A University of Western Ontario professor is concerned Bill C-19 could compromise the integrity of the federal election..Associate Professor of Software Engineering Aleksander Essex is familiar with election problems from hackable computerized voting machines, but has grown familiar with other ways elections can be stolen..When the Western Standard asked Essex if Bill C-19 could lead to a skewed election, he said, “Probably not, but possibly yes.”.Bill C-19 passed second reading in the House of Commons by a vote of 330-1, with independent MP Derek Sloan casting the only opposing vote. The legislation purports to allow a safe election with mail-in voting during the pandemic, but Essex said the current system is hard to beat..“Federally, Canada has had one of the all-time best methods of casting and counting ballots in terms of public accountability and oversight. So the implications of changing the formula must be carefully considered,” Essex said..“And while mail-in voting is strongly preferred relative to its online voting counterpart, Canada needs to better consider the implications of over-weighting the number of ballots marked in an unsupervised remote environment..“There are several reasons. Let me focus on one.: The Canada Elections Act (sec. 163) could not be more clear: ‘the vote is secret.’ In a supervised polling place, we can enforce privacy, and we can call the cops when ruffians show up and start causing trouble. There would be lots of eyewitnesses to any funny business..“But, voting remotely provides little means of enforcing this fundamental protection. We can’t see that domineering family member instructing family members how to vote. We can’t see people gathering around the kitchen table having ‘voting parties.’ We can’t see people buying ballots for $20 a pop. Detection and enforcement, if it ever occurs, is retroactive … after the privacy violation has occurred. And it typically would happen only in cases that rose to the level of an actual complaint.”.Nearly half of Ontario municipalities use computer voting machines. Essex’s warnings that they can be hacked usually fall on deaf ears. However, his outspokenness on the subject has moved others to reach out to him when they encounter election anomalies of various kinds. .“I heard anecdotal accounts from candidates during the 2018 Ontario municipal election of family members or friends casting ballots on behalf of others … both with or without the person’s knowledge. In these cases, people either expressed ignorance or indifference to the offence, or an unwillingness to report their family member to the authorities over the matter,” Essex said..The incumbent Liberals in Newfoundland and Labrador renewed power with a majority government after an election done completely by mail-in ballots. A COVID-19 outbreak in mid-February prompted provincial chief electoral officer Bruce Chaulk to cancel all in-person voting set for Feb. 13. The results of the mail-in vote were announced March 27 following several deadline extensions. .The province’s NDP filed a lawsuit that alleged voting irregularities so numerous and severe that a new election was necessary. Court documents shared with The Canadian Press allege Chaulk told Elections NL staff to register voters who didn’t have proper identification, and that he took ballot kits home and encouraged other employees to do the same..The lawsuit was signed by NDP Leader Alison Coffin, who lost her seat in the St. John’s East-Quidi Vidi district by 53 votes. Her former constituent Whymarrh Whitby co-signed the lawsuit. He told The Canadian Press that, despite several requests, he did not receive a ballot from Elections NL..Essex hopes the provisions of C-19 don’t last..“If C-19 truly is meant to be a temporary measure during COVID, I don’t think it’s the end of the world. My concern would be it becomes a pathway to normalizing unsupervised remote voting,” he said..Harding is a Western Standard correspondent based in Saskatchewan
