Letter Writer Corrects What Is Happening In Regina - Qu'Appelle Riding

Just to correct you. (Story: Rhino Herd Rumbles Into Regina - Qu'Appelle). I collected the required nomination signatures from electors of Regina Qu-Appelle who agreed to nominate all candidates who wished to stand. I collected 110 signatures in total on a form provided by elections Canada, but instead of putting my own name as the candidate I wrote "ALL CANDIDATES".

This method was accepted by Elections Canada for 2 candidates, myself and Eric. But then they got frightened and changed their minds and started rejecting everyone.

Section 3 of the Charter grants every citizen 2 rights. One is to vote and the other is to stand:

3. Every citizen of Canada has the right to vote in an election of members of the House of Commons or of a legislative assembly and to be qualified for membership therein.

3. Tout citoyen canadien a le droit de vote et est éligible aux élections législatives fédérales ou provinciales.


So we are not trying to be candidates without signatures, nor are we even challenging the signature requirement. The section of the Elections Act regarding the signature requirement reads as follows:

66 (1) A nomination paper shall be in the prescribed form and include
(e) for any electoral district except one listed in Schedule 3, the names, addresses and signatures, made in the presence of a witness, of at least 100 electors resident in the electoral district;

As you can see there's nothing said about excluding a form nominating ALL Candidates. We believe we met the signature requirement. What we are bringing to court is the Returning Officer's interpretation of this section of the Elections Act to exclude nomination forms (albeit after accepting them for two candidates) which state "ALL CANDIDATES" instead of one individual candidates name.

At the moment we are filing a motion to get the names of the refused candidates back on the ballot. And we think we have a good shot at winning.

Thanks for covering this story. I'm biased but I think it's pretty interesting.

Kieran Szuchewycz

Szuchewycz is an Independent candidate in the Regina - Qu'Appelle riding.

Editor's Note - we stand corrected.