Support for electoral reform depends on wording

In its Throne Speech Sept. 8, the new NDP government of B.C. promised a referendum on electoral reform, in the autumn of 2018. Good — maybe. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made a similar commitment.

The 2015 election, he declared, would “the last federal election conducted under the first-past-the-post system.”

It proved harder to replace than he had expected.

Until I see the exact wording of the planned NDP referendum, I can’t tell you how I would vote.

If the question asks, “Do you want to replace the present first-past-the-post voting system?” I would unhesitatingly vote “Yes.”

A system that allows two successive federal governments, with dramatically different leaders and policies, to be elected with almost identical shares of the popular vote, clearly lacks some consistency.

Roughly 60 per cent of Canadian voters didn’t want Stephen Harper’s Conservatives in 2011, but he won a majority of seats in parliament anyway.

In 2015, a fractionally smaller percentage gave Justin Trudeau’s Liberals an even greater majority.

First past the post really means “frontrunner takes all.” In any riding, the candidate with the highest number of votes wins. Period. Even if a small proportion of rabid extremists turns out in force to out-vote a larger selection of middle-of-the-road candidates.

As long as everyone else has lower cards, a pair of eights takes the pot.

If the Conservative Party had elected its new leader using the first-past-the-post system, Maxime Bernier would now be its leader — with just 29 per cent support.

But if the question asks, “Do you want to replace the present voting system with a proportional voting system?” I would have to vote No.

That may seem odd, because in the past I have argued in favour of preferential voting, where you mark your ballot choices in order: 1, 2, 3 But there’s a big difference between preferential ballots, which Justin Trudeau seems to favour, and proportional voting.

As I understand proportional voting, every political party that gets a certain proportion of the popular vote — such as, perhaps, five per cent — deserves representation in the provincial legislature. Even if not one member of that party earns “majority support in any riding.

One way around that dilemma would be to increase the number of seats in the legislature, to make room for appointed representatives of the minority parties.

I don’t like that solution. I don’t like back-room appointments of any kind. Also because those appointees have no direct responsibility to anyone but their party.

Proportional representation puts the emphasis on the party, not the person.

Another option, cited during the last referendum on electoral change in B.C., would create larger, multi-member ridings. Presumably, if the whole of “northern B.C. elected, say, five members to the legislature, at least one of them might be an Ayn Rand Libertarian. Or perhaps a Groucho Marxist.

I think it’s more likely that all five members would represent the same segment of the political spectrum. Municipal elections tend to work that way.

Currently, only one municipality in B.C. elects councillors for “local wards — Lake Country. I like having one person directly “responsible to me and my neighbours. So far, I’m pleased with his performance.

If the Conservative Party had applied proportional voting, it would now need a leader split 13 ways.

If can’t help wondering, why would political parties want to impose a voting system on the public that they won’t use for themselves?

Political institutions generally use either a run-off system or a preferential ballot. France, to take one example, uses a run-off to elect its president if no candidate wins an instant majority. All Canadian parties have used runoff elections in their conventions.

A preferential ballot is like a run-off, without needing a second (or third) election. The lowest candidate gets dropped. His or her votes go to the voter’s second choice. And so on.

Votes keep moving on, until one candidate has at least lukewarm support from a full majority of voters.

There may also be other possibilities worth consideration.

In one of his novels, author Neville Shute suggested that citizens could earn multiple votes, based on education, community service, work experience, etc. Shute seems to have assumed that such a voter would throw all his or her votes behind a single candidate, but not necessarily.

I hope this makes my position abundantly clear. Depending on how the NDP government in Victoria puts the question to us, I am either in favour of a referendum, or against it.