What the election commissioner said

By Aaron Wherry - Thursday, March 1, 2012 at 10:30 AM - 0 Comments

Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com/Flickr

During QP yesterday, Pierre Poilievre stood and relayed a remark of the Commissioner of Canada Elections.

There was no conduct reported that would bring into question the integrity of the election result overall or the result in a particular riding.

That sentence is taken from a memo that was released by Elections Canada, though heavily redacted, through an access to information request. For the record, the full observation reads as follows.

There was no conduct reported that would bring into question the integrity of the election result overall or the result in a particular riding. Although misconduct was reported in several ridings, there is no complaint that it affected the final result. There is some speculation in the media that the dirty tricks may have affected the result in some close contests.

That memo is dated May 16. Two months later, the Chief Electoral Officer released his official report on the 41st general election. Under the heading “Electoral law enforcement,” Marc Mayrand explains that the commissioner received 1,003 communications. Continue…

An investigation on two fronts

By Aaron Wherry - Thursday, March 1, 2012 at 8:30 AM - 0 Comments

CBC reports that Elections Canada has expanded its investigation to RMG’s call centre in Thunder Bay. But Postmedia says Elections Canada might not be able to pursue some nuisance calls.

Volpe’s lawyer wrote to Elections Canada on April 15, 2011, to complain that for the previous 10 days constituents in the riding were receiving calls “from persons falsely identifying themselves as calling from the Joe Volpe campaign.” The email from Elections Canada suggests such calls are not forbidden by the act. ”The act does not prohibit or regulate the use of telephone solicitations for a particular candidate or party, or the content of a call unless actual intimidation or false pretence can be shown,” the email said.

The harassing calls in the Toronto riding of Eglinton-Lawrence had a call display showing a North Dakota number often blamed for credit card scams. Calls from the same number have been reported in a number of other ridings across the country. But the elections agency said the use of “spoofed” call display numbers “is not regulated by the Act. ”Consequently in most cases compliance or enforcement issues do not arise under the Act from political calls soliciting support for a candidate or party,” Elections Canada said. “This simply recognizes the role played by free speech and communication in the democratic process, including speech that is annoying, repetitive or of a partisan nature.”

The Commons: Let us debate that which is unsubstantiated

By Aaron Wherry - Wednesday, February 29, 2012 at 6:32 PM - 0 Comments

The Scene. After tracing the necessarily circuitous route to her question, Nycole Turmel was as straightforward as she can be.

“Mr. Speaker, yesterday on CBC, the Prime Minister’s parliamentary secretary said the Conservative party was investigating the allegations of election fraud. An hour later, on Sun TV, he said the Conservatives were not conducting an investigation,” the interim leader of the opposition recounted. “Could the Prime Minister tell us which it is? Are the Conservatives investigating, yes or no?”

Could the Prime Minister? Theoretically speaking, yes. Would he? Practically speaking, no.

“Mr. Speaker, the Conservative party has made available, from the beginning, all information to Elections Canada,” Mr. Harper said. “The Conservative party can say absolutely, definitively, it has no role in any of this.”

On what basis can the government say this? It is difficult to say.

Continue…

The list

By Aaron Wherry - Wednesday, February 29, 2012 at 4:05 PM - 0 Comments

For the sake of compilation, here are the 21 ridings tallied so far in which there are allegations or reports of suspicious calls related to polling stations.

Windsor-Tecumseh, Mount Royal, Lac-Saint-Louis, Edmonton Centre, Kingston and the Islands, Hamilton East-Stoney Creek, Windsor West, Sarnia-Lambton, Prince George-Peace River, Guelph, Kitchener Centre, Kitchener-Conestoga, Kitchener-Waterloo, London West, Parkdale-High Park, Nipissing-Timiskaming, Elmwood-Transcona, Winnipeg South Centre, Sydney-Victoria, Saanich-Gulf Islands and Pierrefonds-Dollard

Sourcing for this list can be found here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here.

