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Report on the 2018 By-elections

Foreword

Under the Canada Elections Act (CEA), if one or more by-elections are held in a year, the Chief Electoral Officer must, within 90 days after the end of the year, produce a report that sets out "any matter or event that has arisen or occurred in connection with the administration of the Chief Electoral Officer's office since the last report and that he or she considers should be brought to the attention of the House of Commons."

In 2018, by-elections were held in the electoral districts of Chicoutimi–Le Fjord (Quebec) and Leeds–Grenville–Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes (Ontario). This report discusses the conduct of these two by-elections, as well as administrative changes and improvements implemented since the agency last reported to Parliament in March 2018.

The following initiatives were piloted during the by-elections and aimed to improve the electoral process for Canadians and election workers for the next general election:

  • Streamlined administrative and financial procedures for election workers in the field and for staff at headquarters, enabled by renewed IT hardware and software;
  • A redesigned ballot that is more accessible and more efficient for printing;
  • Fewer, simplified tools and documents for election workers processing voters at the polls. This will make the voting process simpler and faster for both voters and election workers, while reducing our environmental footprint.

Over the past year, Elections Canada has made significant progress on our strategic priorities as we prepare for the 2019 general election. We are improving the registration and voting experience, strengthening our security posture in collaboration with national security agencies, and making processes easier for election workers.

We will continue to make progress on our priorities in the final preparation stage for the 2019 general election. We will also focus on implementing recent legislative changes enacted by Parliament under C-76, known as the Elections Modernization Act, which received Royal Assent on December 13, 2018. On June 13, 2019, six months after Royal Assent, all provisions in this legislation will be in force. Some provisions will be brought into force earlier as the necessary preparations are made, in accordance with the CEA. For example, on January 19, 2019, we published a notice in the Canada Gazette about several provisions that came into force on that date because we were operationally ready to implement them.

More details on the progress of our work over the last year and our plans for 2019–20 can be found in our 2017–18 Departmental Results Report, on our website and in our 2019–20 Departmental Plan, to be published in April 2019.

With only months before the start of the 43rd general election, Elections Canada is well-positioned in terms of our readiness preparations.