Electoral Reform Committee on Sept. 21st, 2016

[Laura Stephenson]

For example, in the Atlantic provinces, we know that Prince Edward Island is going to have another plebiscite coming up. The impetus behind looking at changing the system again, because it failed the first time, is that they have very unequal results.

We know our parliamentary system is built upon the idea that there's an effective opposition, but if one party sweeps the entire province then they don't have an effective opposition. Their legislature is not able to function the way it should. That's a pressing issue. I think that's exactly why the government has been moving forward to bring about this plebiscite.

In other situations that we've seen at the provincial level, there has been what they call a “wrong winner” election, which is that one party gets a greater proportion of votes than it gets seats, so it's vice versa. We assume that the party that gets the most votes should also get the most seats, whether or not it's perfectly proportional. When that happens, that's often a reason as well that the public get quite engaged around the idea of changing the electoral system.

[Larry Maguire, Conservative, Brandon—Souris, MB]

Thank you, and Ms. Bergeron as well.

I was very interested in your comments, particularly around even the number of blind persons who understand Braille. There are educational processes there. Previous panellists have indicated that we would need to have education in regard to the type of system....

Perhaps more panellists would want to answer this. When you're looking at the types of systems that are there, you indicated there would be particular comments to be made around mandatory voting. I wonder if you could elaborate on that a little more. You indicated, of course, that if there's mandatory voting, you would either have to provide exceptions or make it completely available for everyone. Being very interested in the disabilities part of our society myself, I certainly would like you to expand on that.

[Diane Bergeron]

I truly believe that if we're going to make voting mandatory, then we also need to make sure every person has the same rights in the voting system going forward. If we are going to do mandatory voting, then I don't think I should have to have somebody with me in the polling station who I do not know and who could mark my ballot for me. I think I should be able to do that independently. I should be able to check it myself to make sure that I haven't unintentionally spoiled my vote, and also to make sure that it's in secret. If I don't have those rights upheld, then I don't think I should be forced to go through the same process as everyone else.

If the voting process is made completely 100% accessible to everybody, then that would be different. I truly don't believe that mandatory voting should be put in place without the exceptions to allow people to have the right to back out if they are not being considered equally or treated equally within that process.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you.

We'll go to Mr. Aldag.

[John Aldag, Liberal, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

Thank you.

I'm going to start with Ms. Bergeron.

After you finished your presentation, I had a quick look at the CNIB website. It's interesting to note that the estimate is that 500,000 Canadians are living with vision loss. To me, as you were talking about the barriers you've encountered and the barriers that exist for your community, that's a huge number.

One person excluded from voting because of a disability, or one person having the right to a secret ballot violated because of our system, is one too many.

Do you have an idea, of the 500,000 Canadians living with a visual disability, if there are some who are able to participate in the process, and it's awkward? What percentage of Canadians from your community are completely excluded?

[Diane Bergeron]

I would say that for the components of voting in secret, 100% of people who are totally blind are excluded, because there is absolutely no way to be able to verify your vote. You have to have somebody else there to verify the vote.

As everybody else does, I can take it in, I can use the Braille template, and I can check my mark on the piece of paper, but it's important that we all check to make sure that we didn't accidentally spoil the ballot. I would say it is 100% of the people who are totally blind.

People who can read large print, and people who have some ability to read with magnifiers, would have the ability to do this on their own, but I couldn't tell you exactly what that portion is.

[John Aldag, Liberal, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

Okay, that gives me a sense.

I appreciate you sharing your personal experience with us today. It was a powerful testimony for me.

I'm going to move now to Professor Stephenson.

I had read the same article that my colleague, Mr. DeCourcey, had read. In your concluding comments, you indicate that moving to a different system will generally benefit small parties. I've been sitting here mulling it over, and I'll give you a bit of a preamble, but ultimately I'm asking, to what magnitude would small parties benefit?

I'll give you a couple of examples of what's been going through my head.

In the neighbouring riding to me, the Libertarians ran a candidate. In my riding, there was a Conservative, a Liberal, an NDP, and a Green. A number of people who voted Green, for example, said that truly was their first choice. A number of other people voted Green because it was their protest vote, and they felt that it was the only way they could say that they were disillusioned with the system. They weren't going to support any of the main three parties.

Through the research that you've done, did you get a sense of how many people might move from that protest vote? You said strategic voting is 3%. I've seen strategic voting being more like somebody who decided at the last minute to vote for Liberal versus NDP so they could get the Conservatives out.

On the question of the protest vote, in the research that you've done, have you looked at that? I'm trying to understand if it could harm some of the small parties where people would say that under a proportional representation system they could win a seat. Would that swing them to a different party or to go in to vote a ballot spoilage instead of the protest vote? Does your research support any of that or provide any indication of what voters are thinking?