What happened in Saanich

By Aaron Wherry - Wednesday, February 29, 2012 at 9:30 AM - 0 Comments

Global News finds that Elections Canada received 30 complaints about phone calls that conveyed false information about polling stations. The Toronto Star talks to one voter in Saanich-Gulf Islands.

It was a woman who claimed to be calling from the Conservative Party of Canada telling Hancock that his voting location had been changed from the usual location — a local school not far from his Pender Island, B.C., home — to the municipality of Saanich on Vancouver Island.

The supposed new location meant that Hancock would have to drive to the ferry dock at Otter Bay on the northwest side of Pender Island, take a 40-minute ferry ride south to Vancouver Island, and then drive another 30 kilometres to Saanich to cast his ballot. “It was very strange,” Hancock told the Star Tuesday. “When I started asking her questions, she shut me down pretty quickly and actually hung up.”

Add six more to the list

By Aaron Wherry - Wednesday, February 29, 2012 at 8:30 AM - 0 Comments

NDP MP Joe Comartin says his campaign reported four to six calls about polling station changes to the returning officer in Windsor-Tecumseh. And yesterday’s Postmedia report adds an interesting note in that regard.

There were also several complaints from New Democrats in Windsor-Tecumseh, Ont., including a call to the home of MP Joe Comartin, directing them that their polling station had moved. New Democrat volunteer Andrew McAvoy received a live call directing him to an address where there was no polling station.

Those calls came from the same number listed as the Poutine phone.

Windsor-Tecumseh isn’t referenced on Elections Canada’s list of ridings where polling station changes occurred.

Meanwhile, there are now reports of calls purporting to convey polling station changes in Mount Royal, Lac-Saint-Louis, Edmonton Centre, Kingston and the Islands and Hamilton East-Stoney Creek.

Pierre Poutine

By Aaron Wherry - Tuesday, February 28, 2012 at 3:32 PM - 0 Comments

Elections Canada traces the disposable phone linked to fraudulent calls in Guelph.

The fraudulent robocall that misdirected voters in Guelph came from a Virgin Mobile disposable cellphone registered to one Pierre Poutine, on Separatist Street, in Joliette, Que, court documents obtained by Postmedia News, the Ottawa Citizen and the Edmonton Journal show.

What we’re talking about when we talk about voter suppression

By Aaron Wherry - Tuesday, February 28, 2012 at 11:29 AM - 0 Comments

Daniel Lobo/Flickr

At this point in the story, there seem to be three kinds of election mischief being discussed in relation to the last federal campaign. And it is probably worth differentiating between them.

Type 1. Late night or otherwise annoying calls purporting to be from one campaign or another, presumably intended to bring that campaign into disrepute. These have been alleged in various ridings with reports of calls coming at odd hours or callers being rude and offensive.

Type 2. Automated calls—”robocalls”—carrying messages that convey incorrect or misleading information about a voter’s polling station.

Type 3. Calls from live human callers who convey incorrect or misleading information about a voter’s polling station.

It is types 2 and 3 that I have focused on and, in that regard, I have so far identified 14 ridings where such claims are being made (see here and here). It seems to me that these are the most serious allegations, it being an offence under the Elections Act to “wilfully prevent or endeavour to prevent an elector from voting at an election.” For those 14 ridings, it is mostly unclear (to me at least) which calls were automated and which involved an actual person on the other end of the line, except in the case of Guelph, which seems to have involved robocalls.

The trouble with the Harper government’s explanation

By Aaron Wherry - Monday, February 27, 2012 at 8:14 PM - 0 Comments

I count 11 ridings that have so far been linked to allegations that voters were called about their polling stations: Guelph, Kitchener Centre, Kitchener-Conestoga, Kitchener-Waterloo, London West, Parkdale-High Park, Nipissing-Timiskaming, Elmwood-Transcona, Winnipeg South Centre, Sydney-Victoria and Saanich-Gulf Islands. (For sourcing see here, here, here, here and here.)

