Elections BC admits error in Surrey-Guildford, where the Eby NDP scored its majority
Overseer of Oct. 19 vote says Conservative runner-up filed petition too late.
In a new B.C. Supreme Court filing, Elections BC admits its vote-by-mail team erred in the Surrey-Guildford riding, where NDP candidate Garry Begg won by 22 votes on a judicial recount.
But it says the Conservative Party of B.C. runner-up, Honveer Singh Randhawa, filed a petition to invalidate the result more than a month after the deadline.
Premier David Eby named Begg solicitor general after the recount gave the NDP a slim 47-seat majority in the 93-seat Legislature. Randhawa held a 103-vote edge on election night, but wants the result invalidated and a by-election ordered due to irregularities.
In a June 19 response, Elections BC chief Anton Boegman and returning officer Rana Malhi said mail-in voting packages for 22 voters were requested Oct. 4 and 7, 2024, with a common email address and phone number. Each requested package used the last six digits of a social insurance number as the voter’s unique identifier.
Elections BC had decided before the election to permit an individual to assist more than one voter with a mail-in package, provided the individual was appointed as an election official under the Election Act.
“Upon receiving these requests, the [three-member] vote by mail team noticed the pattern of multiple requests originating from a single source and session; however, the team also noted that the requests came from a care facility with resident individuals,” said the court filing.
“The vote by mail team decided to fulfill the requests from (censored) to ensure the voters received their mail-in voting packages on time. However, the team failed to follow-up with the district electoral officer, Ms. Malhi, to confirm that an individual at (censored) was appointed as an election official.”
Elections BC said all 22 certification envelopes were signed, but three were not counted as they did not meet certain requirements for counting. It also said no individual was identified as assisting a voter on any of the 22 packages.
Elections BC said that Randhawa should have filed his petition no later than Dec. 12, a month after the writ for the riding was returned and the result declared official.
“This admission sharply contrasts Elections BC’s public narrative,” said Randhawa’s lawyer, Sunny Uppal. “In their 2024 provincial election report, Elections BC repeatedly praised the security of mail-in ballots and their successful administration of B.C.’s 2024 provincial election, while also accusing Mr. Randhawa and the Conservative Party of spreading misinformation. At no point in their 2024 provincial election report, did Elections BC disclose their now admitted error.”.
In a June 18 decision, ahead of a hearing to decide Randhawa’s petition, Justice Barbara Norell ruled that identities of voters be redacted from the court documents and replaced with an agreed number, such as Voter 1, and that any names be banned from publication.