Proportional Representation Is Here!

Dear Steve,

Thanks for taking the time to try it out, and for your feedback about the "new" voting system.  You are right, these issues are complex and they take more than 30 seconds to explain.  To be perfectly honest it took me a few tries myself to "really get" what I was doing on the ballot, eventhough I had heard/read/watched quite a bit about BC-STV.  This is a case where experiential learning is very important.

First here is a video for everyone that wants to learn more about this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-4_yuK-K-k

Or if you want a "lighter" version click here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=887sGavI9kY

You've raised a few questions so I'll try to respond to them here, with the realization that there needs to be more discussion of this issue, and that others might have the same questions.

Will more than one candidate from a particular party be eligible to run in a specific electoral district?

YES.  For example where before there may have been 5 different ridings, those ridings are now merged together.  So theoretically where a party would have had 5 candidates in seperate ridings, they might now have 5 candidates running together on the same list.

Instead of having only one vote, the voter can now choose ANY of the candidates from any party, they simply have to list them according to which ones they like the most.

I have no idea how parts of my ballot end up being transferred elsewhere in certain circumstances.

There are three concepts here:
1. Candidates need to meet a certain threshold to get elected(for example 20% of votes)
2. If a candidate reaches the 20% threshold then their votes are redistributed
3. If no candidate reaches a threshold then the candidates with the lowest number of votes is eliminated, and their vote redistributed.
4. This continues until all the seats in a riding are elected based on candidates passing the 20% threshold

A third "No" vote to changing our system will set us back even further.
Actually in the last BC referendum STV got 58% of the vote, and was within 40,000 votes of the 60% "super majority." To my eyes at least, that is an overwhelming VICTORY!!!
The good news is the more people know about the system, the more they like it.

Also on a point of history, some towns in BC already use this system, so people are familiar with it.  It was also used back in the 1950s.  Current polling by the pro-STV side shows that they are just above the 60% mark.

Anyway, I certainly applaud the efforts undertaken here to educate the public. I like to think that I’m a relatively smart guy, but I just didn’t understand it.

Actually I had the same initial reaction and at first thought that Mixed Member Proportional (as proposed by Ontario) was much better. Further study has shown me that a major advantage of BC-STV is that you don't have to have more politicians, and ranking candidates seems to be easier to understand than getting two votes(under MMP).  It took me awhile to get the math behind STV, but if you stick to it anyone can understand it.

A lesson to take away: whatever systems the Green Party ultimately advocates for needs to be easily understood. Perhaps its time we design our own consensus system and present it to the public as part of our messaging to the electorate.

Yes I agree that a system needs to be simple, or at least a system that people could learn.  The Irish have been using STV this since the 1920s so why not us?

I would disagree, however, with advocating for our own form of PR.  If we designed something "in-house" I think that would look very self serving and would be immediately rejected by voters.  A much better route is through a non-partisan "Citizens Assembly" by which we can draw in people to support this idea from across the political spectrum.  In fact that is what our policy from "Vision Green" advocates:

http://www.greenparty.ca/en/policy/visiongreen/partsix#_Toc180047665

You've also brought up a good point about different types of systems(STV, MMP, etc...).  Each system has advantages or disadvantages but I would argue that all PR systems are better than what we have right which is a system that truly distorts what the voters say.  That could be an entire seperate blog.

Thanks for your comments and questions and I hope to continue this discussion.

Sincerely,

Matthew Piggott
Kitchener Centre

"People of good faith, figuring out where we are, not falling victim, making choices, based on our values, with the best available information."

These views are my own and do not represent the official position of the Green Party of Canada.