*Federal Voting Precedures

\

Page 6

For Students Cleared Up?

OTTAWA—(CUP)- Univer- sity students may vote Where they live while at school, if they consider that dwelling their "or- dinary residence", Can- ada's chief electOral of- ficier said today (Sept 12)

The statement by J.M. Hamel appeared to contra- dict earlier indications that enumerators would hin-t der students attempting to register to vote in their university constituencies ‘in the October 30 federal Election.

"If a student tells :the enumerator his ordin- gary residence is room 105 in a certain university residence, well that's it," he said. "we can—' not ask any more from a student than we can from ‘any other citizen. We ‘don't ask other people for proof of age or of citizenship. No more so can we ask for proof 'that a student is really on his own. If a student says he's on his own, then we'll have to accept that." ' Under the new Elect— ions Act of 1970 students lost the right to be enum- erated in both their par— ents' home constituencies and in their university ridings. Instead, Parl- iament gave them the right to vote by proxy in their parents' constituency if they couldn't be there on election day.

Regulations from Hamel's office directed enumerators to determine whether students living "away frothome" were "on their own". If they were they could vote in their university riding, but if they were not they could be enumerated only at ‘ their parents' home.

"All we are asking enumerators to do if they are in doubt is to ask students if they would be willing to take an oath about the location of their ordinary residence if challenged on election day," Hamel said in an interview.

"It's a personal de- cision a student must make by his own conscience," he added.

In directives sent to local returning officQ iers last January Hamel said "enumerators should be instructed that when- ever an occupant of a dwelling describes his occupation as 'student' they should determine which of the four basic situations applies to that person by determining

the relationship of that person to the other oc-

cupants of the dwelling

and the nature and fre—

quency of that person's

occupancy."

(The four situations were married, single live ing at home, single living away from home, and single on their own.)

The tone of Hamel's instructions indicated enumerators would be scrup- ulous in ensuring that only students who were financially independent of their parents would be enumerated in university

"I have a daughter at York and I provide support for her but I con- sider her on her own. I expect she will vote there," he said. "The unquestion- able right to vote where the student pleases must be established," he added.

Hamel claimed such a principle violates the spirit of the Election Act but that students could not be prevented from considering their university dwelling their ordinary residence if they were willing to swear it .on_election.day. m

ridings.

But Hamel said today that studentscould vote in university ridings if they ‘wanted to.

"I want to emphasize that we're not going to submit students to a means test," he said.

But locat returning officers have contacted university residence of- ficials to determine "which students, if any should be enumerated", according to Hamel's earlier regulations.

Hamel explained today that the move was designed to save time, and that any student who was not included on the list provided by resicence of- ficials could meet an e— numerator in a residence common room and get placed on the voters list.

"In Edmonton this morning we got a report that authorities in a university residence said that 150 students might claim the building as their ordinary residence, but now there will be as many as 700 on the list," he said. '

"So residence au- thorities have nothing to do with the result. There're just saving us the time needed to knock on every residence door and allowing us to allo— cate the appropriate num— ber of enumerators," the chief electoral officer added. '

The Election Act it-_ self only mentions students in its section on proxies. All other rulings for stu- dent voting are interpret— ations from Hamel's office.

National New Democra- tic Party secretary Cliff

ford Scotton said today he is certain students can choose where they want to vote, and is unaware

of Hamel's memos indicating;

anything to the contrary.

BAGGIES ; are

our BAG 30" flares 2%"Cuffs Pleats tunnell lodps

$15 to $20 at

HIDE-£80” ’ 1, ’ BE