As the special commons committee on electoral reform finishes hearings and prepares to enter into its deliberations, there is a sense of deja vu. Canadians in six provinces have already had a variety of commissions and citizens’ forums study different voting reforms. British Columbia, Ontario and Prince Edward Island have had votes in which the proposed changes lost (twice in B.C.). New Brunswick and Quebec have yet to hold a vote on their proposals and PEI is currently in the process of collecting new votes on five voting options. (We will tell you what we have been laughing at in this vote after the vote is counted next week.)
But these vote debates will never rival hockey or sex as the Canadian pastime. We know that because pollsters tell us that only about half of Canadians care about vote reform.
In keeping with the elitist approach of the Trudeau Liberals, the current federal committee study has been mainly by invitation only. The Ottawa hearings were largely restricted to academics, foreign experts in countries with proportional voting and a number of Fair Vote advocates. The barely representative hearings across Canada were dominated by more academics and Fair vote advocates and Fair Vote supporters from the audiences.
The differences are in the questions asked by the different parties represented on the special commons committee. The Conservatives are open and confused but insist that any change must be approved in a national plebiscite. The New Democrats, Bloc and Greens are all pushing hard for proportional representation in parliament. (It is their one hope of getting more members into parliament.) The Liberals on the committee have mostly demonstrated their lack of experience in elections and electoral systems. It has been a good learning experience for them and we will know what to write on their report cards when we see their report.
But no matter what the committee reports, the ultimate decision will be made by the Trudeau cabinet. It looks obvious that the committee will not report favourably on Prime Minister Trudeau’s preferred preferential voting. It has been made very clear to the committee that the only party that would have benefited from preferential voting in the last election in Canada was the Liberal Party.
But as much as the chorus of so-called experts keep damning our first-past-the-post voting system, they have no alternative that could be expected to satisfy Canadians. There is little question but that we want every vote to count. They already do. It is the trust that we have in the present system that makes the difference.
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Copyright 2016 © Peter Lowry
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