The Proportional Representation Referendum, I have no idea how I will vote

This referendum is making feel like I need to choose between losing a leg or losing an eye.   All the outcomes are bad and will not benefit the people of BC.

I have been interested in improving the voting system we have federally, provincially and locally for about 35 years.   At times I was very active in the electoral reform movement - REALLY involved.   In 2004/05 it was the fundamental focus of my life. 

I have looked at the history of voting systems and how they have been used around the world   We have a bad system for our federal and provincial elections but not the worst possible.   In BC our local elections use one of the worst possible ones.

What I want out of a voting system are the following values:

• The results fairly represent public will
• Power sits more with elected representatives than with political parties
• The voting system encourages moderation and cooperation
• We have a clear and stable government that follows through with a program that has majority support from the public

First Past the Post does not manage to reflect any of these values well but two of the proposed alternatives (Mixed Member Proportional and Dual Member Proportional) do no better than First Past the Post and the third (Rural-Urban Proportional) really fails on the first value.

I have a real problem with the two part referendum.   You can vote No and then decide which PR system we should adopt  - people who do not want PR will be able to decide what to change to.    That is just wrong.   We needed a clear choice between two systems fully fleshed out.

What also bothers me about the referendum is that we are being asked to vote for a new system without knowing how that will be implemented.   Mixed Member Proportional is a very complex hybrid system (it is not a real proportional system) but how it is implemented makes some serious differences in how it plays out.   The options could really screw over large parts of the province and effectively leave them without representation.   It also normally means shifting a lot more power to the leadership of political parties from the voters.   The government is saying "trust us to design the details after the referendum.    Of course we will be completely fair and ensure that in no way it benefits the NDP or the Greens.".    I do not trust elected officials to create a voting system that benefits the public or preserving their own high paid job.

As much as I worked my ass off to get PR in 2005 and 2009,. it feels wrong to me to have a vote again on the issue.   I feels unfair given the public decided to go with the status quo even though it was not beneficial for them.    People have a right to vote against their best interest and that decision should be respected.   We really should not be having another referendum on this subject so soon again.

I also really dislike both sides of the campaign.    The Yes side is approaching it as if this is a way to ensure the centre right in BC could never be in government again.   The No side is just using disingenuous fear based arguments and doing nothing to explain how our current system works and what it is OK for the minority to rule over the majority.

How will I vote?  I am not sure.   I am certain for the system I will only vote for Rural-Urban Proportional even though it really badly screws people in rural BC. 

 As to Yes and No.   I want to vote Yes because I have spent more than a generation on the issue but I worry that the system we will get because of it will be worse than what we have.   Voting Yes or No would be so much easier if I knew what a Yes outcome will look like.    It should have been a clear question on two systems.

I may end up voting Yes because of the No side and how they are using Trumpesque type campaign tactics.   I feel like voting No would make me feel complicit in a fundamentally destructive campaign.    But I have to balance that against my fear of getting Mixed Member Proportional, a system I see as corrosive to politics from watching German politics since the late 1970s.

Maybe I will not vote Yes or No and only vote for the system?

Overall I am resigned to a bad outcome no matter how the vote goes. 

Serious Governance Problems with Mixed Member Proportional Electoral System as used in Germany

I am posting this because in Canada we are considering electoral reform.   A popular system proposed is the German model which is one that I know very well and from my experience with it see a huge number of problems with it.

Germany uses a Mixed Member Proportional (MMP) electoral system for its European, federal and state elections.   The system is not identical across the board but for the purposes of what I am writing here it is safe to say they are more less the same(1). (Sorry this is so long, but even at this length it only touches on a few problems in Germany with MMP)

In 2016 this MMP electoral system is bringing more and more electoral gridlock to German politics.  Germany has had five parties that generally win seats and now is looking at a sixth.  The problem is that the system can not cope with the addition of another political party that is not able to govern with any other party.  

MMP was introduced by the British and Americans in their occupation zones as a way to ensure moderate stable majority governments.   The idea with the system was that in almost all cases no one party could govern without a coalition partner.   At the same time the system was also designed to avoid the Weimar era political splintering that a pure PR list system can easily bring.

In general a party is awarded seats if it is can break 5% of the vote or manages to win a number of first past the post seats.    The goal of this clause was to ensure that you would not end up with a multitude of political parties.

By the early 1950s the electoral system ended up with two major parties, the CDU/CSU and the SPD, and one minor party, the FDP.   This is the situation that was the status quo of West Germany for the next generation.  In many ways it was not the electorate that decided who was government but the FDP based on who they would partner with.  IN 1982 Helmut Kohl did not become chancellor because he won an election but because the FDP left Schmidt's government and made a new coalition with the CDU/CSU.

 In the 1980s Germany saw the rise of a new party, the Greens, who broke up the cozy three party era.   The Greens tended to only manage 5% to 8% of the vote and did not disrupt the status quo as much as I think they had hoped for.   It did offer the SPD a new possible governing partner and thereby weakened the raison d'etre of the FDP and ever since they have been on the brink of not getting elected.

IN 1990 things get shaken up with the merger of East and West Germany.  This brings a fifth party into the federal parliament, the Left.  In the five new eastern states the Left ends up being a major party.   The fact the party is the follower on from the old East German communist party meant that no other party was willing to govern with them for many years.   In 2016 there are two state governments in the east that have the Left as a government member so it seems the Left can be accepted but it is not likely to ever govern with the CDU and .

The problem in the last five years has been the rise of parties that are protests against the status quo of Germany.   Since 2014 there has been the rise of the Alliance for Germany (AfD).  The AfD is a populist anti-immigrant, anti-politician political party.  

MMP rewards parties that can muster a small by clearly defined vocal group of supporters.   It works against broad based major parties.   The AfD, like the Left, has managed to tap into a narrow populist message that will get them past 5% of the vote.  

MMP lets you cast two votes, one to elect your local representative and the second one to show which party you support.   This leads to a lot of people splitting their vote between the local representative and the party they support.   The CDU/CSU and SPD tend to win the vast majority of the vote for the local representatives but a much smaller share of the party vote.   This disconnect leads to a host of political representation problems that I will not go into here suffice it to say that it makes it much harder to form a government.    You do not get this disconnect when you have a more pure party list system like in Denmark or Sweden because people only have one vote.

