Overall voter turnout is declining, especially with youth.

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Hanne Armstrong

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Speak Up

Quite apart from all the pitches, ads and slogans that are trying to convince you to vote for a particular candidate and party, there's another, quieter campaign just trying to get you out to vote at all. For anyone. Just get out and vote.

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Elections Canada has community relations officers right across the country working to inform, educate and encourage people to vote in the upcoming federal election.

"We're especially targeting students, to increase their participation," says Elections Canada media advisor for the Maritimes, Dana Doiron. "We work on campuses with student leadership, set up information kiosks and posters, all in an effort to increase understanding of the electoral process and remove obstacles to voting from the minds of students."

Why the emphasis on getting students out to vote? It's all in the statistics.

From high's of 79 per cent in the late 1950s and early '60s, national voter participation has been dwindling fairly steadily ever since. In June 2004 just under 61 per cent of eligible Canadian voters bothered to cast a ballot. Despite winter weather, and perhaps motivated by scandal, the January 2006 climbed slightly to 64.7 per cent.

New Brunswickers tend to be more politically active than other Canadians. That 79 per cent from 45 to 50 years ago rises to 81-85 per cent here, and the low from the 2004 vote is 63 per cent here, more than two points higher than the Canadian average. Sixty-nine per cent of New Brunswick voters made it to the polls in 2006.

However, in all those numbers, there's an underlying theme of low numbers of young voters participating in elections compared with the national average. How much lower? Often between 20-30 per cent. Is that a problem? Elections Canada thinks so. In the 'Youth Focus' section of "Explaining the Turnout Decline in Canadian Federal Elections", a comprehensive survey of non-voters done after the 2006 vote says, "It is due in large part to a drop in youth voting patterns that show that overall turnout numbers are declining. Concerns are being raised that this is not a "life-cycle" effect that will amend in time, but that young people who do not vote are in fact embarking on a lifetime of self-imposed disenfranchisement."

Disenfranchisement: being deprived of the right to vote, a right people used to fight for.

"We're doing as much as possible to make it easy to vote," says Dana. "If people are fed up or don't care, though, there's nothing we can do about it."

The most common reason amongst all non-voters for not voting is that they're too busy with work or school on election day. To combat this, Elections Canada has always had advance polls for people to go cast their ballots. To make it even easier, starting two elections ago, any voter can vote on any day of the election campaign.

"All you need to do is contact us," says Dana, "and register to vote by special ballot. You'll need identification and the name of your candidate, and then you can vote any time during the campaign, and by mail if you're out of the country."

So, with a small bit of effort, you can either go to an advance poll, or vote whenever it's convenient for you. Being too busy on the day loses credibility as a reason not to vote....

All right. You're at university, and you've decided that you're this is the year you're going to cast your ballot. But you don't know any of the local candidates or issues, because you're from out of town or out of province. Not to worry.

Students are the only citizens in the country who have the privilege of choosing to vote in one of two ridings. Going to school in Moncton, but live in Saskatchewan? No problem. Find the Elections Canada kiosk on campus or the office in town, and vote at home by mail. Prefer to have a say in Moncton? That's fine as well; just vote when you can, or on election day.

Just make the effort.

Another way Elections Canada is trying to increase voter participation is in publishing their material in 16 languages, including Urdu and two Chinese dialects.

"We have the highest percentage of citizens not born in our country than anywhere else in the world," says Dana.

Elections Canada does indeed seem to be doing whatever they can to encourage and enable eligible voters to participate in the upcoming October election. It's up to the public, though, of all ages and backgrounds, to decide whether or not to take the time to decide which candidate or party is best for them, and then to cast a ballot.

Does Elections Canada predict another increase in voter turnout this time?

"We're hoping participation will increase," says Dana, "but we can't predict the numbers."