Timelines

Speaking of provincial statutes being ignored...

As Polemic and Paradox notes, there are no time limits on when provincial political finance reports have to be made public. The 2006 provincial finance contributions were not published to the Elections Newfoundland and Labrador site until March of this year.

And as this corner has noted previously, there's a curiously long wait for the official poll-by-poll results of the last provincial general election.

So what if Nova Scotians already have full poll-by-polls from last fall's by-election. For that matter, the lucky bluenosers have poll-by-poll results online for general and by-elections going back to the 1930s.

Likewise, Elections New Brunswick has recent by-election results posted.

In Quebec, the unbelievably obliging DGEQ has downloadable Excel-manipulatable versions of recent general election results, and, even more impressively, of the by-elections in the current legislature, as recently as May of 2008.

Ontario, the most populous province, has full poll-by-poll results for the general provincial election held on day off Dannystan's last October. Manitoba gives you poll-by-polls, as does Saskatchewan (again in Excel format!), a province roughly twice as populous as NL, and whose general election was held a month later. Indeed, the hyperefficient Saskabushers even have published poll-by-poll results of a by-election that was held two weeks ago.

On the Left Coast, B.C. has full poll-by-polls of the last provincial election available, and, in another sign of, well, basic competence, even manages to publish financial reports, most of the time, in the first four months of the following calendar year.

And at the federal level, poll-by-polls have been published for the most recent batch of by-elections to fill House of Commons vacancies.

In Dannystan? See for yourself.

Of recent by-elections — Ferryland, Kilbride, Port au Port, Humber Valley, and Labrador West 2007 — nary a sign.

There's a financial report on line for Exploits 2005, but no other by-elections. The MUN library catalogue reveals the existence of the Report of the Chief Electoral Officer on election finances for the by elections held in the districts of Placentia & St. Mary's February 21st, 2006, but not the election results; and also of the Report of the Chief Electoral Officer on the Signal Hill - Quidi Vidi by election November 1, 2006... but not the financials. And MUN's library system has no record of a paper copy of any report since the 2003 general election results were published in 2004.

(Both of those by-election documents are also still listed as "in-process" at the cataloguing department of the library, suggesting that they are recent arrivals.)

Maybe the Government of Dannystan doesn't like to do things the way other provinces or the federal government do. (Like, say, appointing competent non-partisan people to hold the highest office responsible for the non-partisan and transparent conduct of electoral affairs.)

That's fine.

It's stupid.

It runs contrary to Williams Government's quaint pledge to post stuff on the internets within 30 days.

But fine. At least in so far as financial data are concerned, Paul Reynolds, the former President of the current governing party, isn't running afoul of any rules.

Nor did his predecessor, a former Liberal cabinet minister.

However — on the poll-by-poll results front, the Elections Act is clear:

Compiling statistics

214. The Chief Electoral Officer shall publish within 9 months after each general election and each by-election a book containing pertinent statistics of the election, including poll-by-poll results of each electoral district.

The Chief Electoral Officer shall. That's mandatory language.

"Publish". The only sign that any recent electoral results have been published is the library catalogue entry noted above. (And no, offering to mail a copy to anyone who thinks to ask, does not constitute "publishing.")

And "within 9 months".

In respect of the Exploits by-election, that mandatory nine-month deadline expired on March 23, 2006. For Placentia & St. Mary's, the deadline was November 21, 2006. For Signal Hill—Quidi Vidi, it was August 1, 2007. For Ferryland, Port au Port, and Kilbride, November 8, 2007. Humber Valley and Labrador West met the deadline five days later.

And for the general election of 2007, having been held on October 9, 2007 — the day before the much-larger Ontario, whose poll-by-polls have been available for quite some time now — that mandatory statutory deadline was on Wednesday, July 9th, 2008.