.

[olpfan1]

http://www.thestar.com/iphone/news/canada/politics/article/1137273--conservative-scripts-misdirected-voters-in-2011-election-say-call-centre-staff

OTTAWA—Callers on behalf of the federal Conservative Party were instructed in the days before last year’s election to read scripts telling voters that Elections Canada had changed their voting locations, say telephone operators who worked for a Thunder Bay-based call centre.

These weren’t “robo-calls,” as automated pre-recorded voice messages as commonly known. They were live real-time calls made into ridings across Canada, the callers say.

In a new twist on new growing allegations of political “dirty tricks,” three former employees of RMG — Responsive Marketing Group Inc.’s call centre in Thunder Bay — told the Star about the scripts.

A fourth remembered directing people to voting stations but did not remember passing on any message that a voting station had changed.

However, one employee was so concerned that something was amiss she says she reported it to her supervisor at the RMG site, to the RCMP office in Thunder Bay and to a toll-free Elections Canada number at the time.

Annette Desgagné, 46, said it became clear to her — after so many people complained that the “new” voting locations made no sense or were “way the hell across town” — that the live operators were, in fact, misdirecting voters.

“We’re sending people to the wrong place,” Desgagné recalled telling her supervisor.

She said she has no way of knowing whether in fact the poll station locations she gave listeners were wrong addresses or phony locations. But she said the “feedback” elicited by the script was so negative, “we started getting antsy.”

She said she and a few other workers at the call centre were perplexed enough that they began telling the voters they should double-check their poll location with their local Elections Canada office, which was not part of the script.

Desgagné, alone, said some workers shortened their script — although they weren’t supposed to — and said “... I’m calling from Elections Canada ...”

Desgagné’s recollection of the job was largely corroborated by two other women contacted Sunday by the Star. Neither wanted to be named. All worked at RMG throughout the 2011 campaign on Conservative Party voter identification and on get-out-the-vote calls.

The Conservative Party of Canada, in response to Star queries Sunday, did not deny its calls may have misdirected voters but portrayed these as inadvertent mistakes. It said that, in the final five days of the 2011 campaign, calls were made only to identified Conservative supporters.

Desgagné indicated it was unclear to her and her colleagues whether those being called did or didn’t support any particular party.

However, calls made earlier in the campaign, say Desgagné and three other former employees, had been structured to identify voters’ party preferences. If a person identified himself as Liberal or NDP, the agent punched a button to indicate he was not a Conservative supporter, Desgagné said; if Conservative, the call was passed to a co-worker to pitch party policy or solicit donations.

In an email sent Sunday evening, Conservative Party of Canada spokesman Fred Delorey said: “Elections Canada changed some poll locations during the election, which is their prerogative. Our job is to get votes out and wrong locations would hurt us, so to ensure our supporters knew where to go, we would ask them if they knew where their poll was. When they told us their poll was in a different location than was in our system, we would tell them that Elections Canada may have changed it, and give what we thought was the right address.

“We made around six million calls during the Election to identify our supporters and get them out to vote.”

One former RMG employee, a woman aged 24, said she thought at the time that the incorrect polling station addresses coming up on her screen were simply a “computer glitch,” so she started advising people they should check with Elections Canada to be sure.

“We’re not going to give them the wrong information on purpose,” she said.

She remembered the polling station script specifically instructed the callers to identify themselves as calling “on behalf of” the Conservative Party, “but not every call centre agent said it.”

Calls were auto-dialled by computer. Once an individual got on the line, the live agents started to read from prepared scripts. Depending on the answers, they moved on to another part of the script.

As each call ended, the computer auto-dialled the next number. The calls went to ridings across Canada; two employees said most calls went to Ontario ridings.

Desgagné said every shift had a listening supervisor who could ensure the calls were going as intended and monitor listener reactions.

Desgagné said she made notes around election time, thinking someone would follow up on her complaint. But she said the RCMP — she does not recall the officer’s name — told her there was nothing they could do. Nobody else followed up with her.

On its website, RMG advertises itself as Canada’s largest direct-contact firm in the political sector: “We work exclusively with right-of-centre campaigns to develop fundraising and voter contact strategies that target your message to the right audience, maximize your vote-getting, and win.”

[scribblet]

When I read Capricorn's link on the the subject I could not believe it either, but Elections Canada appears to give out all our personal information to all political parties. I doubt if any political party is going to change that policy.

As said in your other thread, there is no personal information on the E.C. voters list other than name, address, birth date and gender for cross-referencing. Birth date is needed for a unique identifier, imagine the no. of Smiths in a d/b.

All parties keep their own data bases of their supporter information, I've never seen any information on them other than name, address, phone number,will donate, lawn sign, will work in office, volunteer and for what jobs. These lists are created over the years of campaigns and information collected by workers. Notes would be made on them e.g. no longer a supporter or do not call again and so on.

