Under section 283 of the Canada Elections Act currently, the deputy returning officer shall establish the statement of the vote on the form that is prescribed by the chief electoral officer. Bill C-76 would remove the mention of the “deputy returning officer” and would change it to “election officer”, as we've discussed on a few occasions.
The statement of the vote needs to say how many ballots were received at the beginning of the day, how many unused ballots are remaining at the end of the day, and how many electors voted. Eventually, the results are reported on the statement of the vote.
As I mentioned yesterday, the Chief Electoral Officer still has a requirement under section 533, I think, of the Canada Elections Act, to report the results of the vote by polling division. This is one of the reasons that election officers will have to write the polling division number at the back of the ballot when each elector votes. Under his power to prescribe forms, the chief electoral officer will likely prescribe a form for the statement of the vote that will allow the votes for each ballot box for each polling division to be recorded. Then these numbers will be amalgamated also for the polling station.
In the end, remember that the chief electoral officer always has to report results by polling division, so results will always be available by polling division. Even if the ballots for a single polling division are deposited in, for example, 10 different ballot boxes at a polling station, these results will be combined at the end of the polling day to make sure that the results are available for each polling division.
Was that clear?