The hue and cry might now be more complete. The Toronto Star has discovered that only about 18 per cent of our Ontario electorate voted for the Ford government’s majority. And would not Shakespeare’s Puck agree? We did it to ourselves.
Not voting is also a political decision, of sorts. Does it really need a proposition on the ballot for “none of the above”?
And despite the clear proof that the majority of the electors said “a pox on all your houses,” the Toronto Star tells us we merely err in how we select our politicians. They blame first-past-the-post voting for the low turnout. And, just how, first-past-the-post voting is to blame for this low turn-out is never really explained.
The Toronto Star wants proportional representation. The greens and NDP have wanted it for years. Some liberals might agree. Let’s hear it, yay, yay for proportional.
Then it is settled. We will henceforth get people to pick a party instead of a candidate. Party leaders have been choosing candidates for some time anyway. So, why not?
But just a minute. If only 43.5 per cent of Ontario voters went to the readily available polling places in 2022, why would more go, just to vote for a party, in 2026? How would we be solving the problem?
Maybe we should be proud of the 2022 Ontario election. Once again, we have proved that any doofus can be premier of Ontario.
And we do not need the insult from the Toronto Star that discussions about changes in how we vote being dominated by political hobbyists. First of all, it is not true. The last full-blown discussion of voting systems was under the quite incompetent management of Justin Trudeau’s government in 2016. Those committee hearings were dominated by political scientists with rare rays of enlightenment to contribute.
Before that, in Ontario, we had a 2007 referendum on a proposal made by lottery winners that was soundly rejected by the voters. British Columbia tried twice to get a rather confused proposal through its voters and it failed both times.
I could also draw the Star’s attention to the ridiculous proposal of liberal leader Steven Del Duca that he would change the way Ontario votes after the recent election. Luckily, he is not in a position to do that.
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Copyright 2022 © Peter Lowry
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