Meanwhile, the CBC now has a list of all the ridings where changes to polling stations occurred during the last 24 days of last year’s election. Of those 11 ridings that are the subject of alleged phone calls about polling stations, I see four on that list: Kitchener Centre, Kitchener-Conestoga, Guelph and Parkdale-High Park.

The other seven are not mentioned.

Add Kitchener Centre to the list

By Aaron Wherry - Monday, February 27, 2012 at 8:30 AM - 0 Comments

The Record finds a report of fraudulent calls in Kitchener Centre.

Stephen Thoms worked as a deputy returns officer on Election Day in Kitchener Centre, which was considered a crucial riding for the Conservatives to hold to achieve their majority.

Thoms said he had between 15 and 20 citizens approach him on May 2 to ask whether they were at the right polling station, saying they’d been called and told their polling stations had changed. He reported it to his supervisor, who said he’d already heard that a lot.

And that riding to this and these on the list of those who received fake calls claiming to report different polling stations.

The number of ridings now alleged to have received questionable phone calls of one kind or another during the 2011 campaign continues to grow. The CBC puts the total at 34. The Sixth Estate lists 42. Meanwhile, an astute reader reminds me of a robocall that went out to Saanich-Gulf Islands residents in 2008.

Voter harassment

By Aaron Wherry - Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 12:51 PM - 0 Comments

Glen McGregor and Stephen Maher identify 14 ridings where voters received harassing phone calls.

Many received calls in the middle of the night from callers claiming they represented the local Liberal candidate. Jewish voters in two ridings complained of receiving repeated phone calls at meal time on the Saturday Sabbath. In another riding where the Liberal candidate was of Pakistani heritage, some said the callers mimicked a South Asian accent. People who received the calls report that the callers would phone repeatedly, irritating the recipients, and then speak to them rudely.

The Liberal campaign alerted the media to this during the last campaign.

Meanwhile, Jean-Pierre Kingsley, the former chief electoral officer, talks to The House (starts around the 26-minute mark) about the robocall campaign. Tim Powers says Conservatives are outraged too.

How many ridings?

By Aaron Wherry - Friday, February 24, 2012 at 7:10 PM - 0 Comments

Various allegations of phone mischief were made during the last federal campaign and various ridings have been cited this week in connection to the fraudulent calls being investigated by Elections Canada. Because the allegations vary—rude calls, late night calls, calls about polling stations, etc—it’s probably worth clarifying how many ridings may have been impacted by calls meant to misdirect voters to fake or incorrect polling stations.

Glen McGregor and Stephen Maher identified seven such ridings.

The robocalls received in Guelph were recorded in female voices in both French and English. They told voters their polling stations had moved to a shopping mall in the city’s downtown, where parking was scarce.

A Citizen-Postmedia investigation has found calls misdirecting voters were also reported in ridings across the country: Kitchener-Waterloo, Kitchener-Conestoga, London-West, Parkdale-High Park, Winnipeg South Centre and Sydney-Victoria. It is possible that they were caused by robo-dialing errors.

Today, the Canadian Press notes a case in Kitchener-Conestoga that was dismissed as human error (this case was previously covered here and here).

Beyond that, there is what was reported nine months ago. Continue…

A debate?

By Aaron Wherry - Friday, February 24, 2012 at 3:54 PM - 0 Comments

Interim Liberal leader Bob Rae has written to the Speaker to request an emergency debate.

In my opinion, this debate is necessary because denying someone the opportunity to vote, is to deny them the most basic right that exists in our democracy. The suppression of voters can undermine the legitimacy and credibility of those elected to serve in Parliament. These reports undermine the reputation of Parliament and cast a shadow over the legitimacy of all Parliamentary proceedings. In my view, denying someone the right to vote is such a serious issue, that it merits the immediate attention of the House of Commons.

