As Sensible B.C.'s petition campaign continues to dominate media coverage, Elections B.C. is looking to clarify a reoccurring inaccuracy.
If the petition - to be released on Sept. 9 - gathers enough signatures within the 90-day time frame, it won't necessarily result in a referendum, according to Elections B.C.
"Initiative (votes) and referendums are two very different things. Initiative petitions are legislations governed by the Recall and Initiative Act," said Don Main, communications manager for Elections B.C.
"Any registered voter can apply for an initiative petition to propose a new law or to propose changes to an existing law," he said.
This requires the applicant, in this case Sensible B.C., to draft a bill to change or amend provincial legislation. Sensible B.C. submitted its application to Elections B.C., including the Sensible Policing Act, which aims to amend the current Police Act, prohibiting officers from arresting people in possession of marijuana.
"They have 90 days to collect signatures of 10 per cent of the registered voters in each one of the 85 electoral districts," Main explained.
There are more than three million registered voters in the province. Sensible B.C. will have to get signatures from 10 per cent of voters in each individual riding. This means 10 per cent from Burnaby-Deer Lake, 10 per cent from Burnaby-Edmonds, 10 per cent from Burnaby-Lougheed, 10 per cent from Burnaby North, and so on.
"... There about 3.16 million registered voters in B.C., so they're going to have to collect over 316,000 signatures," Main said.
And if one riding fails to get the required 10 per cent, the petition fails, he added.
When the required signatures have been collected, Sensible B.C. will submit the petition to Elections B.C. for verification, including verifying all signatures are from voters registered in the corresponding riding.
"(People) can only sign (the petition) for the electoral district in which they're registered," he said.
Elections B.C. has 42 days to go over the petition and then, if there are no issues, the initiative petition and draft bill are submitted to a select standing committee in Victoria.
"Then it's up to that select standing committee to do one of two things. They can either submit the draft bill to the Legislative Assembly to debate in the House, or they can send the draft bill back to Elections B.C. to conduct what is called an Initiative Vote," he explained.
Initiative votes take place on a set date every three years, which means if Sensible B.C.'s petition passes, voters could be heading to the polls on the last Saturday of September 2014.
The Recall and Initiative Act was enacted by the legislature in 1996. Since then there's never been an initiative vote in the province, however there has been a successful initiative petition, the anti-harmonized sales tax movement.
But in that case, the initiative petition reached the select standing committee and it was decided that instead of waiting until the next set vote date, the government would introduce legislation to conduct a referendum, cancelling the initiative vote, Main said.
While this could be the result of Sensible B.C.'s petition, Main said that's purely speculation and it would be up to the government to make that decision, once the initiative process is complete.
In order to sign the petition, people must be registered to vote before Sept. 9, Main added.
To register, visit www.elections.bc.ca and click on 'Register' or call 1-800-661-8683.
