BC Liberals worried about power loss

Dear editor: Re: Don’t give more power to Greens, Daily Courier letters, July 10:

John Thompson seems to be dead set against proportional representation, yet he whines about the current provincial government that came about under our current firstpast-the-post system. What does he want, a right-wing dictatorship?

Thompson is hopelessly confused on the situation in German politics. While it took longer to form the current federal government after their last election and there are stresses within the moderate right-wing coalition regarding immigration and refugee issues, Germany has had stable governments since 1948 when their form of electing governments (proportional representation) was imposed on them by the victorious Allies.

Thompson doesn’t seem to be too keen on the Green Party or the NDP. Well, I’m not too wild about most of the BC Liberal ideas or policies, yet I respect the fact that if the Liberals get about 40 per cent of the vote, then

they are entitled to about 40 per cent of the seats in the legislature.

Unfortunately, this respect does not seem to go both ways as Thompson has a problem with a party that gets 16 per cent of the vote getting about 16 per cent of the seats.

If the BC Liberals (or any other party) want absolute power, they just have to persuade over 50 per cent of the voters (as happened in 2001) that they have the best ideas and then they will have an absolute majority.

Proportional representation means that the makeup of the legislature will truly reflect the will of the people and that power will be distributed proportionally to how the electorate voted.