This year the AfD became the 2nd largest party in Saxony-Anhalt.   With the Greens, SPD, CDU, Left and AfD represented in the parliament there were not a lot of coalition options.   It took six weeks but a "Kenya" coalition was formed - CDU, SPD and Greens(2).   On no level is this a government that has a clear ideological vision but it was the only option possible.

In Baden Wuerttemberg the recent election left the Greens as the largest party but their coalition partner the SPD too small to form government with them alone.   It took close to two months for the Greens to come to an agreement with the CDU to form the first Green-CDU government.   This only happened because the AfD took 23 of 143 seats in the election.

A similar problem has happened in Rheinland-Pfalz where the AfD taking 14 of 101 seats made it very hard to create a majority coalition government.  After weeks of negotiations a traffic light coalition was formed.

Federally the government is a CDU/CSU-SPD government.   This is the so called grand coalition and is in power in three of the 16 states as well.   In Canadian terms this would be as if the Conservatives and NDP formed a coalition government.   In Canada this sounds crazy but in Germany it is common place.

The problem politically is how can the SPD, CDU and Greens argue that they have something unique to offer when they are in government with each other in so many places in Germany?   It really starts to look like it does not matter how the people vote they will end up with the same government.  Of the 17 elected governments in Germany 15 of them have at least two of the three above as a member of the government.

Not getting political change highlights another problem with MMP.   For smaller parties that get seats because they break 5% of the vote and not directly, it is not possible for the public to get rid of the politicians on the party list.  It means that as long as a party can get 5%, the party has a safe set of seats it controls.    Turn over among the smaller representatives can be much lower than it should otherwise be.

In my opinion the German MMP model leads to one of two different political outcomes

1. A cozy status quo of alternating coalition governments decided by a minor centrist party
2. An ungovernable group of representatives from six or more political parties where no one can offer a clear vision for government.

I do not think MMP is suitable for Canada and will not lead to the sort of government anyone is looking for.      

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(1) Some Major Differences in How MMP Works in Germany

• The German courts struck down the 5% barrier in the European elections meaning any party that managed to get enough votes to qualify for one seat got one seat
• In Bremen the seats are allocated on a party list system with 68 allocated in Bremen and 15 Bremerhaven - parties need to achieve 5% in either area to get seats in that area
• In Baden Wuerttemberg the extra representatives come from the losing candidates that did the best in first past the post electoral areas.

(2) Names for German coalitions

• Black Yellow Coalition - CDU and the FDP - very common in the past
• Social Liberal Coalition - SPD and the FDP - very common in the past
• Grand Coalition - CDU with the SPD - uncommon in the past now common
• Red Green Coalition - SPD with the Greens - a moderately common coalition in the last 30 years - there was a Green Red coalition in Baden Wuerttemberg
• Black Green Coalition - CDU with Greens - not common but has happened - there is also a Green Black coalition in Baden Wuerttemberg
• Red-Red Coalition - SPD and the Left or vice versa - in power in one state at the moment had has existed in the east from time to time
• Red-Red-Green Coalition - SPD, the Left and the Greens - has happened once
• Traffic Light Coalition - SPD, FDP, and the Greens - talked about a lot but rarely has happened
• Danish Traffic Light Coalition - SPD, Greens and the Danish minority party in Sleswig Holstein - only possible in one state and is the current government there
• Jamaica Coalition - CDU, FDP and Greens - named for the country because of the flag colours.  it has been a government once
• Kenya Coalition - CDU, SPD and Greens - Also called an Afghanistan coalition, named for the colours of the flags.  Currently in power in one state.
• Rainbow Coalition - Four or more parties without the CDU/CSU - it has never happened but was in serious discussion in Bavaria in 2008 as a coalition of the SPD, Greens, FDP and Free Voters

Federal Proportional Representation in Canada - is it likely?

Elections in Canada with the first past the post system means that MPs can be elected with less than a third of the vote and a party can form a majority government with only the support of around 40% of the voters.    The system is not doing a very good job of translating the will of the public into representation in parliament.   One of the answers is to adopt some form of proportional representation the question is which one.   I believe that Mix Member Proportional is not political possible in Canada whereas Single Transferable Vote might be.

In Canada there are two forms of proportional representation that have been either used or considered:

• Single Transferable Vote, used in the prairie provinces from the 1920s to 1950s and proposed for BC and voted on in 2005 and 2009.   STV works very well in delivering a result that is a good approximation of the public will.  It is especially good at rewarding hard working representatives and eliminating the concept of a safe seat.  The problem is that STV, while be an elegant and sophisticated electoral system, the electoral system is not intuitive.   In STV it is almost impossible to useful game the system and no benefit to strategic voting.
• Mixed Member Proportional - formally proposed in some form in the last decade or so in Ontario, New Brunswick, Quebec, and Prince Edward Island.  As well often being suggested as a form to use for the Federal Parliament.  MMP was created after World War 2 to be less proportional than the electoral system used in the Weimar republic as a response to the fractured parliaments that happened.   Outwardly as a system the concept of how it works is easy but the system often has to have complex mechanisms to achieve the results and the math that goes into who get elected and who does not is very complex.   It is one of the most complex electoral systems in use in the world.   There are several ways voters and political parties can game the system and it encourages strategic voting at the local level

Right now the popular support in Canada is definitely much more in support of MMP than STV, though when provinces have held referendums on electoral reform the results for STV were the best in the country.

The federally the NDP is very much advocating for MMP and there is a moderate chance they could form a minority government which means we could see it being proposed in the next parliament.  It is an electoral system that appeals to the strongly partisan, such as core leadership of political parties, and looks fair to the public.   The question then becomes could MMP be made to work in Canada?

The problem with introducing MMP in Canada is that the number of voters in each riding is not consistent at all.    PEI has four seats for a population roughly the same single seat in Calgary.  Implementation would either mean fewer local MPs especially for BC, Alberta and Ontario or 85 to 225 more party list MPs in the House of Commons.  Either approach would have serious political opposition.

