In a column published in the Edmonton Journal, Lorne Gunter lays out some of the mistakes made by Alberta’s electoral authority and implies the disorder caused by them could “give fuel” to separatists.

Errors on the part of Elections Alberta could undercut the credibility of the referendum scheduled for October 19, but there is no indication that the mess made by the provincial bureaucracy will benefit either side on the unity question or any of the other nine questions being asked.

The errors made by Elections Alberta are not insignificant. With regulations having been changed to invite mail-in ballots, nearly 300,000 have already been ordered in anticipation of lineups at polling stations during the advance and voting days.

Packages mailed by Elections Alberta have been found to be missing some ballots, and they included an out-of-date field in the forms where voters were to attest that they were unable to vote on regular days and could face penalties under the law if they falsely attested. This has caused confusion and mistrust among voters, and for good reason.

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Elections Alberta is facing heavy pressure due to trying to manage a slate of ten questions with limited time to hire staff and arrange voting stations. The printing error on the ballots though, could have been avoided with a 30-second skim by a first-week staff member before sending it to the printers. Such an easily avoidable mistake brings the competency of the organization into question. Having extra ballots or lacking some ballots within the packages is a serious concern as well.

The impartiality of Elections Alberta has been questioned as the agency has inexplicably refused to consider Thomas Lukaszuk’s Forever Canadian campaign to be a campaign while heavily regulating the financing and limitations placed upon other third-party advertisers.

There is no way to know if the mess made with the mail-in ballots would benefit one side or the other.

What could indeed happen, though, is that the losing side in the vote could claim the exercise was illegitimate because of the mistakes made by Elections Alberta. It’s presumptuous to assume which side that would be, and it certainly isn’t fueling the campaign for anybody. Gunter’s column is identifying legitimate concerns, but then stretches to attribute benefits garnered by a side in the campaign.