My Views on Electoral Reform

Sometimes the media reflects our beliefs better than they reflect the truth. That seems to have been the case during the last federal election. We spent over $300 million on voting in a government that is essentially the same as the one we had before the excitement started. The only thing that’s changed is that our Prime Minister now seems to feel reassured that he is the leader Canada wants but two things could change that: 1.) the opposition could grow some freaking stones and 2.) by stripping away party funding, breaking his promise on running a deficit and by showing every indication of making every single vote possible into a confidence motion he might have actually found a way to push things far enough that Canada could end up enduring our second election in the span of six months.

Canada did not, by the way, elect a leader. No matter what you think, odds are, you didn’t vote for Stephen Harper because unless you live in Calgary West – you couldn’t vote for Stephen Harper. Our present system doesn’t permit it.

Now that it’s over, we’re talking about electoral reform; we seem to want it but what does it really mean? Proportional representation is complex no matter what model you choose. It would be costly to educate the public and difficult to overhaul a system in order to reflect a multiparty adversarial system under proportional representation. We’re just not set up for it.

Geographically, Canada is so much larger than every other democracy (I’m not counting Russia as a democracy, technically I may be wrong about that but Putin doesn’t strike me as much of a majority-rule kinda guy.) It is easy to see how size can skew results. The east never votes with the west and Quebec – well, we’re uniquely gifted or saddled with Quebec depending on where you sit in the rest of the country. No matter how you see it, Quebec exerts a significant gravitational pull on Canada as a whole and many Canadians who live outside of the central region find this objectionable on the grounds that they seriously do not consider themselves to be part of Canada and have zero interest in the well-being of people outside Quebec’s borders who do.

If the last election had been a leadership race, I am willing to bet that like most Canadians could, I would have been able to tell you how it would shake out before the first advance polls were taken. The hard, cold truth is, people west of Winnipeg could have told you Dion could not win a federal election, period. They could have told yuo that on the same night he was chosen as leader of his party if for no other reason than that he seems utterly divorced from any western, maritime or rural interests and he is, by birth, a francophone. People in the west are tired of francophone PM’s. They feel burned by Quebec as it is and they are tired of straining to understand a francophone accent and even more tired of being represented by a person who sounds, to their ears, like a Canadian cliché.

In Ontario, Canadians like Jack Layton well enough but any Ontarian would have owned up to the fact that he could never lead the country. Layton campaigned on disdain for the economic system that serves as the financial central heating that keeps Canada from freezing and that just cannot work.

Layton is charismatic and he can be articulate but his campaign defied logic – anti-oil production, pro-government intervention during a recession, and pugnaciously so - I am pretty sure Layton scared even the hard line NDP members willing to elect provincial NDP governments West of the Portage and Main line.

Duceppe isn’t even playing, he’s in the game to be the spoiler. He’s said himself he will never be PM so why he’s involved with a national leadership debate in English is anyone’s guess. Still, Duceppe’s honesty played well in the west and if he had been campaigning as a Canadian he might have made a difference.

As for the Greens - anyone who would run against Peter McKay in Central Nova clearly lacks the judgement to effectively sit as a parliamentarian no matter how much homework they do. Pluck alone is not enough, we do not vote for spunk or Mary Tyler Moore would have run for president.

The fact that Elizabeth May says she plans to run in McKay’s riding again next time is telling. I would argue it’s proof positive that she is not fit for a national leadership role in a global political climate. In that context, knowing your strengths and showing common sense are more important than at any other time in our history.

Harper is seen as cold and controlling, just ask anyone who works within 20 blocks of parliament hill, but he does have a degree in economics – he knows the lingo he won’t be confused by the landscape and compared to the other choices. He looked like the best alternative to most Canadians. Many Conservative MP’s can thank him for their seat in Ottawa.

There’s no question, Harper seems secretive and dictatorial to many of us. And the recent news of Transport Canada’s decision to stop answering any and all media questions in order to make Harper’s new transportation minister John Baird, feel comfortable and safe, only underscores that point.

