It's not your Trudeau.
Evidence of meeting #16 for Electoral Reform in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was issues.
A video is available from Parliament.
Evidence of meeting #16 for Electoral Reform in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was issues.
A video is available from Parliament.
3:20 p.m.
Voices
Oh, oh!
3:20 p.m.
Public Policy Chair, Massey College, University of Toronto, As an Individual
I just want to repeat that in my previous experience, when you give a committee a big, crucial job, and it's an essential framework issue, as the Constitution was and as the electoral system is, looking for broad consensus—not unanimity—is something that should place very, very high in your value system.
3:25 p.m.
Conservative
Gérard Deltell Conservative Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC
Don't you think that the best way to achieve that is by a referendum, to let the people decide on this specific and so important and so precious an issue?
3:25 p.m.
Public Policy Chair, Massey College, University of Toronto, As an Individual
I am with Professor Harrington in this regard: Parliaments make big decisions, and parliamentarians are trustees of the public interest. In that trustee function, though we need education about this, I still think the beginning is that a Parliament could make this kind of decision on its own, as long as it respected consensus and process.
Could this be ramrodded through under time allocation and so on? I think that would destroy it at birth. However, should this committee reach a consensus, can that be reflected by all parties, or least a significant number of members of Parliament if it was not an all-party consensus? Yes, it could.
3:25 p.m.
Conservative
Gérard Deltell Conservative Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC
Okay.
Mr. Axworthy, I follow your line of reasoning that Parliament makes big decisions. In our view, though, this is a fundamental decision because it is our most important democratic institution and it is the electoral system in place that decides who governs us. Then there are decisions regarding the budget, foreign policy, defence and so forth. Fundamentally, though, the voting system is more important than any other institution.
Are you sure that the government has the authority to make that decision? Would it not be preferable to have a referendum?
3:25 p.m.
Public Policy Chair, Massey College, University of Toronto, As an Individual
I would just repeat that of the changes to the pillars of our electoral system—how one creates boundaries, the very franchise itself, and increasingly the franchise to women and young people under 18—in every single case the changes were done by Parliament, and therefore I think this one can be done too. I just referred to one or two, but in my paper I think I list more than 20 of those kinds of changes.
3:25 p.m.
Liberal
John Aldag Liberal Cloverdale—Langley City, BC
Thank you.
This afternoon has been an excellent session for me just to reflect on where we're at with the committee. We've had some wonderful testimony again. I really appreciated the questions that were put to us at the beginning about some of the critical things and questions we need to look at. I've been reflecting on that as I've been waiting for my turn at the microphone.
To the questions about why reform, why reform now, and whether we have a crisis in process or outcomes, I've been reflecting that this isn't the first time we've talked about a need for reform in Canada. It was news to me, as I got into this committee, that it's actually been talked about for about 100 years at various times. To me that's fascinating. It points out that there are things.... Maybe we're not at the crisis mode that we saw in New Zealand, where there were really skewed results and people were unhappy, but I've been reflecting on it. I've been out door-knocking, and during the campaign I was out, and a great number of people said to me that they weren't voting just because they've lost faith in the process, that their vote doesn't count.
There are all of these issues. We're seeing declining voter numbers and lack of representation by certain groups and all sorts of things. Is that the kind of crisis point that we need to be at, or is that not good enough to be the catalyst for it? Our government has heard that there are pressures facing us that should take us down this path. Then there are questions again about the options and improving superior systems. We've tweaked and seen changes made to the electoral system in first past the post.
To all three of you, are we stuck with first past the post? Have we not reached a critical point in Canada, or is this the only system that will ever meet the needs of Canadians? I've been reflecting as well that we've seen referenda across provinces to look at electoral change, and they've all failed. Why do we fail? Why have we never moved past what we have? Is first past the post the only solution for Canada?
Professor Norris, perhaps I can start with you. Then I'll come back to our witnesses here.
3:25 p.m.
Prof. Pippa Norris
Some of the problems you mentioned are there in western democracies. It's not really about either a majoritarian system or PR. A crisis of confidence in parliaments and their role and their power is very much affected by globalization and the loss of sovereignty of countries, which means parliaments are not the institutions they were 20, 30, or 40 years ago; therefore, tinkering or changing the electoral system won't necessarily meet those objectives. In New Zealand they tested, for example, political efficacy before and after reform, and it didn't go up. Confidence in institutions didn't go up.
On the other hand, we do know that if you reform the system, the rules of the game, there are some mechanical things, if you like, on which you do have an impact. The number of women in parliament is likely to go up under PR and turnout is likely to go up under PR. There are specific things that can be achieved by changing the rules of the game. For other things, it might in fact make things worse rather than necessarily better.
It's really a question, again, as we said at the beginning, of identifying the central problem you want to address. It's not a crisis necessarily, but are there particular issues you think are really a problem in Canadian politics? In that case, what are the best rules that actually match that particular problem?
However, there's no single best solution to all of the issues that are facing you, just as there aren't in other political systems or democracies either.
3:30 p.m.
Public Policy Chair, Massey College, University of Toronto, As an Individual
One of the advantages of first past the post and one of the reasons it was supported in the referendums in British Columbia, Ontario, and so on—and it's not to be discounted—is it's simple and it's easy to understand. We're used to it, and simplicity in your electoral system is an important virtue in a world of confusion and many messages.
Therefore, I go back to the point that several of us have made, which is that if we are to make changes, the education mission—in addition to the points I've tried to make about Parliament as a complementary thrust to change in the nature of electoral system—the education that has to go in on those issues is absolutely enormous. I think that when these suggested reforms fail in referendums, it's largely because of the difficulty of understanding alternative systems and because we are used to an easily understood system, which, by the way, doesn't work badly.
