Nunavik voter advocate calls Elections Canada report ‘insult to Inuit’

An 18-year-old who filed a formal complaint with Elections Canada still wants answers following the release of a report explaining how people across several Nunavik communities were denied the right to vote in April’s federal election.

Elections Canada said in its report, released Nov. 27, that a lack of planning and local outreach led to some polling stations running on limited hours and others not opening at all on election day. It also says election officials approved a plan for Nunavik that it admits “deviated” from the agency’s expectations.

Five of Nunavik’s 14 communities saw normal hours of operation.

Tiivi Tullaugak, who lives in Ivujivik where polls didn’t open on election day or for advanced voting, sent a complaint in May asking for a thorough investigation into the issue.

“I’m still confused,” Tullaugak said in an interview about the report. “They took our right to vote.”

He wants to know why Elections Canada management approved a plan that didn’t follow expectations and why local outreach wasn’t done to recruit election workers from the communities.

Outreach tasks to identify locations for polling stations, and find and train election staff to work at those stations, were not done, the report said.

The report also said Elections Canada headquarters knew outreach tasks were falling behind and wouldn’t be completed but the issue was not raised with senior management.

Tullaugak said Elections Canada staff landed in his community briefly before taking off again, without letting anybody cast a ballot.

“Inuit residents were just left without getting an explanation,” he said.

Russ Johnson, a former physical education teacher in Aupaluk who helped Tullaugak file his complaint, shares the same sentiment over the report.

“I don’t really feel this report did very much other than state the obvious,” he said in a phone interview from Montreal.

“If anything, it was an insult to the intelligence of anybody capable of critical thought and definitely an insult to Inuit.”

The report said the outreach workers were never hired and that the returning officer misled Elections Canada officials by providing them a list of potential candidates.

Johnson said he would like to know whether the returning officer’s actions were accidental or deliberate.

He added there needs to be an independent audit.

The report lists several recommendations, including that the returning officer understands and engages with northern communities.

“The recommendations are ridiculous,” Johnson said.

“They already knew they had to do a better job getting to know the North.”

Nunatsiaq News attempted to contact Elections Canada about the criticisms from Johnson and Tullaugak that the recommendations were not new and should have already been implemented, but did not receive a response in time for publication.

Johnson, who volunteered for Liberal MP Mandy Gull-Masty, said Nunavik should have its own federal riding.

Nunavik is currently within the riding of Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, Quebec’s largest riding and Canada’s third-largest.

Johnson said a Nunavik and Eeyou riding would allow Inuit and Cree residents to have better representation.

It’s an idea that has come up before.

Former Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou Conservative candidate Steven Corriveau, who ran and lost in the 2021 and 2025 federal elections, has also said he wants to see Nunavik and Eeyou Istchee regions separated from the rest of the riding.