Thinking it over, there’s a good counterargument here. Even if EC could directly order a by-election in this case (or even was given the power to just outright count the vote), someone would contest this and it’d likely end up before a judge at some point anyways. So might as well just go direct.
They never saw the vote. They can’t count it, it has to go to court. They’re following the law.
Never stated otherwise.
I get what you’re saying, but it’s still disturbing that EC can cause a mistake of this nature and not have the ability to rectify it.
Certainly this isn’t the worst case of disenfranchisement by Elections Canada (see for example https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/article/this-is-unacceptable-polling-station-problems-prompt-calls-for-investigation/ )
Thinking it over, there’s a good counterargument here. Even if EC could directly order a by-election in this case (or even was given the power to just outright count the vote), someone would contest this and it’d likely end up before a judge at some point anyways. So might as well just go direct.