Kenora MP Eric Melillo is continuing to look into why 1,600 voters in northwestern Ontario weren’t able to cast their vote in the 2021 Federal Election.
On November 3, Elections Canada apologized to 1,600 eligible voters in Poplar Hill First Nation, Pikangikum First Nation and Cat Lake First Nation, saying ‘confusion’ between their staff and the three communities led to them not hosting polling stations on the night of September 22.
“It’s a positive step to show that acknowledgment no doubt,” said Kenora MP Eric Melillo, in an interview with Q104 and KenoraOnline late last week.
“But there’s certainly a lot more that we’re waiting for in terms of the investigation into what happened, where there were breakdowns in the process. We need to correct these gaps moving forward. It’s important that every single voter has a chance to cast their ballot.”
In a prepared 1,200 word statement, Elections Canada says they’re continuing to investigate the situation in both the Kenora area and across the country, to ensure these type of scenarios don’t happen again.
“The investigation that Elections Canada is undertaking is important for our riding of course, but also to see if there are some problems that we experienced here that are an indication of wider concerns in different areas of the country. We’ll be following that very closely,” adds Melillo.
In the area, Elections Canada says the returning officer made plans to provide 43 First Nation polling locations on election day, as well as three advance polling locations. Elections Canada had planned to host an on-site election day poll in all three affected communities, but no on-site advance polls.
However, in early September, Elections Canada says they were told that most community members would be unable to vote at election day polls on September 20. Elections Canada did not say who provided them with this information.
Due to this, they say the returning officer then told community members to vote by mail, if they couldn’t vote on election day. The returning officer then took the decision, which was authorized by Elections Canada, to run a one-day advance poll in all three communities on September 13.
The one-day polls on September 13 were approved by local leadership in all three communities, and a decision to cancel voting services on September 20 was made at the local level.
However, due to the timing of the decision, Elections Canada could not update their Voter Information Cards on time, as they were already mailed out, and several electors were unaware that their in-person poll had been moved to September 13.
As well, voter cards for those in a number of northern Ontario First Nation community members had incorrect information about the location of polling stations.