I've never seen an opposition voter list kicking around, except under the one circumstance I mentioned earlier.

It's a puzzlement to me how the people doing this would have the Liberal voter lists as they would have to come from that party as there's nothing on E.C. lists. I did read in one article that the Liberals have said it's possible their lists could've been sold.

[scribblet]

http://www.thestar.com/iphone/news/canada/politics/article/1137273--conservative-scripts-misdirected-voters-in-2011-election-say-call-centre-staff

OTTAWA—Callers on behalf of the federal Conservative Party were instructed in the days before last year’s election to read scripts telling voters that Elections Canada had changed their voting locations, say telephone operators who worked for a Thunder Bay-based call centre.

These weren’t “robo-calls,” as automated pre-recorded voice messages as commonly known. They were live real-time calls made into ridings across Canada, the callers say.

Elections Canada does change polling locations during an election, and often incorrect voter cards are sent out which have to be amended, it's a scramble. Campaign offices have to get votes out so do call voters to give the correct info. That did happen during the last election and will again, so legitimate calls were made, but are now being interpreted and pushed as being part of this larger problem.

[olpfan1]

Elections Canada does change polling locations during an election, and often incorrect voter cards are sent out which have to be amended, it's a scramble. Campaign offices have to get votes out so do call voters to give the correct info. That did happen during the last election and will again, so legitimate calls were made, but are now being interpreted and pushed as being part of this larger problem.

its illegal to say you are from elections canada when you are not

[Cameron]

This is going from bad to worse. I can tell you as a Conservative party member, I don't like this at all. This isn't the way to win elections or carry yourself in politics, and I'm sure a lot of grassroots Conservatives feel the same.

[olpfan1]

This guy was a crown attorney? lol, inappropriate is not the word for it

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-scotia/story/2012/02/27/ns-robocalls-defence-minister.html

The Conservative Party does not need to look into "robocalls" made during the last federal election any further, Defence Minister Peter MacKay says.

"It's certainly not something our party condones," MacKay said Sunday of the fraudulent calls to voters. "It's inappropriate behaviour to say the least."

But he told CBC News in New Glasgow, N.S., that he believes the calls directing people to wrong or non-existent polling places were isolated incidents.

[olpfan1]

This is going from bad to worse. I can tell you as a Conservative party member, I don't like this at all. This isn't the way to win elections or carry yourself in politics, and I'm sure a lot of grassroots Conservatives feel the same.

If this sticks it will stick to the cpc like ad scam with the lpc

...Maybe an ndp minority government is our best bet

[cybercoma]

The Conservative Party of Canada, in response to Star queries Sunday, did not deny its calls may have misdirected voters but portrayed these as inadvertent mistakes. It said that, in the final five days of the 2011 campaign, calls were made only to identified Conservative supporters.

The Conservatives are done. This isn't ever going away.

[eyeball]

Yeah, 1 or 2 by elections are going to appease the rest of Canada.. I hope you don't think that

Our trust in the election process is now damaged more than ever..maybe next election the rest of the 40 % who didn't vote will vote this cheating government out

OTOH the 40% who don't vote could just as easily swell to 60%. Participating only seems to encourage the lying scheming bastards.

It doesn't matter who wins because the government still gets in.

[Wild Bill]

The Conservatives are done. This isn't ever going away.

Maybe. So far we still don't have any hard evidence, just reports from workers who refuse to be named. Who knows who they're REALLY working for?

I'm having a lot of fun watching the show! It's just about at the point where we move to the next level. That's where we start getting reports of similar dirty tricks done by the OTHER parties!

For make no mistake, it's happened! No party is blameless in these things. When monkeys throw poo they often get some splashback.

I'll bet a beer something of this nature will break in the next few days.

[scribblet]

The NDP should be careful what they wish for, my guess they would lose a lot of seats to the Liberals. hmmm makes one wonder about who benefits from this scandal because it sure isn't the Tories.

[PIK]

There is more to this IMO. Lets have a investigation. Again IMO we will have a bigger majority after a new election. What is really funny is how the libs actually think this is their way into power, typical bob rae, always trying to use the back door.

[PIK]

The Conservatives are done. This isn't ever going away.

LOL

[Cameron]

I think it's coming to a point where you have to have an full unbiased investigation. The opposition parties are starting to get in the way by consistently making accusations without any hard proof.

I have yet to see an actual transcript of a script used or a recording of a call. It's all been just hearsay.

If you throw the CPC under the bus without a full investigation, then you are doing democracy just as much of a disservice as the scandal could be doing.

[Boges]

The Conservatives are done. This isn't ever going away.

Unless it can be proven that races would have otherwise gone to the Liberals were swayed by these phone calls it would be hard to convince people that this election was somehow rigged.

Also, if you're really interested in voting how dumb do you have to be to be swayed by a robotic phonecall. I get tons of them during election campaigns.

