Elections BC will start counting the mail-in and absentee ballots from the 2020 provincial election on Friday with the plan to have the counting done by Sunday.
There are 662,236 ballots still left to be counted.
“Note that these figures do not represent the final number of absentee and mail-in ballots that will be counted in each district,” Elections BC said in a media release.
“All certification envelopes must be screened before being accepted for counting to ensure legislated requirements are met, and to prevent multiple voting.”
Starting at 10 a.m. on Nov. 6, voting results will be updated as counting progresses at results.elections.bc.ca. Once a district completes counting a type of absentee ballot, results will be reported for that type of ballot, and the Elections BC website will be updated.
The mail-in and absentee ballots will not impact the overall result of the election but could lead to some ridings changing hands.
Currently, the BC NDP are leading in 55 ridings, the BC Liberals 29 and the BC Greens in 3.
There are 16 ridings in the province where the second place candidate is within 1,000 votes of the first place candidate.
One of the most interesting races to watch is Chilliwack-Kent. There are 7,325 absentee and mail-in ballots still left to be counted.
NDP candidate Kelli Paddon has received 5,200 and is leading former BC Liberal and incumbent Laurie Throness by 195 votes.
“You don’t know if you will remain the MLA, I have a bit of the jitters I will confess,” Throness said.
“In the end the speculation in fruitless. All the decisions have been made. All the ballots are sitting in boxes. Your fate has been sealed by the voters. You just have to wait.”
What makes Chilliwack-Kent fascinating is Throness resigned as a BC Liberal candidate in the midst of the election due to comments he made comparing free contraceptives to eugenics.
It is unclear how many voters cast their ballot before the resignation.
“It could have impacted voters. Did it impact mail-in voters? I don’t know. Many of the mail-in ballots could have been cast before that point,” Throness said.
“If the average mail-in voter is an older voter, that will benefit me. It’s really limbo.”
Other ridings to watch
Richmond South Centre: NDP candidate Henry Yao leads Liberal Alexa Loo by 122 votes with 5,280 votes left to count
Vernon-Monashee: Liberal incumbent Eric Foster leads NDP candidate Harwinder Sandhu by 183 votes with 8,581 votes left to count
Abbotsford-Mission: Liberal incumbent Simon Gibson leads NDP candidate Pam Alexis by 188 votes with 7,385 votes left to count
Vancouver-Langara: Liberal incumbent Michael Lee leads NDP candidate Tesicca Truong by 547 votes with 9,203 votes left to count