(the following text is from our August 27th newsletter)
All of the recent news about the assault on voting rights in the US have got us here at Fair Voting BC increasingly thinking about dealing with voting reform as a civil rights issue. We all believe deeply in democracy – that is, that legitimate power must flow from citizens to our representatives and that citizens should be treated equally in this process.
But perhaps we’ve been too timid. We keep trying to persuade the public and the political powers that our democracy would be better if we had a fairer, more democratic voting system. But women would never have received the vote if they had simply tried to persuade men that society would be better if men would allow them to vote. Rather, the suffrage movement won enfranchisement for women precisely because they wouldn’t take ‘No’ for an answer. Not that change came quickly – the Canadian Women’s Suffrage Association was formed in 1883 and it took 33 years, until 1916, for women to win the right to vote in provincial elections in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta (followed by BC in 1917 and Canada in 1918), and (embarrassingly) not until 1940 for women to finally be able to vote in Quebec.So, is our demand for a new way of voting in any way similar to women’s suffrage? We believe there are strong parallels. With our current Single Member Plurality voting system, only half the voters are represented. Women’s enfranchisement doubled representation from 25% to 50% – adopting proportional representation will double it again, taking us to close to 100%.
We also have a potent new legal weapon at our disposal. When women won the vote, Canada was still governed by the British North America Act, but since 1982, as last year’s 30th anniversary of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms reminded us, we now have a charter that grants us fundamental democratic rights – specifically, Section 3, which asserts our right to vote.We don’t have space here to go into a legal argument in any great detail, but it’s very encouraging to consider that the Supreme Court of Canada stated in 1991 that “the purpose of the right to vote enshrined in s. 3 of the Charter is … the right to ‘effective representation’.”
While the focus in the 1991 case was whether or not it was permissible to have ridings with wildly varying populations, the crucial point for voting reformers is that the highest court in the land both determined that the highest goal of our voting system is that of “effective representation” and recognized that our right to vote has been evolving to enhance the meaning of that phrase. More specifically, Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin explicitly stated that “inequities in our voting system are [not] to be accepted merely because they have historical precedent. … Departures from the Canadian ideal of effective representation may exist. Where they do, they will be found to violate s. 3 of the Charter.”The idea that our current voting system systematically violates the “Canadian ideal of effective representation” has not yet been tested in court, so we plan to explore (with the help of legal scholars and advisors) whether we could possibly successfully make this case. Stay tuned as we learn more.
Fair Voting BC 
The first, simplest and most essential electoral reform is the adoption of a preferential or ranked choice ballot. This transfers significant power from political parties to voters.
While proportional representation (PR) is a desirable reform, it is of modest value in itself. It provides fair distribution of power between parties but moves little power from parties to voters. For example, closed list PR with near perfect proportionality would not be welcome in Canada.
With the use of preferential ballots the disproportional party results of our present single seat system would be far less harmful as MPs would be more answerable to voters and less answerable to parties.
Having first committed to the use of preferential or ranked choice ballots, PR will further improve the electoral system. We will likely get some version of either STV or MMP. STV will of course use a preferential ballot and MMP will be greatly enhanced by the use of a preferential ballot, both for district elections and the party vote.
By using preferential ballots in MMP you avoid the wasted votes that would otherwise be a part of MMP and you avoid the distortions that are a result of FPTP. Trudeau has in any case promised we have seen the end of FPTP so it should not be retained as a part of any MMP system.
Democracy is dying. In 2005 57% of BC voters supported BC-STV and we were told it was not good enough. Now the Federal Government is wanting to IMPOSE a form of PR that no one has voted on. The government can change the rules on a whim.
This is why 8,000,000 Canadians did not vote in 2015. The Government will do what they want regardless of what the Citizens have to say. .
Two free new ebooks on electoral reform and research:
Peace-making Power-sharing:
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/542631
Scientific Method of Elections:
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/548524
Amazon Kindle won’t make them free (at least for now).