The ratio in most MMP systems is roughly 30% to 40% of the representatives coming from party lists.   To achieve something similar in Canada there would have to be 144 to 225 party list MPs as well as the current 338.  Even with only 20% being list MPs, this would entail another 85 members in the House of Commons.     Adding this number of new MPs would not be very popular with the public based on reactions to the idea of more MPs.   The party list MPs are most likely to end up being roughly proportional to provincial populations which would mean the six smallest population provinces would see their relative representation in Ottawa would be reduced.  

Party lists would be most likely balanced in such a way to get the most support for the party and this means not overloading it with people from Atlantic provinces.    With 85 list members it is likely that only six to eight of them would come from the the four Atlantic provinces.  Yes, a party could over load their list with Atlantic members but that is very likely to play badly in the four largest provinces.  As it stands, few people in BC or Alberta think it is fair that PEI gets four MPs.

The other direction would be to stay at 338 MPs and make some of the list MPs, but without a constitutional amendment only 56 could be party list MPs     The constitution mandates the minimum number of MPs per province and six of the provinces are at their minimum already.  The lost local MPs would all come from BC, Alberta, Ontario and Quebec.  Quebec would have the smallest loss with only 3 being removed but Ontario would lose 26, BC 14 and Alberta 13     My own island would lose two of our seven MPs and Vancouver Island would have half the MPs for New Brunswick but a larger population.   I can not see any significant support in the four largest province for this approach.

If the constitution were amended to remove the restrictions on MPs per province the split could be 270 local MPs and 68 list MPs though in this would entail the six smallest population provinces losing seats.  Manitoba would drop five seats, Saskatchewan six, PEI three, Newfoundland three, New Brunswick four and Nova Scotia either four or five.   These six provinces would have to agree to losing MPs and I do not see that happening.

In my opinion MMP is not politically achievable in Canada unless the public can accept the addition of 85 or more party list to the House of Commons and Atlantic Canadian political leaders accept reduced influence in Ottawa.

STV could be introduced without changing the number of MPs and thereby removing all the oppostiion from the province .   The problem with STV is that is a system not favourable to centralized political parties and as a system feels to different for most people.

In my opinion STV could be acceptable to the general public with education but it is not going to be proposed by the NDP, Liberals or Conservatives.

We urgently need to add 112 more federal MPs to make representation in Parliament fair

We have a serious problem in Canada when it comes to representation in parliament because right now we are not even close to equality between the people of Canada.    The House of Commons is intended to represent the people of the country equally but this is not what we have in Canada.   Yes, the parliament has been increased to 338 members from 308 but we are still a long way off from equality.

If we were to distribute 338 seats fairly this is what the House of Commons representation

Ontario     129 +8 
Quebec       79 +1 
BC           44 +2 
Alberta      37 +3 
Manitoba     12 -2
Saskatchewan 10 -4
Nova Scotia   9 -2
New Brunswick 8 -2
Newfoundland  5 -2
PEI           2 -2
Territories   3  0

This works out to roughly 100,000 per riding other than in PEI and the North.   While the large provinces do not gain a lot overall, the important change is the drop in MPs from the low population provinces.    

Because of the Senate clause this redistribution can not happen.

If instead we were to have one MP per 75,000 people this is how it would look

Ontario      171 +50 
Quebec       105 +27 
BC            59 +17 
Alberta       49 +15 
Manitoba      16 +2
Saskatchewan  14  0
Nova Scotia   12 +1
New Brunswick 10  0
Newfoundland   7  0
PEI            4  0 - should be 2 but Senate clause raises it to 4
Territories    3  0

We would now have 450 MPs and only PEI would have more MPs than it should.   This is in my opinion the lowest number of MPs we could have have and still retain a fair representation in parliament and not get rid of the Senate clause.

I know that many people will think that adding 112 more MPs is crazy and too much, but it is much better than the status quo.   As long as the Atlantic provinces are wildly over represented in Ottawa it becomes hard for the country to governed well.    If adding 112 MPs is unreasonable to people, the alternative is to get rid of the Senate clause and allowing provinces to lose MPs if their population does not warrant the number they have.

The abolition of the Senate would remove the Senate clause and allow a fairer representation to happen.

The Problems with BC's Local Elections

In BC the way we elected the councilors for our local governments is called plurality at large.   It is in my opinion the worst method for electing representatives that reflect the will of the public because its nature is to dramatically favour one set of people over another.

In the system you are allowed to vote for up X number of candidates, X being the number of council positions.   The top X candidates then get elected.   It works sort of OK in a small town like Lillooet where almost everyone knows each other but even there the results can be screwy because of how the general public feels they should vote.

For larger municipalities like Saanich, Burnaby and Surrey people can vote up to eight people.    There are a couple of major ways this voting system becomes unfair for the people running and does not reflect the will of the public especially in the larger municipalities

When you can cast up to eight votes most people feel they really do need to vote all eight.  The politically astute will choose to plump their ballot to help their preferred candidate but most of the public thinks this is either unfair or they are not fully exercising their democratic responsibility.

The fact that most people do feel they need vote a full ballot leads to the first problem with the system.  Most of the voters do not know eight candidates they really like.  The voter is then stuck with how to fill out the rest of their ballot and they rely on anything they know at all.   This means voters very often go for any names they recognize on the ballot and in most cases this means the current incumbents.  

A candidate running for council that campaigns hard is effectively campaigning for the incumbents as well.   Based on the average number of ballots cast by the public, for every two voters a new candidate gets to vote the incumbents will each get one vote as well.  Because of this it is very, very hard to defeat incumbents in this electoral system.  There is one change on the ballot that make a huge difference and break this easy hold on office incumbents

The one factor that will change how the election turns out is if there are strong competing municipal political parties.  Once the party name is on the ballot each voter is given a clear indication of who is who and a lot of people vote for all the candidates of one slate or the other.   What happens from there is that either one party is utterly dominant, such as the Burnaby Citizens Association, or the council composition dramatically changes from election to election, which is what Vancouver often sees.

While the municipal political party direction creates very dramatic changes with lopsided councils it does make it easier for incumbents to be defeated.   Incumbents have to first get their party nomination and then the party has to win the election.   Without the party on the ballot it becomes really, really hard to defeat incumbents.  But with the party names on the ballot the election becomes a winner takes all affair.

