Some Saskatchewan voters will mark their ballots in different constituencies in the next provincial election without changing their addresses.
The government introduced legislation Dec. 15 to add three constituencies for 2015 to reflect the province’s growing population, increasing the constituencies to 61 from 58.
The new seats will likely be in Regina, Saskatoon and one rural area.
“We will likely have 100,000 more people in Saskatchewan compared to the last time the boundaries were changed in 2002 by the time of the next election,” said justice minister Don Morgan.
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The government will appoint a constituency boundaries commission to redraw the boundaries next year once the 2011 census data is available.
Morgan said each constituency should have roughly the same number of voters, although not necessarily the same number of people.
In the recent November election, his Saskatoon Southeast riding had more than 16,300 enumerated voters while Saskatoon Centre had 7,400.
Saskatchewan has had as many as 66 constituencies in the past.
The government also introduced legislation last week that could change the date of the 2015 election from Nov. 2 because of the federal election occurring Oct. 19 that same year.
Premier Brad Wall has written to prime minister Stephen Harper asking him to reconsider the federal vote date. The legislation has been introduced in case that doesn’t happen.
“Our strong preference is to stay with our current provincial election date in November 2015,” Wall said.
That would move the election to April 4, 2016.
