PRO-REP ‘LEAP OF FAITH’ A TEST OF HORGAN’S MOJO
New Democrats were still sorting themselves out from their 2013 defeat when John Horgan put electoral reform high on the agenda for the next provincial election.
“The first-past-the-post system is not serving the people of B.C.,” said then-NDP house leader Horgan during a July 2013 interview where he strongly endorsed proportional representation.
“I think that it would increase participation,” he told me.
“We’re going to be pushing aggressively to see if we can get another ballot question about electoral reform.”
Though official NDP policy supported proportional representation, the B.C. branch didn’t campaign for it at election time. The party remained neutral in both the 2005 and 2009 referendums on electoral reform.
Horgan, as he readily admitted, had voted against change in the 2005 referendum. But now he was coming to the issue with the zeal of a convert, frustrated by a status quo system that tended to empower one party and marginalize the rest.
When he assumed the overall party leadership unchallenged in 2014, he was not long in making pro-rep a priority. The promise to hold a third referendum on electoral reform was the NDP’s first official promise for the 2017 election.
Horgan readily conceded that if pro-rep were accepted by the electorate, it would mean more minority governments and power sharing among parties.
“The reason that I’m comfortable with it is that the NDP is a coalition party,” said Horgan, turning the prospect of post-electoral power-sharing into a tacit pitch to the Greens.
“My solution to this issue is proportional representation,” said the NDP leader when challenged to cut a pre-election backroom deal with the Greens. “Allow people to vote for who they want, and let’s create the coalitions after the election, not before.”
Horgan personally favoured the mixed-member version of proportional representation. But the party platform, when finalized in early 2017, left the choice open:
“If elected, New Democrats will give British Columbians a vote to decide if they want a proportional representation system in place for the 2021 provincial election.
“Further, a New Democrat government would not only consult British Columbians on the specific proportional reform to be put to a vote, but would campaign strongly in favour of that reform.”
Late in the campaign, Horgan clarified that the resulting referendum ballot would pit the status quo against a single alternative of pro-rep.
“You are going to give them one system to vote on?” the NDP leader was asked. “Yeah, yeah, exactly,” he replied.
Pro-rep did not loom large in a campaign dominated by housing, tolls, child care and other issues. It was a key in the resulting power-sharing talks between the NDP and Greens.
The Greens, having long pursued pro-rep with self-interested fervour, wanted to implement the switch by simple vote of the legislature. Horgan continued to insist on a referendum.
“I think if you are going to change the electoral system, you should ask people about that,” he said. “It’s their system, not mine.”
The resulting confidence and supply agreement echoed the NDP platform:
“The parties agree they will work together in good faith to consult British Columbians to determine the form of proportional representation. The parties agree to both campaign actively in support of the agreedupon form of proportional representation.”
One form of proportional representation. Chosen via consultations with the public. Both commitments in keeping with promises Horgan made before the election. Then he fudged, starting with the appointment of the shrewdly partisan Attorney General David Eby as the alleged “neutral” arbiter of the process.
Public outreach failed to produce a consensus on either the structure of the ballot or the options for pro-rep. So Eby went with a two-question ballot and three options, two of which were ( by his own admission) not currently in use anywhere in the world. He also left more than two dozen aspects of the three options to be decided after the voting was over, mostly by a committee where New Democrats and Greens would command the majority.
Horgan chose to gloss over all those uncertainties in favour of a near evangelical pitch for British Columbians to join him in a “leap of faith” in favour of proportional representation.
Avoidance of detail served the premier well until the televised debate, where Opposition leader Andrew Wilkinson zeroed in on what the New Democrats weren’t telling people.
“You’re the one who wants to change the system,” he challenged, “and it’s important for you to tell people how this is going to work. ” Horgan either couldn’t or wouldn’t provide details.
In recovery mode a few days later, the premier tried to simplify the issue, endorsing MMP over the other two options on the ballot and further saying New Democrats would implement the “open list” version of that system.
Clarification? Or desperation? Either way, it was a belated intervention by the principal architect of the referendum, Horgan himself, halfway through the campaign. Still, the premier kept campaigning for proportional representation, as he promised, right to the end. Just the other day, I got an auto call from him at my home, urging me to join him in the leap of faith and to enlist my family and friends as well.
Arguably, the Greens have more to gain than the New Democrats from pro-rep. But Premier Horgan has made the switch a test of his own powers of persuasion. Win or lose, he gets to wear the outcome.
Avoidance of detail served the premier well until the televised debate.