montreal's voter turnout was only 37% this municipal election. what's behind the decline?
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the canada post strike messed with voter card distribution during the municipal election campaign, but it appears élections montréal has other voting obstacles to think about as well.
with a voter turnout of 37.07 per cent, this was the third-lowest participation rate of the 15 montreal municipal elections held since 1970, the year the city introduced universal suffrage.
that said, voter turnout has surpassed 50 per cent in only four elections since 1970, peaking at 53.8 per cent in 1978.
in its anticipated post-mortem on the 2025 vote, élections montréal, the office responsible for organizing the city’s elections and ensuring their integrity, will surely talk about the mail strike, which delayed the distribution of voter reminder cards to households. in some cases, voting cards arrived only after one-day advance polling was over on oct. 26.
as well, élections montréal reported an “administrative error” in processing voter registrations online, though it claimed the glitch affected “a few voters” who only found out at advance polling stations that they were not, in fact, registered to vote.
however, élections montréal may also want to consider the number of voting locations it provided when reflecting on the low turnout and long lineups at some polling stations.
élections montréal provided 530 places to vote on election day in 2013, and the number has been dwindling — along with voter turnout — since then.
in 2017, montreal had 468 voting locations on election day. in 2021, the number of voting places dropped slightly to 463.
this year, élections montréal says it opened 451 voting locations on sunday.
voter turnout dropped from 43.3 per cent in 2013 to 42.5 per cent in 2017. it was 38.3 per cent in 2021.
élections montréal says it provided four additional days of voting this year on top of advance voting on oct. 26 and election day on nov. 2. voting at the returning officer’s office in each borough was available on oct. 24, 27, 28 and 29. as well, students were able to vote on the same four days on certain college campuses and at all universities in montreal. mobile voting was held on oct. 25 in seniors’ residences.
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“the number of polling places (on election day) depends on several factors, including physical barriers, the number of ballots in a given district, voter turnout in the previous election and the availability of early voting,” said catherine duplantie, a spokesperson for élections montréal.
“since there were more advance voting options this year (with the returning officer’s polling stations, polling stations for montreal students, advance voting and mobile voting), the number of polling locations on election day was adjusted accordingly.”
still, the 2021 election, which took place during the pandemic, offered 242 locations for advance polling on two days, compared with 200 advance polling locations and one day for advance voting this year.
voters waited in line for long periods at some advance polling stations last week, spurring the mayoral candidates to call on élections montréal to “do better” for election day this past sunday.
duplantie said adding advance voting days in 2021 was an exceptional measure due to the pandemic and public health guidelines on distancing. normally, she said, advance voting is offered on one day.
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