Here’s the article on that – like so many canaries in so many coalmines, it ran virtually unnoticed and in a very Conservative party fashion, it was announced on a day when there is much bigger news to serve as cover. The fiscal update happens today at 4:00 p.m. Eastern.

http://www.canada.com/topics/news/national/story.html?id=f793e22a-6cc7-4580-af67-f1f1a659124d

Canadians voted in the last election as if they were voting for a leader. That tells me that the first step in electoral reform should be to give Canadians the right they think they already have.

We should start with electoral reform. A first step toward fixing the system would be to give all Canadians the right to vote for their Prime Minister. If that was all we did toward fixing the system it would make a significant positive difference but I think we can go a little further without breaking the bank or baffling the voters.

At the Prime Ministerial level, political party affiliation is a significant factor in determining the broad reach of policy and political philosophy that would be the priority of the leader elected. Parties give us the shorthand to recognize the basic principles each leader stands for which allows them to express the nuances of their vision during the course of a relatively short campaign period.

Prime Ministers need to be able to express their political views in broad strokes because they are dealing in broad national issues, local candidates have a responsibility to represent the particular view of their communities – they don’t need the same kind of shorthand, it is literally too big for them.

With the notable exceptions of Alberta and Quebec, Party affiliation is not working at the local level. Canadians feel compelled to accept whoever happens to garner the favour of the local chapter of their national party, personal popularity and strategic nominations mean that we do not always get candidates who are best suited to the job.

If party affiliations were abandoned at the local level, Members of Parliament would earn their seats by personal strengths and political platforms alone. Eliminating party affiliations for MPs would not appreciably change the system except to shift focus on the actions of representatives and not on professed loyalties – which have been known to shift with a little pressure anyhow.

Step by step, it would work like this: the parties would choose a leader by whatever means they feel best. When an election is called the campaign period would be broken into two shorter segments. In the first period, Candidates for Prime Minister would run their campaigns as they have during our most recent election. Whistle stop tours, speeches and national debates would take place in this period. At the same time, local candidates would be going door to door making the pitch for their nomination as MP candidates.

In order to be put forward as a candidate for MP a local nominee would have to gain the support of 300 members of his or her community or ten per cent – whichever is less. (This number would be subject to tailoring depending on the population of the riding.) A person who signs the nomination petition for one prospective candidate cannot sign for another – there would be no overlap. Lists would be entered into a computer spread-sheet in order to cross reference for duplicates. The use of personal computers would make the task of checking nomination petitions an afternoon’s work – at most.

When the Prime Ministerial segment of the campaign period concluded, Canadians would go to the polls and vote for their national leader. Once the results were in, the local campaigning period would continue for seven days, during which leaders of the national parties would be expected to deal with their organizational issues and would not be allowed to campaign.

Every candidate for leadership would have the option of being on the ballot for their home riding, this way, the losers would still be able to sit in the House of Commons and contribute to the management of the country’s day to day business. They would still be required to meet the same standards as any other candidate – they would need 300 signatures on their nomination form.

At the end of the second campaigning period, Canadians would vote in their MP’s. We would do so in the full knowledge of what kind of candidate we would be electing and what kind of leader they would be working with. In other words – there would be much less rolling the dice and virtually no reason to engage in strategic voting.

An election is not a game and it should not have an element of surprise included. Until now we have responded to the idea of an election in the same way as people watch movies or read mystery novels. Nobody wants to have the surprise ending “spoiled” for them. The narrative of an election held under the present system may make for a dramatic storyline but we are talking about running a country here – our entire lives are on the line. This is not the place to be hoping for a surprise, twist ending.

Once MP’s were elected, the Prime Minister would choose a cabinet. The cabinet would be made up of whomever the PM considered best for the job. This would allow a Prime Minister to do what our present PM has already started – there is nothing in the constitution that says a cabinet must be made up of members of the ruling party. By doing away with the idea of two opposing parties in power we would be embracing the idea of a cooperative government made up of individuals representing different viewpoints from across the country all sitting in the house with the common goal of making the country as safe, healthy and prosperous as possible. (Less fun for political pundits but better for the rest of us.)