A departure

By Aaron Wherry - Friday, February 24, 2012 at 3:48 PM - 0 Comments

Michael Sona, an executive assistant in the office of Conservative MP Eve Adams, has either resigned or been fired. And that may or may not have something to do with Elections Canada’s investigation into fraudulent calls made during the last federal election.

Was this the work of one person?

By Aaron Wherry - Friday, February 24, 2012 at 10:40 AM - 0 Comments

An interesting note from Joan Bryden’s review of the robocall allegations.

Opposition MPs noted that whomever organized the calls had to have access to lists that identified each voter’s party preference — something typically only available to local and national party campaign headquarters.

The list of ridings allegedly involved now numbers 27.

A part of the culture

By Aaron Wherry - Friday, February 24, 2012 at 9:30 AM - 0 Comments

Bob Rae blames the Prime Minister for the robocalls.

Rae said the real blame for any election trickery rests with the political culture Harper has created in the party. ”The prime minister has created a Nixonian culture,” Rae said. “This stuff doesn’t happen unless the boss lets it happen. He has allowed to seep into his party and into his organization a culture of attack and, frankly, a culture of deception and dirty tricks, where almost anything goes.”

Shocked and distressed

By Aaron Wherry - Thursday, February 23, 2012 at 5:25 PM - 0 Comments

Matt Meier releases a statement.

As CEO of Racknine, I was shocked and distressed to learn that some party had used our services to try and disrupt voting during the 2011 federal election. We take these allegations very seriously.Our dialling services have been used successfully by hundreds of campaigns to inform voters of where and when to vote in many elections. We believe that our technology has helped engage more voters in the electoral process.

We are committed to ensuring that those who misused our services will face the full penalty of law, and will continue to work proactively with Elections Canada and all law enforcement agencies to help identify the culprits.

‘It’s not part of our campaign’

By Aaron Wherry - Thursday, February 23, 2012 at 4:11 PM - 0 Comments

The Prime Minister responds to the Elections Canada investigation into fraudulent phone calls.

“Our party has no knowledge of these calls. It’s not part of our campaign,” Mr. Harper told reporters on Thursday. “Obviously, if there is anyone who has done anything wrong, we will expect that they will face the full consequences of the law.”

David Akin has audio of the Prime Minister’s exchange with reporters.

‘This serious bastardization of our electoral system’

By Aaron Wherry - Thursday, February 23, 2012 at 1:50 PM - 0 Comments

Here is some of Pat Martin’s opening statement to reporters this afternoon on the subject of fraudulent calls made during the last federal campaign.

Voter suppression techniques are commonplace in the United States with high-priced consulting firms specializing in sabotaging elections. But I don’t think anybody really expected a Canadian political party to stoop so low that we didn’t take the necessary steps to protect ourselves from it.

This could mean the end of the age of innocence in Canadian electoral campaigns. Elections Canada stated that these phoney phone calls deliberately disrupted the voting process. How is this different from a bunch of goons with clubs blocking the door to a voter station as we’ve seen in Third World countries or the deep south of the United States? Because the net effect is the same: you are sabotaging the ability of people to exercise their democratic right to cast their ballot in a federal election. In my view there can be no more serious crime, nor a more heinous affront to democracy.

Too many brave Canadians died fighting for the right to have fair and clean and free elections in this country to let this go unchallenged at the highest possible order. My father didn’t go to war to fight for democracy only to have some sleazy punk in an American-style black ops department run roughshod over it and undermine its integrity.

Continue…

And now a word from Pat Martin

By Aaron Wherry - Thursday, February 23, 2012 at 10:33 AM - 0 Comments

The NDP has called at 12:30 news conference to react to last night’s story from Postmedia and the Citizen. Mr. Martin has already offered a few thoughts via Twitter.

Add the ‘in and out’ scheme of defrauding spending limits to the phoney phone calls in 18 or more ridings, and you might question CPC’s 39%

When the Con’s said they’d be different from the Libs, some people thought they meant they’d be MORE ethical, not less.

