Affected Voters
Making voting facilities available in hospitals and other institutions for the care of the sick or aged will provide accessibility to voting to a significant group of voters who cannot attend normal voting stations. There are three groups of people whose needs may have to be considered in this regard:
- longer stay patients, who will be aware that they will not be able to go to a normal voting station;
- emergency or recently-admitted patients who could not have reasonably foreseen that they would be in an institution on voting day, and thus did not avail themselves of any general facilities for voting in advance of voting day;
- hospital or institutional staff whose duties prevent them from leaving the institution during the hours of voting,
Potential Voting Methods
Providing voting facilities in these circumstances can be a complex exercise, depending on the method chosen. Institutional patients and staff are likely to be registered to vote in a number of electoral districts, not necessarily in any close proximity to the institution. Thus to adequately service these voters, some legal provision for absentee voting (see Absentee Voting) will generally be required. To lessen administrative loads, services available to institutional patients and staff should, as far as possible, be integrated with voting services available to the general community. Particularly with regard to patients unexpectedly admitted to hospitals, facilities that may generally be available through early or mail voting provisions may need augmentation to deal with their special circumstances.
Potential methods for providing services to these voters would include:
- voting by mail (see Early Voting);
- being visited by a special mobile voting station (see Other Special Voting Arrangements), either during any period allowed for early voting (see Early Voting) or on the general voting day;
- in larger institutions, setting up a normal voting station with absentee voting facilities within the institution on voting day--to service bedridden patients, additionally appointed mobile polling officials attached to this voting station could move through the relevant parts of the institution;
- appointing an agent to collect and return their voting material, either from the voting station at which they are registered to vote, or if general absentee voting facilities are available, from an electoral management body office or another voting station;
- appointing a proxy to vote, in person, in their stead, at the voting station at which they are registered to vote.
Each of these methods has particular cost or integrity factors which will need to be carefully considered in determining the appropriate method, or combinations of methods, in the specific election environment. Allowable methods should be clearly, and often legislatively, defined. Whatever methods are implemented should be consistently applied. To make services such as mobile voting stations in hospitals or aged care institutions available only in some areas, without some complementary arrangement being made available in other areas, will arouse suspicions that access is being manipulated to favour particular voters.
Mail Voting
Where vote by mail systems are generally in use (see Early Voting), including confinement in a hospital or other institution in the general eligibility criteria for a voter to claim a mail vote caters to institutionalised patients within the usual voting systems. Where permanent voters registers are maintained, enabling those permanently confined to institutions such as aged persons homes to register permanently as a mail voter can assist their continued access to voting material. However, this must be accompanied by stringent regular review of such registration.
Coverage of care institutions, particularly those for the aged, by mail voting may be perceived as providing significant opportunity for others to influence the votes of a vulnerable category of voters. Where such concerns are likely to lead to questioning of election outcomes, methods other than mail voting should be considered.
For this reason, in some jurisdictions attempts are made to provide voting facilities in care institutions through the more costly method of mobile voting stations, which can provide more direct control over voting integrity. However, mail voting may be the practicable, cost-effective solution in less densely settled rural areas.
Mobile Voting Stations
Use of special mobile voting stations in care institutions can provide both integrity and effectiveness in servicing hospital patients and residents of care institutions (for a general discussion of mobile voting station frameworks, see Other Special Voting Arrangements). There are some issues that need to be particularly considered in relation to mobile voting in care institutions:
Mobile voting stations in care institutions would be preferably under the administration of a local office of the electoral management body office, i.e., the electoral district manager or local electoral commission for the electoral district.
The locations to be serviced by mobile voting stations and the hours during which they will operate should be formally determined and publicised by the electoral management body, in a similar manner to normal voting station locations.
Liaison with management of institutions is necessary, both to arrange suitable times for mobile voting station visits that will not disrupt institutional routine or disturb patients and to determine resource needs. Some categories of patients may require more time to complete their voting than others, depending on age and physical condition. Where complicated full preferential marking voting systems are in place, in some cases these voters could take up to fifteen minutes to complete their vote. Equitable systems would allow for this and not impose any limitation on the time taken by voters to complete a ballot. When mobile voting stations are moving from bed to bed, ward to ward, it would be normal to only service between five to ten voters per hour. Both the mix of patients and the layout of institutions (how many levels, access methods, overall area of the institution) will affect the rate at which mobile voting teams can service voters in institutions, and thus the staffing resources required.
Examine the workloads in care institutions when determining how many mobile voting stations are required and their staffing make-up. For smaller institutions, it may not be necessary to assign a separate mobile voting station to cover each institution. For larger institutions, more than one mobile voting station may be necessary (or several separate mobile polling official teams operating from a single mobile voting station) to service all voters. Depending on the numbers of voters involved, it may be more practicable and less costly to operate the mobile voting stations during any period allowed for early voting, thus allowing a smaller number of mobile voting stations to operate at different locations on successive days rather than attempting to cover all care institutions on the general voting day. Using the latter timing may require the engagement, training and equipping of an excessive number of officials.
Multiple Voting Controls
Where both mail voting and voting through a mobile voting station is available to patients in institutions, systems for control of issue and particularly processing of ballots for the count need to be sufficiently rigorous to prevent multiple voting. While production of special voters lists for mobile voting stations may seem an effective method, it may negate the accessibility advantages provided by a mobile voting station: many patients in hospitals may not know that they will be there on voting day. Using systems incorporating enveloped ballots, with the voter's identity information being included with the ballot for later eligibility checking (see Absentee Voting), may be the most effective method of maximising both accessibility and control.
Voting Stations Located at Care Institutions
In systems that provide for absentee voting, there may be advantages in establishing a normal voting station with absentee voting facilities within larger hospitals, to service staff and patients able to walk, with additional mobile polling officials attached to provide service to wards or areas of patients who are confined to their beds. Consistent size criteria should be applied when determining whether such facilities are warranted, based on the number of potential patients and staff voters at the institution (determined either through use of special registration for such voters or close liaison with institution management).
Proxy Voting
Proxy voting is both the cheapest and simplest method to administer. However, there may be questions as to whether proxy votes cast in the names of patients in institutions, and particularly aged patients, truly reflect their wishes, and of the advisability of allowing proxy voting in any form. (For a discussion of integrity issues surrounding proxy voting in general, see Proxy Voting.)
Appointment of Agent for Voter
Provisions could allow staff on duty or patients at care institutions to appoint someone as their agent to pick up voting material and documentation to authenticate the vote from a voting station or electoral management body office, bring this to the voter, with this voting and authentication material either returned in person by the agent or mailed to the electoral management body. Where early voting in person is available, such a service could be integrated with early voting facilities, as well as in normal voting stations. This method can have some advantages over using a normal mail ballot, particularly in areas where mail services are not reliable. It suffers from the same integrity problems as mail voting, however, in that it is not possible to ensure that there is no influence brought to bear on voters when they cast their vote.