Here are examples illustrating the problem

Victoria has never really moved into having strong municipal political parties.  In this table you can see how safe the incumbents have been over the last six elections:
Year   Incumbents 
    running defeated
2011   8       3
2008   5       0
2005   6       0 
2002   6       1
1999   6       1
1996   6       0
total 37       5

86.5% of the incumbents were re-elected.  This sort of record is not something you would see in provincial or federal elections

In Burnaby the BCA has been very dominant, in fact in the last two elections the mayor, all eight councilors and all seven school board trustees elected were from the BCA.
Year     BCA elected 
     council  school board
2011   8/8         7/7
2008   8/8         7/7
2005   6/6         5/7
2002   7/8         6/7
1999   5/8

To get elected in Burnaby you have to be part of the BCA.

We need to change the municipal voting system so that it much more accurately reflects the public will.  It harms the quality of local government if the elections results are so skewed in the favour of one group over another.

If you can not vote for yourself why should be allowed to run?

I think a simple change in our democracy is to require everyone that runs to be able to vote for themselves.

Right now there is no requirement to run and be on the voters list.  In BC you can choose to run in any local election around the province.   Provincially and federally a candidate does not need to live in the riding where they live.   In all three cases, there is nothing that I can see that requires someone to be registered to vote.

Meanwhile the Senate of Canada, that insult to democracy, does at least require a senator to be a resident of the province they are representing.  

It feels fundamentally wrong to me to have a place represented by someone that is a local voter.  It should be the first requirement to run as a candidate that you are a locally registered voter.  

I know some people will say something like:

 "If the people do not like that the candidate is from elsewhere they do not have to vote for them.   Letting people run elsewhere allows for better people to be elected."  

If residency does not matter, why bother with restricting elections to citizens?  Open it up to everyone and  you can get the best people in the world to run.

I feel strongly about this.  It is a change that needs to happen.

Wrong Winners in Canadian Elections

A wrong winner is when a party with less overall support manages to win more seats than a more popular political party and forms government.  I am highlighting this issue because I am concerned that the proposed model for redistributing the seats for the next BC provincial election will make a wrong winner much more likely in the province.

 I can find ten examples in Canadian history of a wrong winner result.  Interestingly almost all of them resulted in majority governments.

          Govt Party Opp Party Oth Parties
Prov Elect Seats  %   Seats  %  Seats  %
Que   1998  76 42.9%  48 43.6%   1 13.6% govt defeated in 2003 
BC    1996  39 39.5%  33 41.8%   3 17.0% govt badly defeated in 2001
Sask  1986  38 44.6%  25 45.2%   1 10.0% govt badly defeated in 1991
Yukon 1985   8 41.1%   6 46.9%   2 12.0% govt re-elected in 1989
Fed   1979 136 35.9% 114 40.1%  32 24.0% minority defeated early 1980
NB    1974  33 46.9%  25 47.5%   0  5.6% govt re-elected in 1978
NB    1970  32 48.4%  26 48.6%   0  3.0% govt wrong winner in 1974
Que   1966  56 40.8%  50 47.3%   2 11.9% govt badly defeated in 1970
Que   1944  48 38.0%  37 39.4%   6 22.6% govt badly defeated in 1948
BC    1941  21 32.9%  14 33.4%  13 33.5% Libs and 3rd place Conservatives formed a coalition government which won next two elections

Among many elections before World War II there are issues with placing them on the list.   Some provinces used different voting systems in some elections.  There were also many more acclamations and often parties did not run full slates.  

What you can see from the list is that the next election for a wrong winner government tends not to do well in the next election.

Another hard one to classify is the 1985 Ontario election.   In that election the PCs managed to win four more seats than the Liberals but had 34,922 fewer votes but it was the second place Liberals that formed a government with the tacit support of the third place NDP. 

A short clip from Andrew Petter about the 1996 election.

The Next Leader of the BC NDP, another middle aged university educated white man?

As a member of the middle aged university educated white male tribe it guess it should be heartening to me so see that realistically this tribe will once again be the source of all the serious leadership candidates for the BC NDP.   The problem is not just with the NDP but with all politics within Canada and it is not fair of my to pick on them from the same failing all parties suffer.  The NDP leadership really speaks to an ongoing problem in politics when such a small tribe of people retain so much of the power.

I know this is not a news flash, but I had expected things to change faster than they have.   I think it is important for people to understand how small the group is from which most of our political leaders come from.

There were 757,045 middle age men in BC as of 2011 of which 75% of them are white and 30% university education leaving us with 170,000 men from this this tribe.  This is only 3.9% of the population of BC.

Yes, realistically the leader of a political party is going to be middle aged and maybe we should only look at middle aged people.  When we account for that the percentage that comes from the "power tribe" is still just 8.9%.

As a member of the middle aged white men with university education, I like most of us do not feel like I have any easier a path to power.  Most of the 170,000 of us are not in positions where we could realistically be elected as MLA or MP and certainly not within the crowd that has a chance to lead a major political party.  The reality is that most of the political leadership is from the richest 1/5th of the population.  The main political class comes from a small group of 34,000 people in BC.

It is not good for the political process when the core of the political class comes from such a small part of the population.   We elected MLAs as representatives of people but the MLAs are not representative of the population.  How can we govern well when so many of the people in power have no personal connection to the reality of the most of the population?  The lack of lived experience will always handicap the political class from making the best decisions.

How do we change the world of politics and have a broader set of people in the leadership?   How do we make it possible for a early 30s barista living under the poverty line with kids to become a political leader?   There are intelligent and capable young women working two and three jobs to make ends meet who are as able to lead in politics as the leaders we have now but there is no path to how they can get into power.

Maybe the time has come to think outside of the box.  We need a fair and democratic mechanism that will represent the people better.  Maybe we need a second house of people selected at random from around the province, a jury like structure to keep the elected house in line?  A jury is a legitimate and accepted form of democracy.   I would much prefer this any system of quotas.

Whatever the solution is, we do have to do something different because the status quo has been a failure.

Ranking By-election Candidates by votes

I think it is important to see how well all the candidates did in the by-elections compared to each other.   I highlight this because once MPs are in Ottawa they are all treated the same even though many of them have much less support than others.   There is something inherently wrong with our system when 12,642 people can vote Linda McQuaig and she loses by Emmanuel Duborg with 8,767 votes is now an MP.