3:30 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Francis Scarpaleggia
Thank you.
We will proceed to the second round. You have the floor, Ms. Sahota.
3:30 p.m.
Liberal
Ruby Sahota Liberal Brampton North, ON
Thank you.
I'm going to continue from that message of simplicity. I asked a question about it yesterday and I think sometimes people scoff as well at that, saying that it's still simple no matter what system you use. We heard from an Australian witness that they had ballots as long as a mile, but yet it works there for some reason, and it's simple.
I had a gentleman in my town hall on Sunday get up, and somebody asked me on Twitter whether it was hijacked by a certain party and that's why the person was calling for simplicity. It wasn't somebody hijacking or anything; it was simply a man who had come out of sheer interest because he knew nothing about the topic. I would say it was a very small percentage of those people, but it was more people who were there for a certain purpose. I was very appreciative of having this person there. They're fairly new to the country, I believe, probably arriving in the last 10 to 15 years or so. He said that maybe you guys know better up there on the panel, so pick a system that you think is better suited for us, but just make sure we understand it and make sure it's simple because I'm not sure why we're even messing with this.
I looked at him and I thought, “That's interesting. There are quite a lot of people who don't realize what we're doing.” Around this committee table we think we're doing very important work, and among my political colleagues everyone understands that this is a very important issue, as well as some groups that study it and are interested in it, but the general population is asking, “What are you talking about?” When you're trying to get people out to the town hall, they're asking, “What do you mean? What's first past the post?” I even had people who are in politics ask me what that was.
Therefore I ask you, how highly do you value that? Having mentioned that our country is accepting new immigrants to our shores day after day, do we not have a responsibility to also make sure that we're taking them into consideration? One of the fundamental key principles that we're looking at in this committee is inclusivity. Inclusivity also means those people. Inclusivity means making sure people of all educational backgrounds can also understand how to go to the polls and how to vote and how to have access.
What are your thoughts on that, and what system do you think could work in that regard?
3:30 p.m.
Prof. Matthew P. Harrington
I agree. I think simplicity...and the other aspect of that is accountability. When I vote, at the end of the night I can look and I can see who won. I think a system that gets overly complicated raises suspicions that the computer is doing these things, but when we have a government that is accountable because it has gathered the largest number of seats and the people have voted in a particular riding. I think that's also a value that ought not to be diminished.
I think it's especially important for new immigrants or for people who don't pay attention to politics as a hobby or as a job to see that it's not only simple, but to be able to see the results and feel connected. They may not always be happy with the results, but they know what they are.
3:35 p.m.
Prof. Pippa Norris
I have a quick response. Think about the U.K. right now, which has six electoral systems that it's working with quite happily. You have first past the post for Westminster, you have a party list for Europe, you have additional vote for the mayor of London, and you have AMS in Scotland and Wales, and people know how to vote on these different systems.
The complication is really not so much about casting the ballot; that's an issue, but you can explain that. The complications are really more for the electoral commissioner and Elections Canada in how you can actually calculate the results at the end of the day, but nowadays, with technology we can do that fairly straightforwardly. As we saw in Australia, you don't always get the vote result instantly. They take a bit of time, but they get there.
I think the issue of the complexity of the choices and the system is not a fundamental issue. If the U.K. can manage that....
Also, we often think that things are simple because we're familiar with them, but of course if you change the system, people get experience and learn how to run it. You can also have mock elections before you've actually had the real election so that people can try it out to see how it works.
Simplicity can be managed quite easily.
3:35 p.m.
Liberal
Ruby Sahota Liberal Brampton North, ON
Professor, you had mentioned something about no system being able to eradicate strategic voting—
3:35 p.m.
Liberal
Ruby Sahota Liberal Brampton North, ON
Can you elaborate on that? What kind of strategic voting would you see in other systems? So far we've been seeing that this may be eradicated if we go to PR.
3:35 p.m.
Prof. Pippa Norris
Strategic voting is all about the size of the party and your calculations for whether or not your core party, the one you really support, is going to win or not. You do that under every system. There's a marvellous book by Gary Cox about strategic voting.
It's slightly more common under first past the post because any party that's in third and fourth place is going to get nowhere in terms of getting seats, but you can also have strategic voting if you're a small party in a multi-member district or in a very large district as well. It's all the calculation.
3:35 p.m.
Conservative
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
In directing my next set of questions to Professor Norris, to whom I directed my first set of questions, I mean no disrespect to the other witnesses, who are actually particularly interesting. It's just that the subject matter is one in which Professor Norris is the expert.
In responding to my question about comparing the two sets of New Zealand referenda, the flag versus the electoral reform system, you gave me an answer that was unexpected from my point of view. Those are the best answers, of course. You dwelt on the amount of time between the first and second referendum and you emphasized the need in such a situation for adequate time for public education. In so doing, you reflected testimony we heard yesterday with regard to the citizens' assembly process, followed by a referendum in British Columbia and in Ontario when they dealt with electoral reform.
One of the problems we face—and this is critical to the Canadian context right now—is that the Prime Minister made a promise in the last election that we must have a new system in place by the 2019 election, and it takes some time to implement any change to the system.
My party, of course, has been pushing for a referendum, but questions of time are such that it would be literally impossible to have a two-stage referendum, even one that only has a couple of months between stage one and stage two, and still get on with the process of changing the system in time to be in place for the 2019 election.
Is there a way out of that conundrum? Perhaps there is, perhaps there isn't. I'll just pose that question to you.