I for one, wish the Conservatives would fix Health care, not elections. These are seriously bad people

Yup. Fix Health Care Not Elections. That’s my new bumper sticker. In fact replace ‘Health Care’ with your choice…’Pensions?’

Where does the electronic trail lead?

By Aaron Wherry - Wednesday, February 22, 2012 at 10:15 PM - 0 Comments

Stephen Maher and Glen McGregor break news of an Elections Canada investigation into deceptive phone calls made during the last campaign.

Elections Canada has traced fraudulent phone calls made during the federal election to an Edmonton voice-broadcast company that worked for the Conservative Party across the country. While the agency investigates, aided by the RCMP, the Conservatives are conducting an internal probe. A party lawyer is interviewing campaign workers to find who was behind the deceptive “robocalls.”

The measure of the race

By Aaron Wherry - Wednesday, February 1, 2012 at 8:53 PM - 0 Comments

As part of its latest filing with Elections Canada, the NDP has tabled fundraising data for its leadership race through Dec. 31, 2011. Alice Funke has the headline totals.

Q4$: Topp $157K | Mulcair $146K | Nash $108K | Dewar $94K | Cullen $86K | Singh $49K | Chisholm $35K | Saganash $17.5K | Ashton $10K

Contrib count to #ndpldr‘s: Mulcair 621 | Dewar 456 | Cullen 442 | Nash 347 | Topp 278 | Singh 110 | Saganash 87 | Chisholm  64 | Ashton 58

Glen McGregor has graphed the numbers between September and December to show the trend over the first few months of the campaign.

The Dewar campaign boasts that it is now up to 721 contributors. The Cullen campaign claimed last week to be over $135,000.

Just ask

By Aaron Wherry - Wednesday, November 30, 2011 at 11:30 AM - 0 Comments

Ilona Dougherty argues that civics classes aren’t the answer and again stresses the need to actively court young voters the way other age groups are courted.

So what does work? The answer is simple: Ask young people to vote. Elections Canada’s survey results show that young people who were contacted by a political party were significantly more likely to cast a ballot than those who weren’t (83 per cent versus 68 per cent). Having a parent, friend, or roommate who talks about politics also makes young person more likely to participate. There are dozens of rigorous field experiments that reinforce the same basic conclusion: if you ask them, they will vote.

This type of active mobilization is important because young Canadians are currently the group least likely to be solicited: only 40 per cent of them were contacted in any way by a party or candidate during the last federal election. Changing that is a crucial part of any comprehensive strategy, and that means changing what political parties, NGOs, and community organizations do in order to mobilize young voters.

The kids are, you know, fine and stuff, I guess

By Aaron Wherry - Monday, November 28, 2011 at 9:00 AM - 0 Comments

Elections Canada has released its national survey of young adults. Three-quarters of them claim to be voting and they generally seem okay with the state of things.

There were reasonably high levels of satisfaction among the youth surveyed with the way democracy works in Canada, with 53% of youth being somewhat satisfied and a further 17% very satisfied. … A key difference between voters and non-voters was that voters were more likely to have agreed that the government plays a major role in their lives compared to non-voters (81% versus 62%, respectively).

Youth voters were more likely than non-voters to identify with a political party and to feel that by voting they could make a difference. Nearly all voters (95%) agreed that there was at least one political party that talked about the issues that they felt were important, compared to fewer (85%), but still a high proportion, of non-voters. When youth were asked whether they felt that by voting they could make a difference, 88% of voters agreed, compared to 72% of non-voters. Most youth, both voters and non-voters, disagreed that all federal political parties were the same (85% of voters and 76% of non-voters).

Setting aside the obviously dubious self-reporting of voter turnout, the report gets at what’s driving the decline in voter turnout: lack of knowledge, lack of interest, lack of relevance and, as Apathy is Boring has argued, a lack of direct engagement.