1. 17,081 Chrystia Freeland Lib Toronto Centre
2. 13,021 Ted Falk CPC Provencher
3. 12,642 Linda McQuaig NDP Toronto Centre
4. 12,205 Larry Macguire CPC Brandon-Souris
5. 11,814 Rolf Dinsdale Lib Brandon-Souris
6.  8,767 Emmanuel Dubourg Lib Bourassa
7.  6,706 Terry Hayward Lib Provencher
8.  5,716 Stéphane Moraille NDP Bourassa
9.  3,024 Geoff Pollock CPC Toronto Centre
10.  2,387 Daniel Duranleau Bloc Bourassa
11.  2,037 Cory Szczepanski NDP Brandon-Souris
12.  1,837 Natalie Courcelles Beaudry NDP Provencher
13.  1,354 David Neufeld Green Brandon-Souris
14.  1,027 John Deverell Green Toronto Centre
15.    852 Rida Mahmoud CPC Bourassa 
16.    849 Janine Gibson Green Provencher
17.    460 Dorian Baxter PC Toronto Centre
18.    368 Danny Polifroni Green Bourassa
19.    271 Frank Godon Libertarian Brandon-Souris
20.    250 Judi Falardeau Libertarian Toronto Centre
21.    140 Serge Lavoie Rhino Bourassa
22.     89 Kevin Clarke Ind Toronto Centre
23.     75 John Turmel Ind Toronto Centre
24.     53 Leslie Bory Ind Toronto Centre
25.     44 Michael Nicula Online Party Toronto Centre
26.     29 Bahman Yazdanfar Ind Toronto Centre

Electoral Reform in Canada is a long way off

Normally the approach to those opposed to electoral reform has been to ignore the issue but now there is this leaflet being circulated at the 2013 Conservative Convention in Calgary.

There was a time when the right side of the spectrum had some of the strongest supporters for electoral reform.   People like Saanich Gulf Islands MP Gary Lunn and former Reform party leader Preston Manning supported BCSTV both in 2005 a 2009.

The people behind this leaflet want strong stable Conservative governments which is the most honest expression of opposition to electoral reform that I have seen.   There are people within the NDP in BC that took much a similar view in 2005 and 2009 in their opposition to electoral reform.  The people in politics that want power for their partisan view like an electoral system that makes it easier to gain all the power.   Few people in politics are willing to surrender power in return for a fairer system.

More and more the Conservatives feel like a embattled minority defending their political space with everything possible.   This leaflet fits with the actions in parliament by the government to hold on to all power for themselves.

I dislike the representation of equality of ridings versus proportional representation.  Proportional representation is possible with equality of ridings, the two are not mutually exclusive.   STV keeps the riding equality the same as now, not that we have equality at the moment.

When these people call for equality of ridings, they are defacto calling for all ridings in the country to have the same populations.  This means reducing the number of seats in some provinces like PEI to one or two, in New Brunswick to seven, or in Saskatchewan to 11.    The inequity of the current ridings in Canada means the only proportional representation system that could be realistically be implemented is STV.

I have little or no faith that if the NDP become government after 2015 they will make any great strides to improve things.   If the Liberals were through some miracle to win government I am 100% the party would do nothing to improve the status quo.

July 2013 Fair Vote Canada Newsletter

FVC July 2013 Newsletter

• Bob Rae joins our National Advisory Board
• Last Two Weeks to Help the Best Video Win
• Biggest Democracy Week Ever in the Works
• Fair Vote Canada Takes Toronto Reform Fight to Queen's Park
• Executive Director Position 
• Fair Vote Canada in Our Schools
• Two Big Things You Can Do to Help Fair Vote Canada in Less Than 2 Minutes!

 Bob Rae joins our National Advisory Board 

Fair Vote Canada is pleased to announce the addition of former Liberal Leader Bob Rae,  PC, OC,OOnt, QC, MP, to its National Advisory Board. “Canadians need to know that their votes will really count. This means moving beyond our first-past-the-post-system”, says Rae, a long time supporter of adding proportionality to Canada’s electoral system. Bob Rae joins Stephane Dion in endorsing adding proportionality to Canada's electoral system. Dion, who spoke at our 2012 convention is also featured on our new website, is endorsing a moderately proportional system. Bob Rae joins other notable Canadians on our Advisory Board, including Maude Barlow, David Suzuki, Ed Broadbent and Hugh Segal. Read more in our press release.

Last Two Weeks of the Fair Vote Canada Video Contest! 

On August 1 we announce the winners of our first video contest! Contestants are competing for a viewer's choice award (most views), and a judged panel award from a stellar panel of judges, including March Achbar, producer of Canada's top grossing documentary of all time, The Corporation, Jamie Biggar, ED of Leadnow.ca, and former Muchmusic DJ Jennifer Hollet. There's something for everyone in the entries we received... What happens when a 245 million dollar fast food order at the "Selections Canada" restaurant goes bad? What happens when a group of friends try to order a Pizza using first-past-the-post? Learn why we need PR and works it could work in beaver country, mouse county, and Canada! Check out the videos and help the spread the word by sharing your favourites!

The Biggest Democracy Week in Canada is Coming: Sept 16 -23 

Fair Vote Canada is busy preparing for our biggest Democracy Week ever. With a record number of teams and chapters from Newfoundland to British Columbia, supporters will be helping spread the word about proportional representation in communities throughout Canada this September. We'll also be having an event on Parliament Hill to officially launch our 2015 campaign. Stay tuned for event details. If you would like to organize an info table or an event in your community, we'll give you everything you need to get started. Contact: anita.nickerson@fairvote.ca

 Fair Vote Canada Takes Toronto Reform Fight To Queen's Park

On June 11, "local voting reform in Ontario took a quantum leap forward,” stated Stuart Parker, Vice President of Fair Vote Canada and chairperson of its national Fair Vote City campaign. “Activists with RaBIT, Fair Vote and a number of other key civil society organizations won an important moral victory in getting Toronto City Council to make a non-binding resolution to request from the Ontario Legislature the power to use voting systems in which electors may place marks other than ‘X’ on their ballots. This is a major development for both supporters of Instant Runoff Voting and for Single Transferable Vote (STV).” Read more...

