countryside. So we can’t really make a too direct correlation, but it gives an idea that we still need people. “
All citizens aged 16 and over can apply, with the exception of political employees. Elections Canada is primarily looking for information officers, deputy returning officers and polling station supervisors.
This staff shortage causes delays in the polling stations, concedes Pierre Pilon. The health measures in place are also helping to slow the pace. For example, to maintain physical distancing, only one staff member will receive voters at each table, rather than two. “Even in this case, there are more tables to welcome voters,” said the spokesperson for Election Canada.
Voters are increasingly adopting advance polls. Last Friday, the opening day of the polling stations, more than 1.3 million Canadians did their duty as citizens. According to Election Canada, this is more than on the first day of advance polls in the last general election.
In 2019, nearly 27% of voters cast their vote in advance. In the 2015 election, about 21% of Canadians voted this way.
Watch video
Reference-feedproxy.google.com