Electoral reform
All the electoral reform in the
world, everybody getting out and voting, more partys represented in
the mix, even a better quality of representative will not make one
iota of difference if the current “if he said it, it must be wrong,
If I say it, it must be right” confrontational, non co-operational,
my job is to prove the other guys wrong attitude remains unchanged.
We need a quantum change in attitude from both our representatives
and the partys that they purport to represent (damit, they are
supposed to be representing us!) before we can wrest what is left of
our democratic processes out of the hand of the politicians and their
corporate lobbyists and back into the hands of our citizens where it
belongs.”
So
said I some three years ago and this is reflected in
the Conservatives report on Canadas Democratic Institutions way back
in 2007 where those few who had a say in this 'National Survey' were
much more concerned about what our Representative were doing than how
they were elected. Little has change over those 3 years except
perhaps the 'parliamentary dysfunction' has increased! I am
increasingly leaning towards that view myself, whilst electoral
reform MAY change the outcome of any election the question remains
will it change in any way the partisan nature of our Parliament that
is stifling free debate and producing flawed legislation.
Given my previous post whereby I opine
that electoral reform is most unlikely to happen in the foreseeable
future I am not going to spend a great deal of time laying out the
various options, that are readily available on line for those who
care to look. Suffice to say that is is not sufficient to say “I
favor STV” or “I favor MMP” as each
system has numerous variations that can make a
considerable difference as to how they affect the resulting
parliament. The question is why do we want electorial reform? For
many of us it is because we do not like the results that we are
getting under our current system, but whether that is a general
dislike of the results as not being 'proportional' to the popular
vote or more political, i.e. we don’t like the lot that got in via
this method. We must be aware that just because we change the way we
vote for our individual MP does not necessarily mean that the
collective riding’s across the country choices will add up to
reflect proportionality, only the MMP system takes that into account.
That said here is a very brief look at
the major voting systems generally proposed and a couple of personal
comments upon them. I note that such systems may have different names
and slightly different features in different countries.
FPTP - First Past The Post
The status quo, simple winner takes
all.
Not proportional, can lead to strange
results when multiple candidates split the vote.
MMP – Mixed Member Proportional
Proportional, allows voting for MP and
Party separately, ridings remain unchanged
Creates 'extra' MPs to produce
proportionality, methods of selecting 'extras' complex and
controversial.
This is the one that failed to get
support in Ontario
STV – Single Transferable Vote
Somewhat proportional, many more
individuals to choose from when voting.
Complex, hard to understand, multiple
MPs for greatly enlarged riding’s
This is the system that failed to get
enough support in BC
AV – Alternative Vote
Allows voters to indicate their 2nd
and subsequent choices, no 'wasted' votes, simple, easily understood,
ridings remain unchanged
Not truly proportional, however use of
2nd & 3rd choices make it more so.
This is the system proposed but not
adopted Great Britain in 2011
Whilst I previously preferred MMP I now
am leaning
towards AV for a couple of reasons, firstly it is
simple, easy to understand and gives some weight to a voters SECOND
(and possibly 3rd) choice so that voters who do not get
their first choice (and that will invariably be more than 50%) do get
some satisfaction from their votes actually impacting the results.
Whilst not truly proportional this use of second and third choice is
perhaps better as more voters will be somewhat satisfied with the
result. (even with truly proportional systems as many as 60% of
voters will not see their choice of individual elected, and the
riding system can further skew the results of which PARTY gains
power) AV is a compromise, and perhaps one which all sides can agree
upon, it would sure be better than the status quot!
For those who want to see which systems
various countries around the world are using a good overview can be
found at http://www.idea.int/esd/world.cfm.
These sorts of discussions may be somewhat academic given
the chances of seeing any move to actually place such choices before
us, but are still important to have to try and reach some sort of
consensus as to where we want to go WHEN such a move is made. A look
at the 8
Principals of Electoral Systems as provided by
Ontario’s Citizens’ Assembly on Electoral Reform a few years ago
may help put things in perspective.
As a final observation I must say that
we cannot discount “Electronic Voting” as an 'Electoral Reform',
a means of voting easily from within our homes, be that by computer
or telephone, would markedly increase the number of citizens who
exercise their voting privilege. This in and of its self would
probably do more to change the political landscape than any change in
the way we mark or count votes. The difficulty is to both design a
secure and problem free system and to convince the public that it is
indeed both those things, given the increasing probability that the
existing system is being abused that may well be the
hardest thing to accomplish.
Please note:- In view of the ongoing
revelations of electoral fraud during the 2012 federal elections I
have created a permanent page providing links to some details of this
and other recent electoral malfeasance. Click on the Election
Malfeasance tab at the top of the page.
1 comment:
I for one am very interested to see the results of the current scandal. I tend to doubt much will come of it at all, and yet I do hope it may open the eyes of Canadian citizens, even just a tiny bit.
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