B. C. to see some results before voting ends
Paul Bryan isn’t going to wait until the 11th hour before casting his vote on Oct. 19.
Bryan is a Coquitlam, B. C., software developer, who 15 years ago became part of elections history by fighting his conviction for violating a section of the Canada Elections Act related to publishing voting results before polls close. While he ultimately lost that battle, the Conservatives last year removed the restriction, meaning results from Atlantic Canada will be known to British Columbians before polls close on the West Coast at 7 p. m.
While that theoretically provides British Columbians with an opportunity to make a last- minute vote based on how things are going out east, Bryan notes that the window of about one hour will be too small and the information too scant to be of any real value.
And it’s not why he challenged the conviction, which resulted in a $ 1,000 fine, in the first place.
“I saw this as a very significant threat to freedom of expression — if we start accepting these kinds of restrictions then, it’s hard to imagine how we could have open forums form communication among citizens,” he said.
“I didn’t really look at this as a vehicle for me do anything different … I didn’t look at this as a way of B. C. people using this as a mechanism for strategic voting. Frankly, it’s about allowing Canadians to tell other Canadians what is going on.”
That’s not to say strategic voting won’t be at play in several of B. C.’ s 42 ridings, where a number of threeway races exist and polls continue to place the NDP, Conservatives and Liberals in a near statistical tie.
A recent B. C. poll by Insights West showed that the NDP, while still in the lead, was losing ground to a resurgent Conservative party and, to a lesser extent, the Liberals. The poll, however, also showed that a third of voters ( 35 per cent) might switch allegiances.