Electoral Reform Committee on Aug. 22nd, 2016

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would like to ask Professor Lijphart a question before I turn to Professor Pelletier.

I feel that it is increasingly clear that proportional systems are more representative, more stable and more effective. They encourage dialogue between political parties, given that parties have to work together. In addition, they provide better public policy than governments that evolve in a “winner takes all” kind of system.

However, some people seem to have some hesitation, some doubt, about the two types of members, the ones elected locally and the ones elected from the lists.

Could you explain to us how things are done in the many countries that have operated in this way for decades, and tell us how voters perceive those two kinds of members, who are elected in slightly different ways?

[Prof. Arend Lijphart]

I think the fact that with MMP.... Of course, if you have STV you do not have that, and I think STV is a reasonable option for Canada, or any country as well.

With MMP you do have the fact, and I would not consider it a problem, that you have two different sets of legislators. In practice, in both Germany and for a shorter time in New Zealand, this has not caused a big problem. A party still tries to put people on the list so that the list is geographically dispersed, and so in many cases in a particular district or a riding, as you call it in Canada, you will in fact have two representatives from that district, one elected from that district and one elected from a list. They may well be representatives from two different parties, so that the people can feel comfortable with at least one of these representatives. This depends, of course, on how the parties manage the process of putting together the list, but I think that, on the whole, is the way that parties have tried to do it in Germany and New Zealand.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Thank you, Professor Lijphart.

Professor Pelletier, in the process that went on in Quebec and in the National Assembly, the proposal basically was for a mixed-member proportional system. If I recall correctly, we were talking about 77 members who would be elected by the system we know currently, and a compensation of 50 members. There was no need to add a large number of members for the system to function. We only needed two.

But some people were afraid that candidates could practically guarantee success in the election by being part of both systems. Could you tell me the reason why the mixed-member proportional system was chosen and whether we could have avoided significant problems by preventing candidates from throwing their hats into both rings?

[Prof. Benoît Pelletier]

The Government of Quebec wanted to reconcile various factors. One of them was regional representation. That led the government to choose regional compensation over provincial compensation.

The second factor that the government considered is that it wanted a relatively simple system. So voters voted only once but, in a way, the vote was transferred onto the list according to a system that calculated the total number of votes for a political party in an electoral district. That was divided by the number of seats won, plus one. Each time, the remaining seats were distributed. Actually, the calculation was that there would be about three constituency members and two members from the list in the same electoral district. The seats from the list were distributed according to the calculation I have just described.

From the outset, the dual candidacy seemed to be the rule everywhere. In 2006, if I am not mistaken, I made a ministerial statement putting a time limit on the process. However, I had asked Quebec’s chief electoral officer to produce a report, which he did in 2007. At that point, I opened the door to the possibility of two votes, meaning one for the constituency member and one for the list. I felt that that procedure was fairer for small parties.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you.

[Prof. Benoît Pelletier]

In addition, we would be less open to the accusation that we had developed an electoral system to favour ourselves.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

We have reached the end of the time Mr. Boulerice had for questions.

We now move to Mr. Thériault.

[Luc Thériault, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

Mr. Chair, I am going to share my time with Mr. Ste-Marie. He can have the floor.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

You told me that at the beginning.

Mr. Ste-Marie, the floor is yours.

[Gabriel Ste-Marie, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Good afternoon, professors and colleagues.

My question is for you, Mr. Pelletier. It deals with the principle of federalism that you briefly explained earlier.

If I understood correctly, constitutionally, the principle of the proportionate representation of provinces is in order to protect minorities. If we adopted a mixed-member proportional voting system that involved lists, do you believe that that system could not operate Canada-wide and should operate by province to remain constitutional?

[Prof. Benoît Pelletier]

I have not thought about the modalities that a national list system would involve, but there could be a national list, redistributed regionally. That means that, in the case we are dealing with, there would be a provincial redistribution that would observe the principle of proportionate representation.

What I am saying is that the United States has a political system that is completely different from ours, but it is still a federation. The same goes for Russia. The fact of being a federation does not pose an obstacle to the reform of the method of voting. The obstacles are those that I spoke about during my presentation. They are limits or parameters rather than obstacles to the reform of the method of voting.

[Luc Thériault, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

I am going to continue my comments along that line.

Professor Pelletier, I would like to thank you for this remarkable analysis.

We will talk a little later about the decision in the Figueroa case. I am going to try and ask questions in quick succession if I possibly can. My colleagues know how difficult that is for me.

The decision in the Figueroa case rests on the value of equity, especially in terms of the funding of political parties. Equity also drives this desire to reform. Do you not feel that, at the same time as we are reforming the law, and if it is necessary to hold an election with a different method of voting, we will have to re-establish state funding for political parties in order to allow for ideological plurality on the start line during that election?

[Prof. Benoît Pelletier]

Yes.