They charge $0.99.
Peace-making Power-sharing:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00XM3CE2O
The second book also out at Amazon now:
“Scientific Method of Elections”
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00Z4QIAPC
A brief survey of the character of these two books follows:
Peace-making Power-sharing:
The first section charts the Canadian Citizens Assemblies.
Lavishly illustrated with color plates, as well as monochrome pictures of pioneer Canada.
Other developments are traced in the electorally undeveloped Western world,
including that microcosm of electoral lawnessness, Britain.
Super-simple, and merely simple, explanations given of transferable voting.
The last chapter is the earliest extant version, in French (with a Unesco copyright) of the subject of my second book:
Scientific Method of Elections.
Firstly, so-called democratic election practise compares to what sport would look like, if it had no referees, other than the contesting players themselves, who (nearly) always rule in their own interest.
From force and fraud to freedom and knowledge,
scientific measurement and the philosophy of science are used as a guide to right versus wrong voting method.
British reports on voting methods are studied and criticised. The consensus, from investigators – the disinterested ones – for STV/PR is even greater than it appears, and usually over-looked by politicians and their partisan media.
Special attention is paid to two great pioneers of election science and progress: JS Mill and HG Wells.
Academic apologies for electoral anarchy are held to be worthy of a modern Dr Pangloss.
Finally, I explain my own contributions to refining the single transferable vote, namely (Preference abstentions-inclusive Keep-value averaged) Binomial STV, and the Harmonic Mean quota.
from
Richard Lung.
The first of my two e-books, “Peace-making Power-sharing” on electoral reform and research is available free.
The first section is about the BC and Ontario Citizens Assemblies, lavishly illustrated with color & monochrome plates of pioneer Canada!
(Edited and augmented versions of my web pages.)
Obtainable at Smashwords in epub format:
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/542631
It is also available from Amazon, which makes the author charge at least $0.99 until they find out it is free elsewhere.
The Amazon kindle (mobi) format is available here:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00XM3CE2O
I’m so tired of voting and being disappointed. Never getting the real facts at election time, just the Lie’s to get elected
Voting for parties in the First past the post is the worst system one could have. Ban political parties and just vote for the individual will work best. As long as we have a whipped party system the people will never be represented in government.
We need to continue to demand electoral reform as was attempted in 2005.
Since their one 2001 legitimate majority mandate, the Liberals have won all-powerful majority governments, able to pass legislation with no real opposition, in 2005, 2009, and 2013 with 45.8, 45.8, and 44.14%, of the votes. And that is out of the mere 50% who voted. Soon it will be more than a decade that the Liberal government, with a quarter of eligible votes, has had this power.
Here’s another fact about our non-representative government: The landslide Liberal win of 2001 was accomplished with 57.6% of those who voted. The electoral reform referendum BC in 2005 had 57.7% ‘Yes’ votes. However, this high ‘Yes’ wasn’t enough because the government had set the minimum at 60%. (Ironically, BC voted 0.1% higher for electoral reform and lost; yet the Liberals won their 2001 landslide with 0.1% less votes.)
ANY politicians advocating political reform are either lying or disguising the truth… while we need major changes… NOTHING yes NOTHING will be done because ALL changes must be approved by the Govt and it will NOT do that. You can whip a dead horse all you want but it won’t get up and it won’t pull a cart…. nice idea but waste of time
That’s why we’re speculating about the possibility of a legal case 🙂
The BC Women’s Liberal Commission is hosting a public discussion “Fair” Elections? Really?
It is a coffee discussion with Hon. Stephane Dion, MP. Mr. Dion is a keen advocate for electoral reform. He will make a short presentation of his ideas, followed by Q/A.
It is open to everyone, and is free. Brunch items available for purchase.
Saturday, March 1, 2014 from 9:00 – 10:00 am
Thai Urban Bistro in Yaletown. 1119 Hamilton street.
RSVP: coffeewithdion@gmail.com