The NDP member of parliament for Nanaimo-Cowichan, Jean Crowder, says she supports a 'yes' vote in B.C.'s May referendum on changing the voting system.
“This is our opportunity to support a form of proportional representation and I think we should grab it,” she said. “I don't hear too many people saying this current system is working for them.”
On May 12, along with the provincial election, B.C. voters will be asked whether they want to keep the current first-past-the-post system or switch to the single transferable vote form of proportional representation.
Last week The Tyee reported that the NDP MP for Victoria, Denise Savoie, said she supports making the change.
The provincial NDP has taken no official position on the referendum. “We do lots of really great work together and we will sometimes have our differences,” said Crowder.
Crowder said she followed the Citizens' Assembly process that recommended STV, and has done her own reading on the subject. The current system often returns results that don't reflect how people have voted, she said. “People understand that kind of skewing of the representation does cause problems in terms of making representative decisions.”
STV opponent and former NDP MLA David Schreck said he has never voted for a winner in an election (he lived outside the constituency he won and didn't even get to vote for himself), but has always felt represented.
“Even when it was just Joy and Jenny,” he said, referring to the 2001 election where Joy MacPhail and Jenny Kwan were the only two NDP MLAs to win their seats. “Joy and Jenny did a better job than some of the larger caucuses.”
Andrew MacLeod is The Tyee’s Legislative Bureau Chief in Victoria. Reach him here.
I support the STV...
It's not perfect but it's a helluva lot better than what we have now.
What is Proportional Representation?
Representation of all parties in proportion to their popular vote. If the Greens get 42% of the vote, they get 42% of the seats. Sounds pretty fair, no?
But true PR means we would be just voting for the party it's self, and having MLA's appointed to us. So other various forms of PR have been created.
Some people seem to think that PR = better democracy, when that's just a point of view of what democracy is.
To some, pure PR is the best system, because under pure PR, 42% is 42%. But the problem with that is, people would just be voting for a party brand, and no longer be electing MLA's. So if that's "your democracy" then you support it. While other's call our current system a democracy.
My own personal democracy is "having the right" to elect people who represent me. And who provincially represent me? The Premier and my local MLA.
So to me, I would prefer to see Gordon Campbell and Carole James go head to head. So whoever gets 50% plus 1 in the popular vote, becomes the Premier of BC.
But for that to happen, we would have to get rid of the old fashioned non-confidence vote, and allow a Premier to govern without having the majority of seats.
But having a NDP Premier being surrounded by Liberal MLA's doesn't really work, because political party's like to play political games.
If they were all independent, then less polticial games would be played. But then the very low voter turnout wouldn't know who to vote for.
FPTP is not my 1st choice, but at least I keep "my right to vote for my MLA" while under STV, even though I keep my 1 vote, I now have to elect 2-7 MLA's.
For those of you who voted in the last municipal election, (only 30% of you in Vancouver, very shameful) imagine you had only 1 vote, yet had to elect 10 city councillors. Is that fair? No!
People who support STV will try and tell you that get more than 1 vote by ranking your candidates 1, 2, 3, 4. But in some cases, your second & third votes may not be counted, and even when your 2nd choice is counted, it will be redistributed to other candidates at half value.
ie, if you had $20 dollars on you, and you bought something that costs $19 dollars, instead of getting $1 dollar back, you get .50 cents.
Is that fair? No! And STV's voting system isn't fair either!
I am voting NO again. I want
I am voting NO again. I want full pro rep not this.
Pro rep made for BC
Dan the socialist wants "full pro rep"? Like, with no local MLAs? Like the Netherlands, where 0.75% of the national vote for a party elects one MP? Did you make that suggestion to the Citizens Assembly? Do you understand why most people in BC want local representation combined with proportional representation? There are two ways to do that: STV and MMP. The Citizens took a year to design excellent models of both MMP and STV, and then choose the one they found best suited BC. That was their job. Democracy, eh? Unless the old boys' network of "play by the old rules" folks manages to confuse voters.
STV is not like electing 10 city councillors at large. It's proportional representation. In six-seater West Vancouver, I can see voters electing 3 Liberals, 2 New Democrats and a Green. But I expect the Liberals would likely run five candidates, and the NDP likely four, so there would be competition between candidates as well as between parties; accountable MLAs. Ireland and Northern Ireland agree on almost nothing, but they both use STV, because it's fair to all sides and keep politicians under local control.
S.Yee
Actually if you want to be able to have a vote for each member of a legislature or council etc like you do in Vancouver municipal elections then that means you must want to be able to have a vote in every riding in the province as well?
Why bother having ridings at all then?
I am voting No.
I like the system we have because it forces the government to pay attention to the swing voter in the marginal riding. Larger ridings mean less responsiveness to local concerns.
If there's some unfairness in the way parties are treated, that can be remedied by introducing a limited measure of proportional representation. On top of the 85 members elected from districts, we could have ten additional members chosen from short party lists, presumably with the Party Leader at the top of that list, in proportion to the popular vote received. That would allow any party getting 5% or more of the provincial popular vote the right to seat its leader in the Legislature. It would also allow the larger parties to grant two or three additional fairly safe seats to prominent and talented Canadians who could add considerable expertise in the area of public policy and public administration.
For those of you......
Who favor STV, I recommend this......
http://www.strategicthoughts.com/record2009/stvstuff.html
Different doesn't necessarily equate to better.
Stephanie T
Thanks, but I've read all of Shreck and Tielman's arguments and when they're not being outright dishonest their arguments simply don't hold water.
If there's any you find personally convincing and think we've overlooked by all means toss them into the ring here.
Tielman
Just to put what Tielman says into perspective he was also against MMP in Ontario and PEI.
Great news! For those
Great news!
For those interested, find out more about BC-STV at STV.ca!