 Fair Vote Canada in Schools

Volunteers continue to reach out to civics and social science teachers with our secondary school lesson plan. This year, we are pleased to announce that Fair Vote Canada and Fair Voting BC have been accepted as partners with the BC Social Science Teachers Association.  Fair Vote Canada member and teacher Cindy Spackman has written an excellent article -Teaching Proportional Representation- for the June 2013 issue of Voice, the magazine of the Elementary Teachers Federation of Ontario, which reaches 80,000 teachers in Ontario. If you know a teacher, share this article! A working group is helping us improve our lesson and get it out to teachers. If you would like to play a role, contact anita.nickerson@fairvote.ca

Executive Director Position

Wayne Smith, former Executive Director of Fair Vote Canada, has moved onto other opportunities. We wish him all the best in his future endeavours and thank him for his service to Fair Vote Canada. Anita Nickerson is the current Interim ED while the National Council conducts a search for a full time Executive Director. A job posting will be on the Fair Vote Canada website shortly.

 The two biggest things you can do to help Fair Vote Canada in under two minutes

1) Sign and share our Declaration of Voters Rights. We are at over 19,000 signatures. We know from the latest Environics poll that 76% of Canadians support proportional representation. if each of you can share this with friends and family, we can massively increase the number of signatures. Then we'll deliver the Declaration to Prime Minister Stephen Harper and opposition leaders, as part of our biggest campaign yet - to make 2015 the last unfair election.

2) Donate. Fair Vote Canada is a one staff, volunteer driven, non-profit advocacy organization with a big goal - to make our votes count. We can only succeed together thanks to supporters like you. We deeply value your support.

The Proposals for Reform of the Legislature by Simpson, Huntingdon and Van Dongen

Bob Simpson, Vicki Huntingdon and John Van Dongen today released their proposals for democratic reform in BC.  If the NDP and Liberals do not adopt them they do not deserve to be elected in May.

• Move the fixed election date to the first Tuesday of October
• Ban corporate and union donations and only allow BC residents to contribute money
• Party leadership contests should be run by Elections BC
• Elect the speaker of the house by secret ballot
• Empower Legislative Committees
• Free votes in the Legislature   

I think all of them are good ideas and I can not see any good reason why any of these proposals should be opposed.   What I expect the Liberals and NDP to do with them is to ignore them and hope that they will go away.   If we do not hear from the Premier and Adrian Dix within a couple of days that they agree with the changes I can only assume that they do not want the changes.

One reason neither the government nor the official opposition will talk about these proposals is because political parties have little or no interest in any improvements to our democratic system.   All political parties should put democratic reforms ahead of the interests of the political party but I have no expectation of this happening.  Fundamentally, if the Liberals or the NDP do not embrace these changes neither party deserves to be elected.  Voting for either party is a vote against reform.

Personally I think we need a lot more changes than what these three MLAs have proposed.   As an example we need to see the power of the premier dramatically weakened.

Show your support for the changes by liking them on Facebook

Giving Election agencies a bigger role in elections

We have Elections BC provincially and Elections Canada federally that run our elections.   They are the agencies that run our elections, but are also tasked with getting people out to vote.   It is this second role that they could do a lot better a job with.

One way we could improve voter engagement is to have some of the core public interests in elections taken over by the elections agencies.   Research shows that a lot of people do not vote because they do not feel like they know enough about the candidates to be able to vote for them and getting good information is not easy.  Provincially there are things Elections BC could do to improve this situation.

Many people want there to be good all candidates meetings, what if Elections BC took on the task of running all-candidates forums for the public to come and meet the people running in the election?    These all candidates could be videoed and kept online by elections BC so that the public could watch them.

Since Elections BC is mailing to every voter, why not allow each candidate to put a brochure in with the stuff?  It means every serious candidate has an equal footing to at least get some of their information in front of the public.

Online Elections BC could have a website for each riding with the history of the voting and with links to all the online and social media from the candidates.

Elections BC could also take on the task of the leaders debate.   One important part would be setting clear rules who gets to be in the debate.    The debate could then be required broadcasting province wide on all commercial TV and radio stations while at the same time being kept available on the Elections BC website.

How do we fund this?  If we have each candidate have to pay to run that would cover a lot of it.   Or, each candidate has to pay Elections BC the equivalent of 10% of what they spent on the election.  It is also important remember that Elections BC already spends money to trying to get people to vote, some of those resources could be diverted to getting voters more and better information about the candidates.

Bob Simpson, Jane Sterk and John Cummins speak about electoral finance reform

Internet Voting in BC? Estonia shows us the way!

Today it was announced that BC would be looking at internet voting and see if it might be an option here.   There is one jurisdiction that has used internet voting since 2005 - Estonia.  The Estonians call it "I-voting".   The Estonians have the experience to show us here in BC how to conduct internet voting and I hope the panel set up by elections BC has at least on representative from the Estonian Electoral Commission.

Estonia has used internet voting for the last five elections and an increasing number of people are using the internet to vote with the 2011 parliamentary elections seeing almost one in four people vote via the internet.

Election                I-votes   % of total vote
2005 Local elections       9,287     1.85%
2007 Parliament election  30,275     5.45%
2009 European Parliament  58,669    14.70%
2009 Local elections     104,313    15.74%
2011 Parliament election 140,846    24.27%

I know most of you likely know nothing about Estonia, so here is a quick run down of the country:

• Estonia is a country about the size of Vancouver Island with a population of about 1,300,000 people.  
• It is located on the Baltic Sea south of Finland, west of Russia and north of Latvia.   
• It became independent in 1918 but then was occupied by the Soviet Union in 1940, Germany from 1941 to 1944, and then the Soviet Union again from 1944 to 1991.
• It is a technologically advanced country with an average of 1.5 mobile phones per person and many strong innovative software firms.   By 2015 everyone in the country will have access to wideband internet with two way data transmission of 100Mbits at the bottom end to 2.5Gbits at the top end, most people will get the top end speed which is 7 to 25 times faster than the broadband we have here in Victoria.

How It Works:
You need to download an app for the Vabariigi Valimiskomisjon.  This app encrypts the vote effectively making it a sealed envelope.   The voter then attaches their digital signature to the encrypted data.   After the polls close on election day the encrypted files are separated from the digital signature and counted.

