Defeated BC Conservative candidate claims new evidence in effort to invalidate election result

A former BC Conservative candidate claims he has new evidence as he continues to challenge the results in the Surrey riding in which he was defeated in last fall’s provincial election.

Honveer Singh Randhawa and his lawyer say they have filed an amended petition to the BC Supreme Court, as they allege irregularities and misconduct impacting the October election’s outcome in Surrey-Guildford, where he was narrowly defeated by 22 votes by the NDP’s Gary Begg.

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Randhawa filed an amended petition to the BC Supreme Court on Monday, updating the documents originally filed in January.

That initial petition included claims of 14 non-resident voters and irregularities surrounding 22 mail-in ballots from a residential care home.

Lawyer Sunny Uppal said Tuesday that Elections BC did not properly deal with how mail-in ballots were handled at a residential care centre facility.

“The most notable aspect of the amended petition that was filed yesterday is that it states that BC elections has admitted that one individual had ordered 22 mail-in ballots on behalf of approximately 22 lodge residents at a mental health facility,” Uppal claimed in an update on Tuesday.

“This was a clear breach of the Election Act, as the Election Act provides that you’re not entitled to order a mail-in ballot or assist anyone to fill out a mail-in ballot unless there’s an election official present,” he added.

Uppal alleges that the person who ordered the ballots then helped the 22 individuals fill out the mail-in ballots.

“Then this individual mailed these mail-in ballots in and on the certification envelope which … provided a place for the individual to put their name stating that they had assisted these individuals fill out the mail-in ballots, that was left blank,” he alleged. “So, there was no way for Elections BC to know that this one individual had assisted 22 vulnerable individuals fill in these mail-in ballots.”

Randhawa says that when a judicial recount occurred in November last year, “this information was not in front of the judge.”

Randhawa adds that he has made requests of Elections BC to provide specific details on the last 600 votes, which he says caused the difference.

“They refused to do that. They refused to tell me how many were mail-in ballots. They refused to give me any sort of breakdown. They gave me 19,000 voter IDs without names,” he claimed.

The allegations have yet to be heard or proven in court. Elections BC suspended its review of Randhawa’s complaints in January until the court challenge is dealt with.

Randhawa says that his “basic point” is that these kinds of situations don’t happen again.

“If there has to be changes, amendments, or some sort of awareness required to stop this from happening in the future, that is required,” he said.

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