All parties will benefit from PR

Dear editor: Re: “It’s not easy being green,” guest editorial by the Victoria Times Colonist (Daily Courier, Jan. 15). There are a number of misconceptions. The writer says that “Greens will be the major beneficiaries” of proportional representation.” The reality is that all parties will benefit from PR, not just Greens.

Under PR, it is likely that more parties will work together to decide issues. A decision on Site C would have been made by more that one party to begin with and money would not have been wasted on reexamining previous decisions.

As to the writer’s opinion that there is “no significant difference” between the NDP and the Greens, so “why bother voting Green?” I see important differences that would allow the Greens to ally themselves with either the Liberals or the NDP. The Greens frequently adopt more conservative positions, and might indeed choose to partner with the Liberals.

The writer seems to envision that under PR there would be a “series of minority administrations, to the frustration of voters.” In an MMP style of PR used in New Zealand, we might expect either Labour (the NDP in B.C.) or National (Liberals in B.C.) to gain majority or minority governments. John Keyes, the National leader, was in power for a decade in New Zealand, even though there are four or five parties (National, Labour, Maori, Green, New Zealand First). Then in 2017, a Labour government was elected

Were the NDP to adopt a rural-urban made-in-B.C. version of PR, there would be only need to be a few MLAs added to the legislature to achieve satisfactory proportionality, and each of us would be represented locally by a member of a party with whom we can relate. William Stocks Peachland