BURST
OTTAWA – The Bloc Québécois says it will ask the Superior Court of Quebec to order a new election in the riding of Terrebonne, Que, “as soon as possible,” following the Liberals’ victory by a single vote.
Bloc Leader Yves-François Blanchet announced Thursday that his party would challenge the result “on the basis of a vote that was not taken into account, which constitutes an irregularity” in the electoral process. The challenge is not based on the judicial recount that took place.
“The judge said that we lost by one vote; the vote that would have created a tie appeared in the hand of a citizen. There is therefore a difficult-to-contest irregularity that, according to the law, requires that the election be rerun,” Blanchet told reporters on Parliament hill.
Liberal candidate Tatiana Auguste was declared the winner following a judicial recount on May 10, bringing the number of seats won by the Liberal Party of Canada to 170, two shy of a majority. The incumbent, Bloc Québécois candidate Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, previously thought she had won the riding by dozens of votes.
However, a Terrebonne voter came forward a few days after the results were confirmed, claiming she had voted for the Bloc Québécois by mail, but that her ballot had never been cast.
This vote would have placed the Liberals and the Bloc in a tie, potentially leading to a byelection to determine the winner.
Emmanuelle Bossé stated in several media interviews that her special ballot was returned to her by Canada Post a few days after the April 28 election.
Elections Canada does not have the authority to order a rerun of the election, but admitted the error raised by Ms. Bossé.
According to Elections Canada, the error was in the last three characters of the postal code of the office’s address, although, it declared the results final .
“To date, only one case has come to our attention where an envelope containing a marked ballot was returned to a voter because of an incorrect address,” said Matthew Mckenna, a spokesperson for Elections Canada.
In an email exchange with National Post, McKenna also said the local office issued 115 special ballots for local voting by mail, and that according to their database, five ballots were received late at the local office and that the return envelope contained an error in the postal code.
“There is no information as to whether the delay was due to the incorrect postal code. We note that voters signed the declaration late in the election period,” McKenna said.
Meanwhile, 85 of these ballots were returned on time and counted, 16 ballots, including Bossé’s, were not returned to the local office and 9 other electors gave up voting by mail and voted in person in the electoral district.
Sinclair-Desgagné told reporters on Thursday that this whole experience has been a “roller coaster” emotionally but that it’s also an “issue that goes beyond the outcome of a single party.”
“I think it’s an issue of trust in our democratic institutions and that it’s important in our case to follow through with these efforts so that in the end, the residents of Terrebonne and the citizens of Terrebonne have a legitimate MP to represent them,” she said.
Sinclair-Desgagné did not say whether she still trusted Elections Canada and Canada Post, because “there is a legal recourse pending.”
Alex Marland, a political science professor at Acadia University in Wolfville, N.S, told National Post that while he’s always “very careful about expressing opinions”, in this case, he “100 per cent think that it should go to the courts.”
“That one woman who has that one ballot is an irregularity that affected the results of the election, and we can say it affected the result of the election because of the closeness of the outcome,” Dr. Marland said.
“So, to me, this is a slam dunk, and it should not be looked at by anybody as a partisan play by the Bloc,” he added.
Blanchet did not ask Prime Minister Mark Carney to keep Auguste out of the House of Commons while the case is ongoing, but said he hopes it will be resolved “as quickly as possible,” with Parliament scheduled to resume on May 26.
According to Marland, Carney and the Liberal Party should support the Bloc in this legal case to “clear the air” and emphasize that an administrative problem influenced the election outcome.
“I think this is an opportunity for him to just realize that we’ve got real issues about elections integrity… A byelection is a way to clear it, but a court case that drags on is not in anybody’s interest,” he said.
Liberal Party spokesperson Matteo Rossi did not comment on the Bloc’s legal challenge or indicate whether the Liberals would support it. Instead, he referred questions to Elections Canada.
Meanwhile, Blanchet said he had “a very high level” of confidence in the Bloc’s case and believes a judge will trigger a byelection.
Although, precedent could work against the separatists.
In a split decision, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled in 2012 — more than a year after the 2011 federal election — that Etobicoke Centre Conservative MP Ted Opitz could keep his job, bringing to an end former MP Borys Wrzesnewskyj’s long battle to overturn the election result.
The majority of Canada’s highest court found that minor administrative errors should not be sufficient to allow an election to be overturned.
“The practical realities of election administration are such that imperfections in the conduct of elections are inevitable,” the justices wrote. “Courts cannot demand perfect certainty.”
National Post
atrepanier@postmedia.com
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