Here’s how voting works in the Conservative Party of Canada leadership race

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This article was published 19/07/2022 (891 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

OTTAWA – The next leader of the Conservative Party of Canada will be named Sept. 10. Here’s a look at how the voting process will work:

Mail-in ballots:

Party members who have a valid membership as of June 3 will be able to vote.

Most of the more than 670,000 ballots have been sent in the mail, and some which have been completed have been mailed back. This week, the party began the process of validating the ballots it received.

Party members have until Sept. 6 to return their ballots. The final results will be announced in Ottawa on Sept. 10.

The protocols around voting are set by a committee of Conservatives who were appointed to set the rules around the leadership race.

Ranked choices:

Unlike in a general election, when voters can only make one choice, the Conservative party picks its new leader through a ranked balloting system.

What that means is members will rank their choice for leader from one to six, as there are that many candidates in the race.

A winner is chosen when a candidate receives more than 50 per cent of the points. If that doesn’t happen when ballots are first counted, the candidate who receives the lowest number of points will be eliminated. Whichever candidate was listed as being the second choice under theirs will receive the eliminated candidate’s votes when ballots are counted for a second time.

Voting will continue in rounds until a candidate receives more than 50 per cent of the points, which is why those running not only want to be the first choice of members, but also listed as their second and third choices.

Points:

The party’s membership base is split into 338 electoral districts in the same way the country is divided into federal ridings.

Each of these districts is assigned points. A change made last year to how the Conservative Party conducts leadership races stipulates that in order for a riding to be allotted the full 100 points, which is the cap, it must have at least 100 members. That means candidates are encouraged to sell party memberships to supporters living in areas that have low membership numbers.

Party rules indicate that candidates are assigned a point total depending on their percentage of the vote in each riding.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 20, 2022.