Because there would not be party affiliations in the house there would also no longer be a need for the adversarial seating arrangement. MP’s would sit according to geography, increasing the possibility that geographic concerns might benefit from solutions put forward by neighbouring constituencies.

Under this system there would be no time wasted on party caucus meetings, in fact, party meetings would be rare and held to discuss leadership issues – really, apart from labelling the candidates political orientation, eventually we might not need parties at all.

This system would also increase transparency because there would be no reason to try to gain a party advantage. The effectiveness of MP’s would increase because they would have to focus on the concerns of their constituency and learn to think for themselves and we would save money on funding party war chests.

Question period and committee work would proceed in exactly the same way as before except that committees would be formed by geographical representation, personal interest, capacity and professional speciality not by party appointment.

 The tasks assigned an MP in parliament would be more in keeping with their having a job – we would have the best qualified candidates not the most politically advantageous. This can only help things run more smoothly since it minimizes the learning curve but maybe more importantly, these are JOBS we are giving to these people. They are quite well-paid jobs too and if a person is not qualified to do the job maybe we shouldn’t be asking them to accept it.

During question period, MP’s would be given the opportunity to question cabinet based once again, on geographical representation. Personal attacks would be considered strictly off-topic and if an issue did not concern your part of the country then you as an MP would not be permitted to speak to the issue.

Attacks on the Prime Minister would not only be counter-productive but also irrelevant since the PM would be able to claim a mandate from the entire country as a whole.

There is no practical reason why an MP from Northern Ontario should have a single word to say for or against measures taken to protect BC’s salmon fisheries – for example. It’s inexcusable that we conscience this kind of meddling. More importantly, it is a waste of time.

It should be the job of government to run the business of the country, not to waste our time and money bickering amongst themselves and jockeying for position in the next election. A country is something like a business or a household writ large. Together we have a certain amount of money, resources, assets, to spend use and protect and we have a certain number of expenses and necessities to meet. A household or a business run by people who actively despise each other is ineffective. It cannot be an efficient or pleasant place for everyone to live and work. We are not at war with each other – we are all just trying to make sure we have the best Canada we can make. It’s time we started acting that way.

Under this new system, every vote in the house would be a free vote. We would, by necessity, stop taking sides and start thinking like a community.

The House would change from being adversarial to being perhaps not harmonious but cooperative. And members would sit according to geography – not by party affiliation and leader’s favour. This system would focus MP’s on the interests of their region and their country. It would create a climate of common interests which, in other words – a nation.

Because Canadians would vote for a leader and then, in the full knowledge of that leader’s policies, choose a representative that would reflect their interests and priorities it would be the role of the candidates to educate their potential constituents on their understanding of the issues and their ideas about how to address them.

The new system would require only minimal change to the infrastructure of the current system. Voter education would be a by-product of the process itself and not something required before an individual could engage in the process.

In the House itself, the number of seats, ridings and committees would all remain the same. However, participation in a federal parliament would require a commitment to a federal agenda on a riding by riding basis.

Provincial MP’s would sit together and presumably work together but they would also sit in regional clusters, just as they do on the land itself. Quebec could benefit by sitting and working next to New Brunswick and Ontario. If only by understanding that they do not exist in isolation from the rest of Canada. The western provinces have already seen the benefits of regional cooperation but being able to express that cooperation within the House of Commons can only strengthen the bonds that already exist.

Ministerial positions would be fixed and could only be altered by a House vote. Leaders would not be able to make up portfolios. Just like in a household, if you’re in charge of doing the dishes, that’s fine, sometimes you might need some help, but the dishes are your job. Your mom is not going to put someone else in charge of making the water soapy, that’s just stupid.

If the family gets a dog then someone has to take on the job of taking care of the dog – so far, Canada does not have a dog so we don’t need any new ministers. It’s time we allowed Canada to function as it is and as we, as Canadians believe it to be. If we are asked to vote for a leader in a federal election then we should be given the right to cast a vote for that leader and if we expect our MP’s to represent our interests in Parliament then we should understand how they intend to do that on a person by person basis because sooner or later, every Canadian counts.