Evidence of meeting #20 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 constituency.
A video is available from Parliament.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
I have a couple of questions. I want to understand the impacts we've seen in Scotland or Germany, if any, of lowering the voting age to 17 and then 16, in terms of voter turnout. Have you done any research to see what the impacts have been? What type of resistance did you face? I proposed a bill in my first term in Parliament to do such a thing. We actually had a coalition of a Conservative, a Bloc, and a Liberal go on tour with the bill in Canada, but there was a fair amount of uncertainty among Canadians about making such a move. What results have we seen, if any, in Scotland and Germany so far?
Head of Electoral Commission, Scotland, The Electoral Commission
In the independence referendum in 2014, 16 and 17-year-olds were given the vote. It was a very engaged electorate. There were thought to be well over 90% of 16 and 17-year-olds registered, and very high levels of participation in terms of voting.
We are about to publish our report on the Scottish Parliament next week. Through opinion polling of the age group, we have again found very high levels of registration, and claimed turnout is well over 70%—which of course is higher than the actual turnout, but that is a common phenomenon.
The electorate, the 16 and 17-year-olds, has been very interested in registering and voting, and that is seen through the activities in schools.
Convener, The Electoral Management Board for Scotland
Anecdotally, it's been welcomed here and there was some disquiet that 16 and 17-year-olds couldn't vote in the Brexit referendum earlier this year in June. There was a very specific debate in the House of Commons and the House of Lords about that. I'm sure it would be of interest to you to read those debates. At the end of the day, it was decided that they wouldn't have a vote, although the Lords did suggest that it was a good idea. There is now a bit of confusion, in that 16 and 17-year-olds up here have the vote for some elections but not for some others, and I don't think that is ideal.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
If I understand the German case, it's by some levels of government and some regions. The voting age is not uniform across levels of German politics. Is that correct, or do I have that wrong?
Prof. Friedrich Pukelsheim
That's correct.
The voting age differs on the state level, on the local level, and on the federal level. On the federal level, it's 18 years, but in Austria it's 16 years. There is a permanent discussion going on about whether we should lower it to 16 years. So far, any attempt in this direction has not been successful in the Bundestag.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
Perhaps not today, but if either of the professors from Germany have any evidence on what the impact has been, because you have a neighbour who is using a lower enfranchisement age, that would be interesting to us.
Turning back to Scotland for a moment about the education component of changing systems and how vital it is to engage young people in particular—regardless if they're at voting age or not, because they'll inherit the system—what efforts were made? What advice would you have for us in speaking to young people about what determinations we make?
Head of Electoral Commission, Scotland, The Electoral Commission
It interests me because 16 and 17-year-olds are easy to find because the vast majority of them are all in school. We work with the education lists at both the local level and the [Technical difficulty--Editor] to help teachers undertake registration drives, because you can register online now and learn how to vote. We also work with Skills Development Scotland for about 8% of 16 and 17-year-olds who aren't in formal education to get messages out. We arrange for tweets to be sent to that core vote, which actually [Technical difficulty--Editor] good registration level.
Bloc
Luc Thériault Bloc Montcalm, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
In terms of the right to vote at 16, I would like to point out that education falls under provincial jurisdiction and that all the budgets are managed by the provinces. If the federal government decided to go ahead with this amendment, changes would automatically need to be made at the provincial level. Training would have to be added to all the schools, which would require funding. That might be a challenge.
As we listen to the testimony of experts, a number of nuances emerge. Proponents of the mixed member proportional system sometimes say that this will increase voter turnout. Others say that it’s not the case or that it’s not significant, but that it will allow for more ideological pluralism. I think that makes perfect sense. However, changes to the voting system depend on the values we want to uphold in a democracy.
In terms of the ideological pluralism, I will turn to the witnesses from Germany.
How are small parties treated in your Parliament? Earlier, you said that, notwithstanding the 5% of mandatory votes to have access to effective representation in Parliament, those parties had the same rights in terms of participating in committees or taking the floor in Parliament.
Is that correct or are there differences, like in Canada? For instance, my party, which has 10 elected members with almost 20% of the votes, is excluded from all the parliamentary committees.
Should we not change the procedure while we are discussing, within very tight deadlines, how to establish the physical presence in our Parliament?
In your country, does each member of the smallest party actually have the same rights as the rest of the parliamentarians?
Prof. Joachim Behnke
The small parties have to reach the five-person threshold. This is very important point because it's connected with the point of strategic voting. I think the most important failure of the first past the post system is that it discriminates between votes depending on the preferences that are expressed in the vote.
In the first past the post system, the design was intended to reward strategic voting, that some citizens give their votes to parties that are not their preferred party. Without the strategic adaptation to the electoral system, plurality systems couldn't produce the desired manufactured majorities of a single party. This means that the cost of a sincere truthful vote, which is in accordance with your true preferences, depends on your political convictions. If you aren't very happy in situations and your preference is for one of the candidates of the two biggest parties, your cost of casting a truthful vote is equal to zero, because this is exactly what you should do. However, if you are a member of the Green Party, in most constituencies the cost of a truthful vote is high, because for a truthful vote you have to sacrifice your only chance to have any impact on the electoral result.