[Laura Stephenson]

I have never really thought about it that way. It is an interesting point.

Where my comments came from, or where my conclusions would have come from, is that when electoral systems are more permissive, which usually means that more parties will get seats, you tend to see more parties forming, or at least more parties getting the support, because they now become viable players.

Whether or not there is a lot of strategic voting going on, we have to recognize that electoral systems also create incentives—or not—for parties to enter the arena. Some of the very small parties we have are a little out there, so—

[John Aldag, Liberal, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

Your research indicates 23 registered parties in the last one. How many of those would actually become players, and how many of them are at the fringe of the electoral process?

[Laura Stephenson]

That is exactly the point there. When we are talking about protest voting currently, we are talking about these small players, but perhaps there would be groups within our existing parties that would splinter off to create more specialized, let's say, interest parties, more directly related to their own interests. Those would be smaller parties, but they would be more likely to get the support.

The idea is that parties have the incentive to enter the electoral arena if they are more likely to get elected. Voters have the incentive to vote for those parties when they are more likely to get the seats. You tend to see a greater spread of interest being represented in seat-earning parties in more proportional systems.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you.

Mr. Boulerice, the floor is yours.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Good afternoon. Like my colleague Nathan Cullen, I am very happy to see that our first group of witnesses is predominantly female. That is important; it is a value that we share. Nathan is not the only male feminist around the table. I am very proud of the fact that the NDP caucus is 41% women. It's true that it's not by chance and that it is the result of political will and recruitment efforts to have candidates who reflect our society.

Professor Stephenson, you talked about the importance of a relationship between voters and representatives, the local, somewhat organic, connection between the two. The system that you are supporting maintains that connection. That comes up quite often; it is a concern for the people and it is understandable. People like to know who they have to call to complain.

The system you are presenting makes me think of the Irish system. I think they have between three and five members per constituency. I find that very appealing, but one of our problems is the geography of the Canadian Confederation. We often say this: Nathan's riding is 330,000 square kilometres, which is larger than Poland, and my riding is 11 square kilometres. We can easily imagine that, on the Island of Montreal, it is possible to amalgamate and merge ridings to make bigger ones, but it would be more difficult to do so in other parts of the country. Can you see a Canadian solution with multi-member constituencies in large and mid-sized cities and with the traditional one-member constituencies in less populous regions?

[Laura Stephenson]

We certainly could have a made-in-Canada system, by all means. The distinction to remember is that any single-member district system will necessarily be a first past the post system, so it would not be proportional. You could have single-member districts as well as multi-member districts, just recognizing that the only proportionality would come from multi-member districts. The extent to which that is going to be liked across the country is something to consider.

Certainly, geography is a challenge in these issues. It is made to work in other systems. There is no perfect way of looking at it. You could do a mix of first past the post and PR, but it might raise some other issues. To be fair, I have never seen that anywhere else.

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

You pointed out something that I thought was very interesting. It seems to be a fairly well-known fact, except for some witnesses, that proportional systems increase the presence of women in parliaments. We have often heard about quota systems or closed lists where men and women alternate on the ballots. However, this is the first time I have heard that more women are elected in open list systems. I have not heard that before.

Can you explain why open lists in a proportional system would have more women elected than the first past the post system?

[Laura Stephenson]

What I was referring to there was the research we did with an experimental study. It hasn't been tested in the real world, but we have a lot of faith in those results nonetheless. What my colleagues and I—I have several co-authors on the piece—think occurred is, literally, that the individuals wanted to vote in more females. Remember, we used real MP names, so they were real politicians. We found that women and men both increased their votes for female candidates in these systems, although more women did than men. Maybe men are disadvantaged.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

You have 40 seconds left.

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

Can you imagine a system with two votes: one for a local representative and another for a list? The representative from the list would do the work with the people and the community organizations in their city or region.

[Laura Stephenson]

Yes, I would assume so.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Good, good, we're all happy.

We'll go now to Mr. Reid. Good to see you back here.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Could you show some ID, though, please?

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

I get the sense everybody knows my story at this point.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Not really, but we've been insinuating it.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

Okay.

The reason for my absence—it was not intentional disrespect to this panel, let alone the earlier panel that I missed completely—is that at Winnipeg we were all going through the airport, and I had the misfortune to be in line directly in front of somebody who decided to steal my ID and my cellphone. At any rate and from a prudential point of view, it is not a good idea to steal somebody's ID when you're in a place that has cameras on all the time. The RCMP located him. He was on the same flight as us. He was arrested when he got to Toronto, and I came on a later flight.

Thank you, by the way, to our extraordinarily competent staff, who organized and arranged everything.