It shouldn’t be surprising to British Columbians, who have been dodging voting responsibilities for many years now.

But the most recent provincial election, by all accounts the largest majority win ever attained by the BC NDP, only captured a tad over half of all registered voters’ attention.

Elections BC Oct. 27 reported that at least 52.4% of registered voters voted in the 2020 Provincial General Election.

This is a preliminary estimate of voter turnout based on the following:

• the number of voters who voted during advance voting, in their electoral district;
• the number of voters who voted on Election Day, at their assigned voting place;
• an estimate of the number of certification envelopes containing absentee ballots, to be considered at final count;
• an estimate of the number of completed vote-by-mail packages containing mail-in ballots, to be considered at final count.

A total of 670,324 voters voted in their electoral district during the advance voting period, and 546,877 voters voted on Election Day at their assigned voting place.

An estimated 85,000 certification envelopes containing absentee ballots will be considered for final count.

These ballots were cast at absentee voting opportunities during advance voting, on Election Day, and throughout the campaign period (at voting opportunities such as voting at a district electoral office or a special voting opportunity).

As of October 24, Elections BC had received approximately 525,000 mail-in ballots, though this figure does not include mail-in ballots returned by voters in person to voting places or district electoral offices before the deadline of 8 p.m. Pacific time on October 24.

The preliminary estimate of voter turnout will likely increase when mail-in ballots dropped off in person are accounted for. Elections BC will update its estimate of the number of mail-in ballots when a more accurate count is available.

As of September 26, there were 3,485,858 registered voters in B.C.

In the 2017 Provincial General Election, 61.18% of registered voters voted, and there were 1,986,374 valid votes. The number of valid votes in 2020 could be comparable, at around 1.8 million. However, the number of registered voters has increased since 2017, resulting in a lower percentage of registered voters voting. In the 2017 provincial election, there were 3,246,647 registered voters in B.C.

Elections BC will publish an updated figure for voter turnout once more accurate figures are available.

With mail-in votes still beingecounted, it appears Columbia River-Revelstoke MLA Doug Clovechok and Kootenay East MLA Tom Shypitka, both BC Liberals, have been re-elected.

e-KNOW

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