You can use I-voting from the 10th day to the 4th day prior to the general election day.   You can vote multiple times but only your last vote is counted.  When you vote again you erase your previous vote.   You can still go to the polling both on election day and cast a ballot which then erases you I-vote.

In Estonia everyone in the country has a government issued ID card which comes with two PIN codes.   You need a smart card reader attached to your computer.   You insert your ID card into the smart card reader which allows you to download the app.  You then enter your first PIN and you get your candidates you can vote, you then vote.   This encrypted data is then connected to your digital signature which you confirm through your second PIN.

Is it safe?
In 2007 Estonia was the target of the first and most serious international cyber attack against a government.   The attacks originated in Russia but Russia has denied being formally responsible for them.   The voting system was not compromised.  Even though there have been various active campaigns by Russia to overtly and covertly influence Estonia, since 2007 there have been no examples of any breech of security in the system.

Instead of spending a lot of time talking, BC should simply hire the Estonians to set up the system here, though that would have to be for the 2017 election.

Fair Vote Canada August 2012 Newsletter

Fair Vote Canada Newsletter

August 7, 2012

In this issue:

• Canada Day Action launches petition campaign
• Democracy Week is coming again, September 9 - 15!
• Veterans for Fair Voting

 Canada Day Action launches petition campaign

Fair Vote Canada has established local Action Teams across the country to help volunteers work together to take action for democratic reform. The first action was to launch our formal petition campaign on Canada Day. Over 175 volunteers in 92 ridings began collecting signatures on our petition on July 1, and the signatures have been pouring in to our office!

These signatures will be presented to MPs across the country, who will be asked to stand up and present our petition in Parliament. Hundreds of MPs in every part of Canada are about to find out that people who live and vote in their riding care about the state of our democracy and are demanding a new, modern, fair, proportional voting system!

If you would like to help gather signatures on our petition, you can download and print off a copy here: Fair Electoral Representation: Petition to the House of Commons.

Note that the formal petition requires actual handwritten signatures, but you can also still sign our Declaration of Voters’ Rights online on our Web site: Declaration of Voters' Rights.

Democracy Week is coming again, September 9 - 15!

Last year, Fair Vote Canada announced the first ever Democracy Week in Canada, coinciding with the International Day of Democracy on September 15. We will hold the second annual Democracy Week this year from September 9 to 15. Our chapters and action teams across the country will be organizing a range of non-partisan events in conjunction with other organizations, educating and engaging Canadians to find out more about how our democratic institutions work, and how they don’t work.

We will be arranging forums, speakers, films, and town halls, and making the point that democracy is not something that happens to us—it is something we do together!

If you would like to help out with Democracy Week activities in your area, or if you are part of a group that would like to work together with Fair Vote Canada on Democracy Week, contact us at DemocracyWeek@FairVote.Ca.

Veterans for Fair Voting

Fair Vote Canada is looking for a few warriors. We are asking all veterans who have ever fought for our democracy to step forward once more. We want you to help make Canada a country that truly respects the democratic process and the sacrifices you and your comrades in arms have already made for this nation.

Without an overhaul or retrofit, military equipment becomes less effective over time and begins to break down. Our democratic institutions too, need to be overhauled from time to time.  Canada is one of the world’s oldest democracies. We don’t send our soldiers into battle on horses any more, but we are still using a medieval voting system to choose our representatives.


Most of us vote for candidates who don’t get elected. Most MPs ‘represent’ mostly people who voted against them. Parties with less than 40% of the votes win ‘majority’ governments and have 100% of the power. Sometimes the party with the most votes loses the election!

Political parties are out of touch. They don’t develop policies for all Canadians, but play to their narrow support base. The rest of us don’t matter, because our votes don’t make a difference. Party discipline is more and more rigid. Politicians represent their party instead of their constituents. Parliament doesn’t matter, because it can’t hold government accountable. Ordinary MPs are ‘nobodies’.

Canadians understand that they are not being represented by our present system. Our democracy seems to not matter anymore—many take it for granted, or even worse, ignore it altogether. Canadian participation in elections is already at an all-time low and is getting worse at almost every new election.

But voting is a duty. Canadian men and women in uniform sacrificed their bodies, their sanity, even their lives for our democracy. Voting says that those lives and those sacrifices do matter.

Fair Vote Canada needs your help to renew our democratic system and to help renew Canada. You have fought for this country before—can we enlist your aid once again for a battle for new Canada?

Would your group like to hear a speaker from Fair Vote Canada who can answer your questions about proportional representation? Contact Rod Morley now at Veterans@FairVote.Ca.

Fair Vote Canada is a multi-partisan citizens’ movement to change the voting system in Canada. Our work is supported almost entirely by the generosity of individual donors like you. Please consider making a donation, or better yet, becoming a monthly donor: Support Fair Vote Canada! 

Is there a future for electoral reform in BC after 2013

This is not a prediction of a BC 2013 election but just a scenario for consideration

Assuming the votes splits:

• NDP 45%
• Liberals 29%
• Conservatives 15%
• Greens 10%

So what could this mean for seats?  Using election prediction software you can end up with the following result:

• NDP  77 (75-79)
• Liberals 5 (4-10)
• Conservatives 1(0-3)
• Greens 0
• Independents 2

The NDP ends up with over 90% of the seats for less than half the vote.  How much will this result push the desire for electoral reform in BC?  Who would be the champion?   Will the left be willing to consider any electoral reform after a huge win?

A really big landslide will increase the desire by the public for election results that more closely reflect the way people voted.  But is there anyone that could capitalize on it?  If it is a party on the right side, it could not happen till they win a general election which would be no earlier than 2017 and realistically one has to think it is in 2021.  Will a landslide NDP win in 2013 hold public attention long enough to see a change in the 20s?