The point is that there is no system without strategic voting, and strategic voting is needed to make systems function in the way they're intended to function. To give the voters of small parties a chance for a bigger percentage, we have a level that is low enough, at 5%, and also high enough to prevent a total fragmentation of parliament.
Bloc
Luc Thériault Bloc Montcalm, QC
At any rate, regardless of the voting system, strategic voting can always take place.
I would have liked to talk with you about the duty to be accountable at the end of a term and how that influences the electoral dynamic. Perhaps colleagues will be able to ask you a question about that.
Here, it seems that we change government every eight years. The government is accountable for what it did. With a coalition government, I imagine that a group may last from one election to the next. In that case, the dynamics of alternance are not clear. But that’s a value that Quebeckers uphold.
Liberal
Green
Elizabeth May Green Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC
Thank you again to the witnesses. I know it's difficult testifying by video. We're all together here and looking at you disembodied on our screens.
I want to try to pursue the issue of closed party lists, first with the German academic team and then with our friends from Scotland.
Thank you, again, for taking such time and care to try to apply the German system to a Canadian model hypothetically. It's much appreciated, and I know it must have been a lot of work.
Looking at page 6 of your brief, where you describe what we would do to fill the party lists, you suggest, “The seats left may be filled from closed party lists. Closed lists encourage parties to promote social cohesion and to include underrepresented groups.”
Now, as you have probably suggested with your experience in Germany, some people don't want to know that the lists are closed; they want some access to them.
I wanted to ask particularly how.... You must be familiar, of course, with Baden-Württemberg, and their use of people who were on the constituency lists and failed to win a seat but had done very, very well. They become, as I understand it, the party choice to fill those seats.
Do you have any observations on how that works in practice?
Prof. Joachim Behnke
Baden-Württemberg is very complicated. The point is that in Baden-Württemberg you have something like an open list because there's only one vote for the constituency seat. For the parties that had not gained constituency seats, the list is constructed in accordance with a percentage of the votes that the candidates have won in the constituencies. The most successful candidate for the Greens, for example, was the first who got one seat, and the second successful one, the second seat, and so on.
The point is that if you want, for example, to take in women's representation, the list is the best opportunity to force every party to give half of their seats to women. There is no enforceable quota in Germany. The quotas are all informal or voluntary commitments of the parties.
The party that first made this commitment was the Green Party. They have a quota of 50%, and they always have the biggest share of women. In Württemberg, where it's something like an open list, the Green Party has the biggest share of women in Parliament, but it's only 40%. In the other Länder, when there are lists, they have 50%.
Green
Elizabeth May Green Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC
You may or may not know that I am the Green Party member of Parliament on this committee, so I stay friends with my German Green friends.
There's a tension, is there not, between a closed party list as a way of promoting social cohesion, inclusion of women, and inclusion of minority groups, and a public sense that, perhaps, this is party cliques and insiders who don't have the same rigours of running for election? Is that tension felt in Germany?
Prof. Friedrich Pukelsheim
Yes, the tension is felt in Germany, but it's not viewed as something bad or indecent. In fact, it's in the interests of parties to ensure that their leading personnel are seated in Parliament. There's nothing wrong with it, I think, in the public's opinion in Germany.
Green
Elizabeth May Green Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC
Turning to Scotland, because you also used a closed list system for the Scottish Parliament, are there informal or formal quotas around inclusion of women on that closed list? In general, how is the list system regarded in the Scottish Parliament?
Head of Electoral Commission, Scotland, The Electoral Commission
In terms of diversity and women on lists and such, there's nothing in the electoral rules that formally requires it. It's really been left to the parties to deal with that and create a more inclusive, representative Parliament.
Parties have tried various devices to ensure a better representation amongst women. For instance, the Labour Party in the European elections requires the list to be female, male, female, male, alternating down the list.
In the past, in the Scottish Parliament election, again the Labour Party used a thing called “pairing”. It was in the early life of the Parliament when the Labour Party was winning a lot of the constituency seats. They paired two constituencies and they had to be winnable constituencies. Of the two, the party required one candidate to be a male and one candidate to be a female.
But all these things are really left to the parties to decide.
Liberal
Matt DeCourcey Liberal Fredericton, NB
I apologize if I missed this in earlier conversation. In Germany, with the closed list, I understand that it's common for candidates to run in a riding and be on the list. Must they do both? Or is it a matter of choice for candidates, in the way parties choose candidates?
Prof. Friedrich Pukelsheim
It is a matter of choice. Actually, most candidates are constituency candidates and they figure on the list. They have a list position.
There are a few exceptions. For example, the president of the Bundestag has no constituency because campaigning in a constituency would be so outspoken for his party that it would be detrimental to his continuing as president in the next legislature.
There are a few leading politicians who are only on the list, but most politicians are on both. They are constituency candidates where they live and they are on the party list of the state they belong to.
Liberal
Matt DeCourcey Liberal Fredericton, NB
I have effectively the same question about Scotland. Is it a can, a must, or a do that candidates both appear on a party list and run in a constituency?
Head of Electoral Commission, Scotland, The Electoral Commission
It's a can. You can stand in both. In Wales, you could, then you couldn't. They're about to change it to, you can.
It really depends. Some parties choose not to because of the way they're packing their votes. The Scottish Green Party, for instance, in the recent Scottish Parliament election, stood in only two constituencies, but it stood in all the lists. It depends where your concentration of vote is.
