More than 3.6 million Canadians voted at advance polls over the Thanksgiving long weekend.
Elections Canada said this morning that’s an increase of 71 per cent over the number of ballots cast at advance polls in the 2011 election.
Some of that increase is attributable to the increase in days that the advance polls were open — four days this year compared with three days in 2011.
Also, there was an increase in the number of polling stations — 265 more this year for a total of 3,423 across Canada — including 602 in B.C.
Elections Canada expects to provide provincial and riding breakdowns of the advance poll turnout later today.
Meanwhile, not all voters who took advantage of the holiday weekend advance polls were happy about the experience.
Rosalind Coleman, 69, of Brentwood Bay, called it a black day for Elections Canada. She arrived at her advance polling station at the Saanich Fairgrounds on Friday just as it opened at noon.
“I thought no problem,” Coleman said. “I waited for an hour and a half.”
Coleman saw voters who turned back at the door or drove by without stopping, and is concerned about how many won’t or can’t return on election day, Oct. 19. She called the inability of Elections Canada to respond to demand at advance polls a form of voter suppression. “I think there were people who were dissuaded from voting,” Coleman said on Monday, the last day of advance polling.
Elections Canada estimated that 767,000 electors voted on Sunday, for a total of 2.4 million over the first three days of advance polls across Canada.
That was 16 per cent more than the 2.077 million votes cast over the same three days of advance polling in the 2011 federal election.
Coleman said the planning for advance polls was poor — there were no seats at some stations for the elderly and the process was laborious, with just two workers at her polling station to help each voter.
“This officer could not start checking in the next voter until I had deposited my ballot,” Coleman said. “This is madness.”
The process took about five minutes per voter, she said, whereas at a Cordova Bay Elementary School polling station on Saturday, there was “an individual who made things happen” and the voting time was greatly decreased.
Normally, there is only one ballot box per advance poll because typically, 80 per cent of people vote on election day, said Elections Canada spokeswoman Dorothy Sitek.
Sitek said unlike cashiers or managers at a grocery store who can switch jobs or open extra cash registers when confronted by a long line of customers, Elections Canada workers must stick to a formal process.
“The Elections Canada Act is very prescriptive about what each election worker can do,” Sitek said.
Only the poll clerk can write the name and address of each elector, have the elector sign it, then strike the voter’s name from the list, for example, Sitek said. The deputy returning officer can then check identification and hand out a ballot. “There’s a legal process that must be adhered to,” Sitek said.
Elections Canada called the lineups a good news story about an unexpectedly high number of people exercising their democratic rights in the advance polls.
Coleman agrees it might be cause for celebration if more people vote, but said Elections Canada needs to show more dexterity when faced with long lines.
Sitek said on Monday that “adjustments” were made starting Saturday to better accommodate the volume of voters.
While many told stories of long waits from Friday to Monday, others said they voted within minutes.
John and Catherine Reid, who live in Kiwanis Village seniors’ housing complex on Cook Street, said they had no trouble voting on Saturday night.
Before heading downtown for dinner before 5 p.m., they noticed the lineup seemed long outside the Constance Gibson Centre, the polling centre in the complex’s activity room.
“When we were coming back from dinner about 7-ish, it was completely empty,” said John Reid. “Four or five people came in after we voted. It was great.”
On Monday, Catherine Reid said, the lineups returned to a steady stream but were not overwhelming.
