'It's disappointing': Islanders weigh in on why voter turnout dropped - Action News
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PEIPEI Votes

'It's disappointing': Islanders weigh in on why voter turnout dropped

A historically low percentage of people on P.E.I. cast a ballot in the 2023 general election, which many Island voters say is a big disappointment.

Turnout was less than 70% including advance polls, mail-in ballots and regular votes

Ballot box elections PEI
Unofficial results from Elections P.E.I. late Monday showed a turnout of 68.5 per cent, including advance polls, mail-in ballots and regular election day voting. (Shane Hennessey/CBC)

A historically low percentage of eligible voters cast a ballot in the 2023 Prince Edward Island election, which many Island voters say is a big disappointment.

Unofficial results from Elections P.E.I. show a turnout of 68.5 per centincluding advance polls, mail-in ballotsand regular election day voting in the April 3 election that gave Dennis King's Progressive Conservatives a strong majority government.

That's the lowest turnout recorded in the history of the centralized voting agency, stretching back to 1966. The next lowest turnout was back in 2011, when 76.9 per cent of Islanders went to the polls to vote.

"I think it's disappointing. I think people need to get out and take advantage of the democratic process," said voter Toby Hill.

"There's no excuse not to have goneout. There were lots of advance polls, the weather's been good, so I'm really disappointed that more people didn't take advantage of the opportunity to express their opinion," she added.

A woman stands on a street corner in front of buildings smiling at the camera.
Voter Toby Hill says she went to the polls on the first advanced polling day and found the process of voting straightforward and easy. (Brittany Spencer/CBC)

Julie Zhao, whoimmigrated to P.E.I. eight years ago,said she wanted to vote in the election but didn't receive her voter registration card in the mail and missed her chanceto vote.

"Now I'm a Canadian. We are a very small group, I want to make a voice for our group to show what we want and we like," she said.

Two women sit on a couch side by side smiling at the camera.
Kari Kruse and Sarah Outram, program coordinators with the P.E.I. Coalition for Women in Government, say the spring election timeframe left most political parties and voters with little time to prepare for election day. (Brittany Spencer/CBC)

Ben Miller, who cast his ballot on general voting dayMonday, saidtraditionally P.E.I. has one of the highest voter turnout rates in Canada, so the numbers this year were a bit of a surprise.

"This time around, I'm not sure. Maybe a lot of people figured it would be a PC majority or maybe they're just not as interested," he said.

He also suggested it "might have been not going on the fixed election date in October."

Snap election left little time to prepare

That's something staff at the P.E.I. Coalition for Women in Government agree could have kept more people from heading to the polls. King decided to not abide by the province's fixed-election legislation, which had set Oct. 2 as the date of the election.

"Lower than 70 per cent is not something we were anticipating," said Sarah Outram, a program coordinator with the coalition."I think this tells us something about how important fixed election dates are."

She said calling an early election tends to favour the party currently in power, and while all political parties on P.E.I. raced to campaign as widely as they could, the snap election left them little time to do that. That's something she said could have led to increasing voter apathy.

A man stands on the street wearing a flat cap and smiling.
'This time around... maybe a lot of people figured it would be a PC majority or maybe they're just not as interested,' says voter Ben Miller. (Brittany Spencer/CBC)

Kari Kruse, another program coordinator with the coalition, said she's hearing from a number of voters who say they didn't feel well represented in this campaign especially young people.

"I do know that a lot of people were feeling disenfranchised and disillusioned by this election," she said."I think youth were not super-involved in this election."

Krusesaidthat while young peopleare becoming more politically engaged than in previous generations, they tend not to identify with particular party stripes but get involved over specific issues.

More youth engagement needed

Hannah Steeves agrees.

She decided against voting in this electionbecause she didn't feel she had enough information to make an informed choice.

"Political education as to like, what the different parties are going for and what their goals actually mean for me, it didn't really help to influence me in any direction, so I didn't feel like it was worth me voting, if I wasn't educated on what I was voting for," Steeves said.

A woman stands on a boardwalk in front of water on a sunny day.
Hannah Steeves is 18 and was eligible to vote for the first time but opted not to, saying she felt she needed more information from parties to make an informed decision. (Brittany Spencer/CBC)

The 18-year-old was eligible to vote for the first time on Monday,but feels more could have been done to make sure young people heard from parties about what their potential government would do for them.

Maria Campeanu, who is also 18, did vote in the election and agrees more should be done to engage young people.

"I know that a lot of people don't vote because they think it's just one number, it's not going to add too much to anything. But it does add up.That's why I was encouraged to vote," shesaid.

"We're the generation of the future, we're the ones who are going to be making decisions later."

Tim Garrity, P.E.I.'s chief electoral officer, shows the card that will be mailed to P.E.I. household in the coming days.
'We always strive for 100 per cent turnout,' says Tim Garrity, P.E.I.'s chief electoral officer. (Stacey Janzer/CBC)

Other first-time voters said they found the process fairly straightforward, but feara drop in voter turnout will only lead to more apathy down the road.

"It makes me feel that it will keep dropping and the community is less engaged," said student Yannick MacPhee.

"We still have a choice for who we want to run our province," said studentJeremie Boutilier."I still think it's important forIslanders to go and vote."

A range of things for different people'

Tim Garrity, P.E.I.'s chief electoral officer,said it's hard to understand why voter engagement changes from election to election, adding:"We always strive for 100 per cent turnout."

He said there were 65 voting locations this time out, three advanced polling days, and more than 1,100 mail-in ballot applications sent out all over the world.

"We do everything we can to make voting accessible, to make it easy for everybody to be able to cast their ballot. But then we really kind of pass the torch onto the voters themselves."

While the spring election call could be a factor, he said, there's no way to know for sure.

"Whatever the reason is if people were just not engaged or a little bit tired over the past couple years it's a little bit difficult to say exactly what it was because I think it would be a range of things for different people."