The territorial government is accepting the conclusion of a legal saga involving an ex-Yukon Liberal Party candidate who ran in the 2016 election.

Tamara Goeppel pled guilty to one charge under the Yukon Elections Act, and was sentenced to a fine of $1,000 Wednesday in territorial court.

Goeppel ran in the Whitehorse Centre riding, losing to NDP Leader Liz Hanson, who had held the seat for several years.

Charged with three offences, Goeppel changed course from over a year ago after being poised to fight all three. Instead, she pled guilty to one (the remaining two were withdrawn) on Tuesday.

They were related to improperly filling out proxy ballots, which have since been repealed.

Wednesday’s sentencing “confirmed that the law was broken and I accept those findings,” Premier Sandy Silver said in a statement.

When questions about a candidate’s compliance with the law are posed, the premier added, “the proper place to address those concerns is in the courts.”

The Yukon Liberal Party’s president, Devin Bailey, echoed the premier’s statements.

Speaking to the Star briefly Wednesday afternoon, Bailey reassured that a violation like Goeppel’s is rare.

“It’s not a widespread issue throughout the party,” he said.

Goeppel is the first person to be charged under the act, Bailey noted (as reported in the Star in 2017).

His comments come on the heels of opposition parties which had pressed the premier and Liberal campaign team about how a violation could have taken place and what proactive steps were taken to prevent them.

Particularly vocal were Hanson and the NDP, who had called for the Liberals to remove the candidate from their team and withdraw their support in late 2016. 

The party said much of the same after the outcome of the court proceedings in a statement to the Star Wednesday afternoon.

“The Liberals should have probably distanced themselves from their candidate as soon as the matter was referred to the RCMP,” wrote Francois Picard, the party’s chief of staff.

“The fact that it hasn’t happened until today is surprising.”

Charges were laid against Goeppel in February 2017.

Picard was perhaps hinting at the Liberal party president’s statements.

“The Goeppel campaign (team) interpreted the Elections Act the way they interpreted it,” Bailey said.

“No other candidate used proxies in a way that Tamara did.”

That interpretation, along with the fallout, has renewed questions about what candidates were primed on, and whether that specifically involved proxy voting, the Yukon Party said.

“This is not a minor thing,” Brad Cathers, the party’s justice critic, said Wednesday afternoon.

The party had issued a release shortly after the sentencing yesterday, detailing some questions it had.

“Certainly, we’re hoping it’s not a case of (the Liberal campaign team) being laissez-faire about it,” Cathers said of briefing candidates as they headed into the campaign.

He had questioned the government on Goeppel’s situation and the training Liberal candidates had received several times in the legislature.

One of the concerns listed in the Yukon Party’s release questioned whether this could open the door for the possibility of other election violations, particularly if anybody else had used proxy voting improperly.

Bailey suspects this was not the case, saying that “the fact that there are no other candidates that did this, speaks for itself.”

As the next months unfold, Cathers said, the Yukon Party may consider continuing to question the premier about the sentencing and his role in the measures taken to prevent violations once the legislature resumes Oct. 1.

The party had agreed with the Yukon NDP after it called on Silver to withdraw its support for Goeppel in 2016.

Now that the matter has run its course through the courts, Cathers hopes to receive some more information in the legislature.

Part of those answers was perhaps provided by Bailey, who later detailed in a statement some of the tools provided to those vying for the nomination.

All candidates were given “specific training on a number of topics, including special ballots and proxies,” he wrote late Wednesday, noting that “this is standard practice in our party.”

That included a handbook and training seminars with the candidates themselves as well as volunteers.

“Campaigns also had access to these materials online,” he noted.

It’s something that Elections Yukon might have implied is good practice.

It issued a release yesterday, noting collaborative efforts can be useful in its mandate to “deliver fair, compliant and impartial elections.

Max Harvey, Elections Yukon’s new chief electoral officer, said in the statement that “it is the obligation of all electoral stakeholders to adhere to the rules designed to safeguard the vote.”

Ultimately, this helps ensure that all candidates are on a level playing field heading into campaign season, among other things.

With the Liberals having been given a five-year mandate, the next election is scheduled for 2021.

Meanwhile, Picard wrote, the NDP was happy to see proxy voting repealed “because it left so much room for abuse.”

That Goeppel solicited vulnerable people perhaps living without stable housing in particular during the election campaign to arrange proxy votes is still troubling, Picard said. He commended the sentence nonetheless.

“It sends a strong message about respecting all voters, no matter their circumstances.”

Goeppel and her Vancouver-based lawyer, Richard Fowler, had maintained throughout this week’s trial that her intentions were in the right place in trying to help vulnerable downtown residents participate in the electoral process.

That intention did not always mean that lawful behaviour would be carried out though, her lawyer explained after the sentence, handed down late Wednesday morning.

Goeppel was given two months to pay the fine.