I'm happy to start with that.
That was, of course, something we were very concerned about. There were a couple of things. One was making sure they were able to vote, particularly people who were in long-term care or in hospital. We did make particular provisions. We had a couple of backup things that we could do. One of them was ensuring that we had people trained in using personal protective equipment who were able to go into a long-term care homes and facilitate people voting in the care home.
We also had the option of mail-in ballots that people could use within a care home as well, or in hospital, and they would be collected from them. They could do the ballot in their room, and rather than putting it in the mail, an electoral officer would go around and pick it up for them.
The final thing that we had for people who couldn't use those methods was an option that they've put together here in British Columbia—and Anton would have the details of it—that allows people to vote by phone. It's a process that allows you to call in to a specific number where your identification is confirmed, and then you're anonymously passed over to another person who takes your vote. We had all of those in place to be able to support seniors in care homes as well as people in hospital who were eligible to vote. That was really helpful.
As for seniors who were actively part of the electoral teams, we spent quite a bit of time with them going through the things that keep us safe and the barriers that are in place. There was a lot of detail put into how the voting places were set up. Plexiglass was our best friend, and there were lots of appropriate barriers. We had to have scripts to talk to people about how it's our natural inclination to look around the barrier to talk to people. We educated people in line as they were waiting to go in to vote.
We didn't make masks mandatory, but we made masks available for everybody coming in to vote. We asked them to wear a mask. We said that it was an expectation of people who were going into a voting place.
We had appropriate lines. The voting stations were all separated and marked appropriately, so you came in one way and out the other. There was no mixing, and it worked very well. The seniors and others who were involved had access to PPE. It was an additional expense, but everybody had access to masks and face shields. There were a lot of people who wanted to wear visors, particularly if they were monitoring people in line and talking to people about how the process was going to work.
Those were the basics.