Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Macfarlane, I am very pleased that you covered all the bases in pointing out that proportional methods of voting do not necessarily lead to unstable governments. It is a myth to make claims like that and I feel that it is important to say so clearly. On the contrary, these methods of voting can provide very stable governments. We have seen that in a number of western democratic countries, like Switzerland, the Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden and Germany.
On Twitter, a person by the name of Jesse Hitchcock is following the committee’s work and wants us to talk more about what lies at the origins of the low turnout at elections.
In that context, let me suggest an idea to you, Ms. Goodman. I feel that the current method of voting, the one we call “winner takes all”, is an obstacle to participation. In some ridings in Quebec, members have been elected with fewer than 30% of the votes. In other words, the votes of 70% of the electorate were not counted. They just went right into the garbage.
I will take the results in the riding of Rosemont-La Petite Patrie as an example. In that riding, there was little motivation for Conservatives to go and vote. They had little chance of winning the election. The same goes for New Democrats in Mr. Deltell’s riding. We often hear people asking themselves: “Why would I go and vote? My vote will not change anything.” If proportionality were a factor, perhaps that vote would not make a difference in the riding, but it would count later as seats are redistributed.
Would voters not be motivated to get out and vote if their vote could count and give them a voice in Parliament?