What's all this ruckus about voter registration and election fraud? I'm asking because in Canada, our elections are run a little differently from you fine folks in the U.S and quite frankly we don't go through the kind of ridiculousness I'm seeing in the news. In fact, we're having our own federal election on tuesday, the day after our thanksgiving and I can pretty much guarantee it's going to be a far milder event than the pomp and pageantry that CNN's been cooking up for your coming election.
Let me boil down how we do voter registration in Canada.
In a federal election, every single person in the country, who is registered to vote, gets a paper card in the mail. This card has your name and address on it and the location of where you go to vote, as well as your riding. Every one who is registered gets this one card, and can only use it at their designated station.
This is sent by a government organization called..... drumroll please.....
Elections Canada!!!
I know. Brilliant, isn't it?
This organization's purpose and goal is twofold:
1) To make sure that every single person in the country who's eligible to vote is registered, and knows where to go on election day.
2) To ensure that the election and ballotting and all the stuff is carried out in as impartial a manner as possible.
But what if you're not registered to vote?
Elections Canada sends out notices to every person in the country who they think is eligible but hasn't registered yet. They compile this list by going through
- Provincial and Territorial motor vehicle registrars
- Canada Revenue Agency (think IRS)
- Citizenship and Immigration Canada
- Provincial and Territorial vital statistics registrars
- Proven electoral lists from other jurisdictions
An eligible voter is anyone who's over the age of 18 and a Canadian citizen. Pretty complicated huh?
And, of course you can register at the polling station on election day, but that does require you bring ID and something like a utility bill to proof your address.
Suffice it to say, Elections Canada tries pretty damn hard to get you registered, they actively go looking for you and if for some reason you've slipped through the cracks you're bound to catch one of the adds on TV, radio, or flyers passed out telling you how to register. Basically, you have to live under a rock and have no interest in politics to not be registered.
Even if you're homeless and not registered, you can still vote on election day provided an already registered voter vouches for you and the Officer in charge of the station gives it the okay.
Long story short: Elections Canada doesn't give two rips about what political party you might vote for, they just want to make sure you're going to be able to cast your f***#ng ballot.
There are no third party groups trying to flood the registrar with a bajillion names to be registered right before the election and there are no counter-third party advocacy groups screaming that those bajillion names are actually all frauds and terrorists.
Despite all this, are there attempts at election fraud? Sure there are, always will be. But with one national organization that has no political bias, with access to all the key sources of info a lot of that junk is minimized.
Now for part 2- the voting booth!!!!
Once you go to the voting station with your registered card, or, if you register cold turkey at the station on election day (provided you have right documentation) you're given a piece of paper.
No Diebold voting machines.
No hanging chads.
Just a piece of paper, probably with 5 names on it (maybe more or less depending on how many parties are running a person in your riding) and the political party next to each name.
With your pen....I think it was pen and not pencil the last time I voted.... you colour in/checkmark/scribble or make an X next to the name of the person you want to vote for. Then drop in the box.
I know, really complicated isn't it?
Who sets up and administers the voting stations?
Elections Canada!
Shocking, I know. And to boot, since one organization is setting up ALL of the voting stations across the country you have uniformity- everyone in the nation goes through pretty much the exact same thing, only with different names on the ballots depending on the riding.
Whichever political party wins the most seats becomes the government and the leader of that party becomes prime minister. Although, the prime minister has to win in his riding too, or else one of his party members will have to give up their seat which would be pretty embarassing right off the get-go.
So that's how it works up north. Now what's all this voter registration ruckus about down south???