Virginia Bowman was furious. The 89-year-old woman told the Georgia Straight that she has always voted but on October 14, she wasn’t allowed for the first time to cast her ballot.

“Just because we’re old, we’re not stupid,” Bowman, a resident of the Millennium Tower, a senior-care facility in the Vancouver Centre riding, hollered on the phone. “I’ve been denied a vote.”

Bowman blamed Elections Canada’s  decision to  instruct her and other seniors to cast their votes at a mobile station that was set up inside her building, but which didn’t stay long enough.

She claimed that signs were not put up ahead of time stating that voting in the building’s lobby would occur from 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.  on election day.

While Bowman and other residents of the Millennium Tower were given only two hours to vote, other Canadians had 12 hours to cast their ballots, from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. locally.

The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees the right of every citizen to vote in an election.

In addition, Section 15 states: “Every individual is equal before and under the law and has the right to the equal protection and equal benefit of the law without discrimination and, in particular, without discrimination based on race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, sex, age or mental or physical disability.”

This raises questions whether or not seniors could file a legal challenge claiming that their Charter rights were infringed by Elections Canada's decision to curtail voting hours.

Bowman recalled that in the 2006 election, the voting station inside the building was opened until 7 p.m. “I’m very disappointed,” she said. “I’ve always voted all my life.”

Located at 1175 Broughton Street, the Columbus Charities Association-operated   Milllenium Tower has 97 residential units.

Elections Canada spokesperson Susan Friend explained to the Straight that the situation may have been caused by a miscommunication on the part of the facility’s administrators.

“That would have more to do with the people who are the administrators of the building to let their residents know that the poll is going to be there,” Friend said in a phone interview. “Elections Canada makes arrangements with the administrators of the facility.”

Friend also said that mobile polling stations only stayed for so long because they had to be deployed elsewhere. She likewise pointed out that it isn’t the first time that these stations were put to use. She added that aside from senior-care facilities, these stations also receive votes in acute-care hospitals.

“On election day they’re really aimed at accommodating voters who have difficulty getting to the polls,” Friend said.

Friend explained that if somebody received a polling card stating where he or she should vote, that person couldn’t do so in another polling area.

And this is what happened to 71-year-old Mary Harrison, also a resident of Millennium Tower.

Harrison related to the Straight that she didn’t see the signs about the voting hours, and when she went downstairs from her unit at about 2 p.m., the mobile station was already gone.

Harrison tried to vote at a polling station right next to the building but was told she  wasn't allowed to  cast her ballot there.

“I don’t know what to think about it,” she said about  her experience, which prevented her from voting for the first time.

According to her, Elections Canada should have indicated voting hours on the polling cards it mailed out to seniors.

Am Johal, media liaison officer for NDP Vancouver Centre candidate Michael Byers, tipped the Straight about what happened at the Millennium Tower mid-afternoon on October 14.

He suggested that the same “totally discriminatory” situation may have occurred in other senior-care facilities.

“You have elderly people who are being disenfranchised as a result of Elections Canada’s incompetence,” Johal said.