If you thought your vote had no effect, you might change your mind.
A three-day hearing is underway in Canada to decide whether the results of April’s parliamentary elections should be overturned because of a vote that went uncounted due to a clerical error.
Liberal candidate Tatiana Auguste won the Terrebonne constituency north of Montreal by just one vote, flipping a seat long held by Canada’s Quebec separatist party, the Bloc Québécois.
The highly unusual one-vote victory gave Prime Minister Mark Carney’s ruling Liberal Party 169 seats in parliament, moving it closer to the 172 seats needed to form a majority government in Ottawa. The Bloc Quebecois has 22 seats.
Mr Carney won the election in a stunning party reversal, buoyed by US President Donald Trump’s threats to impose steep tariffs on Canada and annex the country as the 51st US state.
But Bloc Quebecois incumbent Nathalie Sinclair-Degagne disputed the results after some voters said their mail-in ballots had not been counted.
Terrebonne resident Emmanuel Bosset told public broadcaster CBC Radio-Canada in May that his ballot was returned to its sender because the return envelope provided by the national election board had the wrong postal code.
According to a statement filed in the province’s Supreme Court, Elections Canada staff realized they had mistakenly printed their postal codes on dozens of ballots ahead of Election Day, according to the Canadian Press.
“I wasn’t the one who made the mistake on the envelope from Elections Canada,” Bosse told Radio-Canada. “Elections Canada has affixed this label to the envelope.”
Bose said she was angry that her vote wasn’t counted, especially given how close the race was.
“I voted for Brock,” Bosse told Radio-Canada. “So maybe the vote could have changed something.”
The election results were confusing from the beginning. Auguste was initially expected to win the seat by just 35 votes. However, following the standard verification process, Mr. Terrebonne lost 44 votes to Mr. Sinclair-Degagnier.
Due to the close race, a judicial recount was conducted. This is required by law for races won by less than 0.1%. After a recount, Auguste was declared the winner on May 10 with a total of 23,352 votes, just one vote ahead of Sinclair-Degagné.
Lawyers for both candidates presented competing arguments in Quebec Superior Court this week over whether the results should be upheld or a new election should be held.
Sinclair Desgagné’s lawyer Stéphane Chatigny said in court Monday that confirming the election results would “send a dire message to voters” and “undermine public trust,” according to the Canadian Press.
Meanwhile, Auguste’s lawyer, Marc-Etienne Vien, said canceling the results would “disenfranchise” tens of thousands of Terrebonne residents who voted in April.
David Bohm, a lawyer with Elections Canada, said court elections “are not meant to be perfect,” according to the Canadian Press.
“This is a large, complex machine, so errors are inevitable,” Boehm said.