In Quebec, we had a plan to reform the method of voting and we also wanted to change the elections act. I have always believed that substantial state funding was something to be valued in a society. However, it must perhaps not be full state funding because the people’s participation seems to me to be an important principle.

But you previously mentioned the decision in Figueroa. In paragraphs 167 and 168 of that case, Justice Lebel wrote at length about regionalism and regional representation. Some might believe that the principle of regional representation becomes an obstacle to electoral reform. In my opinion, that is not the case as long as each province is well represented and the principle of proportionate representation is maintained.

Let me draw your attention to this. The Supreme Court of Canada said, in its reference in relation to the Upper House in 1979 and in its reference in relation to the Senate in 2014, that the Senate’s function is to be the voice of the regions. Now, senators are not elected. That means that it is perfectly possible to have a chamber made up of non-elected people and still maintain the idea of a regional voice and the principle of regionalism. The same principle would apply for a reform of the method of voting.

[Luc Thériault, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

We could talk about that again. I wanted to ask you that question, but you answered it yourself.

We have lived through the pitfalls of the process. I am commenting here because of the experience we went through when we did not deal with the pitfalls. In terms of the current process, some experts have told us that representative democracy has allowed us to move forward. We have been told that, because it is a complex matter, we could forgo the will of the people in order to set up the advantages and the various voting methods.

Do you not feel that the work of this committee should not be rushed and that it should perhaps culminate in a draft bill that would involve much more specific consultation in order to seek the agreement of the citizens of Quebec specifically—

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

That is a huge question. Mr. Pelletier, I don't know if you can provide a yes or no answer.

[Prof. Benoît Pelletier]

No.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you.

Ms. May, the floor is yours.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

I am going to return to exactly where I left off with Professor Lijphart, because I think, as my colleagues around the table have mentioned, we are hearing opinions from a lot of experts, and this is a 36-country study in which I understand you are saying that these are facts, that this is empirically known. How many researchers have concluded, and how confident are you, that there's a pattern to democracy such that by changing its electoral system, Canada would join those countries that have more stable governments, a better quality of democracy, better macroeconomic performance, and better environmental protection? Those are some of the indicators in your studies.

[Prof. Arend Lijphart]

Obviously, I cannot make any specific prediction of what would happen to Canada if it were to move to proportional representation. But my conclusions are based on very clear facts that are indisputable. Nobody can be 100% confident, but I am quite confident that for Canada, it would be a good move to change the electoral system to some form of proportional representation. As I've said, I have no strong preference for a particular kind. There are some systems that I think are more likely to be adopted in Canada, but I'm quite confident that this would be a good thing for Canada.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

I'm going to ask you a question now that came to us from Twitter. It's from one of the more well-known, non-governmental organizations in Canada that promotes proportional representation, so I suspect that Fair Vote Canada may already know the answer to this tweeted question, but they want to know from you, how do women fare in PR countries? I think they mean by that, how many women get elected?

[Prof. Arend Lijphart]

We obviously have very good figures on that. The degree to which countries are proportional, have a consensus democracy, correlates in significant ways with the number of women elected to Parliament, with the number of women in cabinet, and also with general measures that the United Nations has developed of gender inequality. Basically, the rights of women tend to be better on the whole in the consensus democracies.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Thank you.

Do you have any view on the following? I'm throwing you a question that you've had no time to consider, but our former Chief Electoral Officer, Jean-Pierre Kingsley, wondered at committee if we could do single transferable vote by clustering ridings in those parts of Canada where the populations were more dense and lent themself to that, and leave things as they are in our larger ridings, such as those of our territories. That would be a hybrid system, though I don't like the idea of leaving anyone with first past the post.

Have you seen countries adopt a bit of PR and a bit of not-PR in order to accommodate regional differences of that kind?

[Prof. Arend Lijphart]

I think Ireland is probably an example, where the number of representatives per district ranges between three and five, so that there are some districts that are in fact closer to being a one-member district. I don't have this at my fingertips and would have to look it up, but I also think that in Switzerland most of the cantons elect representatives by proportional representation, but a few smaller, very small, cantons have just a single representative. If you have a single representative, you necessarily need a majoritarian system, but not necessarily FPTP. You could use the alternative vote system, which also works with voter preferences. That would be my recommendation if it becomes impossible to have multi-member districts and you need a few single-member districts, that is, if you're going to use STV, which is a preferential system, to also use the preferential system for that single-member district, which would be the alternative vote.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

We'll go to Ms. Romanado now.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

Thank you very much.

My next question goes to Professor Pelletier.

Earlier, you mentioned the importance of providing people with information. In the exercise that was conducted in Quebec, as soon as people found out that there would be two kinds of MNAs, they said that they were not in agreement. We have heard other witnesses stress the importance of informing Canadians about our current system and about the ones we are going to consider.

But other witnesses have told us that Canadians—

don't want to “look under the hood”.

In your specific opinion, what is the importance of informing people about the positive aspects of all the electoral systems, as well as about the ideas that do not seem to be very good, like having two types of members?