2026 provincial election: special measures in certain remote areas

Between September 25 and October 1, voting teams will travel to several remote or isolated areas, including many Indigenous communities, to facilitate voting. Electors will be able to be entered on the list of electors or update their address, and vote at the same time.

Élections Québec teams will also return to these communities on election day, October 5. Electors in these areas may also request to vote by mail, if they want.

These special measures are offered in certain areas of the electoral divisions of Abitibi-Est, Duplessis, Gatineau, Gaspé, Îles-de-la-Madeleine, Laviolette–Saint-Maurice, Pontiac, and Ungava. For example, in the electoral division of Ungava, which covers Nord-du-Québec, voting teams will travel by plane to about twenty remote Indigenous communities.

Dialogue with certain Indigenous communities

Since the last general election, Élections Québec has reached out to some thirty Inuit, Cree, Innu and Atikamekw communities to better understand their reality. These meetings identified certain challenges that members of these communities face when they vote. These challenges include entry on the list of electors; the availability of the pieces of identification required to confirm one’s identity before voting; and the delivery of information documents sent by mail. In addition, a large proportion of electors in these communities do not speak French.

Special means of communication

Electors in Inuit, Cree and Naskapi communities will receive an additional information document in the local language. This initiative is intended to address the language barrier and distribution challenges in delivering the information documents encountered in previous elections: while we have electors’ home addresses, in these communities most mail is delivered to post office boxes with addresses that differ from home addresses. The additional information document will therefore be distributed to post office boxes rather than to electors’ home.

Élections Québec will also broadcast advertisements on local radio stations, as well as web banners.

The institution also translated the information guide for the provincial election into 10 Indigenous languages and dialects. On the institution’s website, this guide is available in Algonquin, Atikamekw, Northern Cree, Southern Cree, West-Central Innu, Inuktitut, Mi’gmaq, Mohawk and Naskapi.

Establishing identity without a piece of identification

To vote, electors must present one of the accepted pieces of identification: the health insurance card, the driver’s licence, the Canadian passport, the Indian status card and the Canadian Forces identification card.

However, an elector who has none of these documents can go vote accompanied by a spouse, a relative or an acquaintance who has one of these documents. This person will be able to confirm the elector’s identity to allow them to vote. A person may attest to the identity of multiple members of their immediate family (for example, their spouse and mother), but an acquaintance can confirm the identity of only one other person during an election. It is not necessary to have the right to vote to attest to a person’s identity: for example, a 14-year-old teenager can confirm their father’s identity if they have one of the accepted pieces of identification.

To confirm their identity, a person can also present two documents indicating their name and then take an oath. One of the two documents presented must also include their photo; otherwise, it must include their date of birth and domiciliary address.

About Élections Québec

Élections Québec is a neutral and independent agency. Its mission is to ensure the integrity, transparency, and reliability of elections, and to contribute to the vitality of Québec democracy. 

In practical terms, the institution organizes provincial elections in cooperation with the returning officers of the 127 electoral divisions. In addition, it designs and offers several democracy education programs; it ensures compliance with political financing rules; and it acts as a public prosecutor to ensure compliance with Québec’s electoral laws.