If you're an informed citizen you should know that your polls are set by where you live and Elections Canada sends your voting info over the mail.

[olpfan1]

http://m.peterboroughexaminer.com/articledisplay.aspx?e=3106797

Call it a case of mistaken Jeffs.

MPP Jeff Leal sent out a heated press release Tuesday afternoon, after hearing complaints from constituents who said they received an automated phone call Monday evening.

The message identified the speaker as "Jeff," and reminded them to go vote. Some residents, and Leal, assumed that the caller was an imposter claiming to be the region's MPP.

Leal believed the caller was trying to annoy voters and create ill-will toward the provincial Liberal party.

He vowed to find the culprit and publicly expose him or her, telling The Examiner he would leave no stone unturned until he did so.

MP Dean Del Mastro read The Examiner's article online, called the newsroom and offered to overturn that stone for Leal.

"It was us," Del Mastro said. "It was my campaign manager, Jeff Westlake."

Del Mastro said his campaign sent out two automated phone calls, one in the morning, and one in the afternoon, to people they had identified as Conservative supporters.

The message, about 10 to 12 seconds long, reminded residents that Monday was election day, and provided the campaign office's phone number in case someone needed a ride to a polling station.

It's a standard practice, Del Mastro said, adding that he would be calling Leal next to sort out the confusion.

[email protected]

[olpfan1]

There is more to this IMO. Lets have a investigation. Again IMO we will have a bigger majority after a new election. What is really funny is how the libs actually think this is their way into power, typical bob rae, always trying to use the back door.

ya right harper saw what happened to martins libs after calling a public inquiry

hes not that stupid to do the same

[scribblet]

I think it's coming to a point where you have to have an full unbiased investigation. The opposition parties are starting to get in the way by consistently making accusations without any hard proof.

I have yet to see an actual transcript of a script used or a recording of a call. It's all been just hearsay.

If you throw the CPC under the bus without a full investigation, then you are doing democracy just as much of a disservice as the scandal could be doing.

Totally agree, even legitimate phone calls to help out voters are being spun as something else, with no hard evidence of anything. All speculation and innuendo so far.

[mentalfloss]

Crank-call scandal fits Conservatives' pattern of political expediency

In all but one the race was viewed as being between a Conservative and a Liberal, and in every one the calls were made to Liberal supporters.

[Shakeyhands]

There is more to this IMO. Lets have a investigation. Again IMO we will have a bigger majority after a new election.

My guess is that Harper doesn't have the balls to call an inquiry.

typical bob rae, always trying to use the back door.

Yeah, What a dink for expecting people not to interfere with elections.

[PIK]

ya right harper saw what happened to martins libs after calling a public inquiry

hes not that stupid to do the same

You guys were caught down right stealing, the party of entitlements, This is nothing compared to what the libs did to canadians. How many actually went to the wrong place? , how many on those lists was not going to vote anyways? This just bob rae being bob rae, trying to get in the back way.

[Newfoundlander]

If it wasn't such a long process it could be interesting for the Liberal leadership. Three potential leadership candidates whos ridings were targeted, Peter Fonseca, Martha Hall-Findlay and Borys Wrzesnewsky, lost their seats by fairly small margins, if by-elections were held in their ridings and they ran I think they'd each win.

[Vendetta]

Again, the Conservatives would not need to access Liberal vote lists to identify who votes Liberal and NDP, they collect that info themselves with robocall polling. Also the only info that elections canada provides is voters lists:Name and adress, phone numbers are not included, nor is voting intention. This was obviously a coordinated Conservative election fraud scheme, just like the in-out scheme, and the lying calls about Irwin Cotler stepping down.

[Battletoads]

Callers on behalf of the federal Conservative Party were instructed in the days before last year’s election to read scripts telling voters that Elections Canada had changed their voting locations, say telephone operators who worked for a Thunder Bay-based call centre.

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/politics/article/1137273--conservative-scripts-misdirected-voters-in-2011-election-say-call-centre-staff

http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/02/27/i-made-misleading-election-calls-for-the-tories-call-centre-workers-speak-out/

If true, this is pretty damning.

Edited February 27, 2012 by Battletoads

[scribblet]

It's likely true that there was confusion over the polling location as often happens, E.C. changes the poll or the voter cards get printed incorrectly, it happens. So it's likely true that the campaign office tried to rectify that with more incorrect information, but not to deliberately confuse voters. But, that will be spun of course as something nefarious, those who've worked on a campaign will know how such things happen.

All we have so far unverified statements of what they think they remember, so again there's no hard evidence about anything... I await facts.

Mike Duffy is partisan of course but his theory isn't off the wall IMO, I think there is more to this than meets the eye. The problem now is that the media and the opposition have a done a very good job at framing the narrative so no matter how innocent the party is, or proven to be, it will not be believed.

Possible Third Parties G & M

Edited February 27, 2012 by scribblet