Elections NB official testifies at court challenge of Saint John Harbour vote
Trial began Monday, 9 months after Liberal Gerry Lowe defeated PC candidate Barry Ogden by 10 votes
Nine months after the provincial election, a court challenge of the results in the Saint John Harbour riding got underway Monday.
Former Progressive Conservative candidate Barry Ogden is seeking to have the results in the riding set aside. He lost by just 10 votes to Liberal Gerry Lowe.
The PCs are alleging 78 instances of irregularities in the Saint John Harbour vote. They include ineligible people voting in the riding, people voting twice and several voting without presenting correct identification.
None of the allegations have been proven.
On Monday, the Saint John courtroom heard from long-time Elections New Brunswick official Richard Thorne, a retired Saint John High and Rothesay Netherwood teacher who has worked in senior positions in numerous elections over the years.
Thorne, who acted as field liaison officer for nine southern New Brunswick ridings in the Sept. 24 election, described problems with training of poll workers in Saint John Harbour in the weeks prior to the vote.
He spoke up to Elections NB officials in Fredericton and the riding's training officer, Nathan Davis, later resigned — just one week before the election. Thorne was forced to take over some of the training.
Other poll workers completed training in the neighbouring riding of Portland-Simonds on the Friday prior to election day.
Thorne said there were also problems during the vote itself.
He described the situation at one polling station where an Elections NB official's initials were not included on some ballots, causing delays because the voting machines would not accept the ballots without the initials box being filled in.
Citizens can 'by and large' have faith
He said later that afternoon he also stopped officials at the Saint John Harbour returning office from closing a box of special ballots without all the ballots being accounted for.
Having said that, Thorne told reporters afterward New Brunswickers can "by and large" have faith in the election outcome in the riding.
"At the end of the election, the votes were all counted and we produced a result, and we counted them all over again with the same result," said Thorne.
"So that's going to be the wisdom of the judge to deal with all the other evidence around it. And I wouldn't presume to poach on his territory."
Thorne is the only witness for the Ogden legal team — although they have filed a number of documents with the court to further support their case.
The trial is scheduled to continue Tuesday with Lowe's team making its case. The hearing is expected to wrap up Thursday or Friday.
Nine pre-trial hearings were previously held.
Saint John Harbour had the lowest voter turnout in the province at 53.1 per cent, according to the court documents.