Fair Voting BC Newsletter

March 26, 2012 Mulcair, Robocalls, NDP Blowout?, Senate Elections, Just Say 'Phooey'

Dear Democratic Reform Supporters: NDP Elects Leader Committed to Electoral Reform;  Online Voting Process Vulnerable to Attack This weekend Thomas Mulcair was elected the new leader of the federal NDP and therefore of the Official Opposition.  We are pleased that Mulcair has said that moving to a mixed-member proportional system will be a fundamental plank of the New Democratic Party’s platform next election: “Canadians are well aware of the pitfalls of our electoral system. They agree with us that change is needed. When we get elected, we will get elected with a strong mandate to address those shortcomings. If needed, we will cooperate with other parties in the House of Commons and the Senate in order to make electoral reform a reality.”  We urge electoral reform supporters to hold the NDP to account moving forward. On a related note, the NDP's online voting process was significantly delayed, allegedly by a form of Denial of Service attack;  Fair Voting BC remains deeply concerned about current moves towards increased use of online voting when virtually no reputable computer scientists are willing to endorse the use of such systems for public elections, arguing that all current systems are unacceptably susceptible to both external and internal attacks. Robocall Scandal Demonstrates Susceptibility of Single Member Plurality Voting System to Manipulation As Elections Canada digs deeper into the voter suppression tactics employed in the last federal election (largely against Liberal supporters), we are reminded that the main reason such tactics can be effective is because of the pathological sensitivity of our current Single Member Plurality voting system to small manipulations of votes.  With SMP, numerous ridings are typically won by vanishingly small numbers of votes (e.g., Jay Aspin won by only 14 votes in Nipissing and Ted Opitz by just 26 votes in Etobicoke Centre).  Adding these up, we find that barely 6000 votes out of nearly 15 million cast (about 0.04%) meant the difference between a minority and a majority government in last year's federal election.  Robocall tactics in a few selected ridings can therefore easily have a hugely disproportionate payoff that simply could not happen under a more proportional voting system - for example, 7000 effective robocalls under proportional voting would likely have no effect at all since 50,000 voters would have to change their minds to shift a single seat.  This hypersensitivity of SMP voting would also make internet voting highly susceptible to fraud.  Check out SFU professor Anke Kessler's assessment of the statistical impact of robocalling. New Poll Predicts NDP Blowout;  Will BC Liberals Reconsider Voting Reform? The BC Liberals may be reconsidering their failure to follow through on voting reform in light of a recent Forum Research poll that suggests that if an election were held today, "[t]he NDP would come close to shutting out the opposition . . . capturing 75 out of 85 seats". The Liberals would take nine of the remaining seats and Independent Delta South MLA Vicki Huntington would keep hers, the poll said.  According to The Tyee, "[t]he poll put support for the NDP at 47 percent with the BC Liberals and BC Conservatives tied at 21 percent each and the BC Green Party at nine percent."  While NDP supporters may crave the satisfaction of seeing the Liberals ousted (in a reversal of the 2001 election that saw only 2 NDP MLAs elected), democratic reformers know that such lopsided results, so common with our current voting system, don't actually promote good governance.  Rather, all voters should be able to count on getting the representation they vote for.  Will the current government take heed? BC Liberal MLA Proposes Senate Election Process Using Online Voting BC Liberal MLA John Les (Chilliwack) this month introduced a private member's bill calling for online elections to start this fall to choose future BC Senators.  Les's proposal calls for BC to be divided into six electoral districts and for the current Single Member Plurality voting system to be used.  In an additional wrinkle, he also calls for use of online voting.  Fair Voting BC does not regard Senate reform as a high priority issue (reform of voting for the House of Commons is far more important), but warns that hasty proposals could lead to significant problems down the road.  For example, using SMP (First Past the Post) voting would only replicate the current inequalities in the House, but proportional representation in the Senate might not be helpful either as that may prevent future changes in how the House is elected.  It may, in fact, be better to make Senate elections entirely non-partisan so as to preserve and enhance the Senate's function as a chamber of 'sober second thought'.  FVBC also strongly cautions against the use of online voting for public elections at this point;  as political scientist professor Dennis Pilon of York University warns, online voting is currently “a horror show.” (photo courtesy of thoth188 on Flickr). Ida Chong Tells Civic Parties to Enforce Donation Rules by Saying 'Phooey' In the wake of last week's filing of financial disclosure statements by Vancouver's civic parties, showing that donations were up 50% from 2008 (from just under $4M then to just under $6M last year), including a single corporate donation of nearly $1M, Minister Ida Chong has said she won't implement the request from Vancouver City Council to limit personal donations or ban union, corporate and foreign donations.  According to Vancouver Courier columnist, Allen Garr, "in an act that can only be described as wilful ignorance, Chong has suggested if the parties want spending limits and electoral reform they are free to voluntarily agree among themselves".  And her proposed enforcement mechanism is even more bizarre:  Chong said, "If they believe strongly that there should not be acceptance of corporate donations or union donations - if they believe strongly in that - then they should not accept them. And they can say phooey on the party that does."  Fair Voting BC would like to see rules with sharper teeth than that and encourages our supporters to say phooey to Minister Chong's proposals. Reminder About Upcoming Democratic Dialogue Series A reminder that we will be jointly offering a dialogue series later this spring in Vancouver with Party X asking “How can citizens ensure that public policy reflects the public will?”  Thanks to those of you who provided input into our poll of potential topics.  Over 80 of you responded, and it looks as if you'd most like to talk about online voting, citizen initiat ives and the Enbridge Pipeline consultation process.  Planning is now underway, so stay tuned for future announcements. Local Gatherings We'd also like to remind you about a couple of regular get-togethers of democratic reform supporters on the third Tuesday each month in Burnaby and Victoria.  The April meetings will be on the 17th.  The Burnaby meeting begins at 7:30 PM at the Bread Garden Urban Cafe near Metrotown (SkyTrain accessible): 4575 Central Blvd.  The Victoria meeting is held at Swan's Pub in downtown Victoria, near the Blue Bridge (Pandora and Store Street), starting at 5 PM (look for us in the alcove near the Store Street entrance).  For more details or to get in touch with the organizers, please send a note to info@fairvotingbc.com. Book a Speaker from Fair Voting BC Fair Voting BC has also been invited to speak about electoral reform to the BC Property Rights Initiative in April in Surrey - look for an announcement shortly.  If your organization would be interested in hosting an electoral reform discussion event, FVBC would be happy to provide a speaker - just drop us a note to get things rolling. Yours for a stronger democracy, Antony Hodgson President, Fair Voting BC