Evidence of meeting #29 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 young.
1:50 p.m.
Green
Elizabeth May Green Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC
I would ask Mr. Breslaw to comment on that, but also on the benefits of STV, and then I have another question, if I can get back to Professor Nikolenyi.
1:50 p.m.
Professor Emeritus of Economics, Concordia University, As an Individual
The reason why this is so interesting to me is that it actually asks the Canadian voters to accept the system that they are very happy using. In that sense, I don't think we're going to get a lot of argument from them in terms of changing the system. Change is always disruptive, and this one doesn't involve any change as far as the electorate is concerned.
As for the question of it being too complex for the voters, well, they don't have to care about it because.... And you have been told as a committee that 67% of Canadians are in favour of proportional representation. So how do we have proportional representation on one level and not changing the system at the other level? Well, I've just given it to you.
1:55 p.m.
Green
Elizabeth May Green Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC
If I could go to you again, Professor Nikolenyi, you're clearly supporting single transferable vote. I don't want to put you at a disadvantage. Have you seen the evidence before us from Jean-Pierre Kingsley, our former chief electoral officer, about his way of addressing STV and dealing with large rural ridings?
1:55 p.m.
Professor, Department of Political Science, Concordia University, As an Individual
No.
1:55 p.m.
Green
Elizabeth May Green Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC
Okay. Well then, let me ask if you have given any thought to how one would treat, say, the territories when you're doing an STV system for Canada.
1:55 p.m.
Professor, Department of Political Science, Concordia University, As an Individual
It's a tough question that becomes a question of how you draw the boundaries and how many seats you assign to those particular districts. Other than that, I'm not sure what you're getting at, but the question is whether electoral boundaries need to follow clearly and exactly provincial and territorial lines, or perhaps you imagine district boundaries in a more creative alternative fashion.
1:55 p.m.
Green
Elizabeth May Green Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC
Under your proposal, would the number of seats in the House of Commons change to accommodate STV in Canada?
1:55 p.m.
Professor, Department of Political Science, Concordia University, As an Individual
It doesn't have to, but again, if what you have in mind is to correct for some of the under-representation that currently exists in Canada, but playing with district magnitude and recognizing the fact that some areas, some groups, may be under-represented, district magnitude can address that. But changing district magnitude doesn't mean changing the number of seats in the House. What it means is how many winners, how many representatives, you have from the various districts. District boundaries would have to be redrawn then.
1:55 p.m.
Liberal
September 23rd, 2016 / 1:55 p.m.
Liberal
Sherry Romanado Liberal Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I would like, once again, to thank our colleague Gabriel Ste-Marie for welcoming us in his lovely riding. We are very proud to be here with him today. I would also like to thank the citizens who have come here today to participate. It's something of real importance.
Now, to my two esteemed colleagues who are from my alma mater, it's a pleasure to see two professors in front of me. I feel I need that white board and some explanations, so—
1:55 p.m.
Professor Emeritus of Economics, Concordia University, As an Individual
It's good to see students who have done well.
1:55 p.m.
Liberal
Sherry Romanado Liberal Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC
My first question will be for Professor Nikolenyi. Please forgive my pronunciation of your name.
1:55 p.m.
Professor, Department of Political Science, Concordia University, As an Individual
That's been the best so far.
1:55 p.m.
Voices
Oh, oh!
1:55 p.m.
Liberal
Sherry Romanado Liberal Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC
All right, but now you won't like what I ask.
You mentioned, when talking about MMP, that depending on how many proportional seats are in the House, you may end up with unintended consequences when mixing up those two types of MPs. Can you elaborate a little on what you meant by that?
1:55 p.m.
Professor, Department of Political Science, Concordia University, As an Individual
That particular aspect is only one of the many variables that define a mixed member system. Probably much more important, or just as important, what is no less important than the number of seats you allocate to the proportional theory is how much cross-contamination you allow.
Look at the German system. The German system is known as a mixed member system, but Professor Massicotte's name has come up before, and he went on the record many times to say that it is actually a list PR system in terms of its fundamental outcome, because the proportional peer, the outcome of the party list vote, determines the overall allocation of seats.
Do voters know that? How many voters will know that when they are presented with the choice of voting for a party on the party ballot and for a candidate on the constituency ballot?
There are all kinds of complications. What if the constituency seats that the party gets entitled to actually exceed the number of seats that the party would be entitled to under the proportional vote? You can correct for all of those, but those need to be also checked and looked at. When I—
2 p.m.
Liberal
Sherry Romanado Liberal Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC
I'm going to stop you because I have another question.
2 p.m.
Professor, Department of Political Science, Concordia University, As an Individual
Sure.
2 p.m.
Liberal
Sherry Romanado Liberal Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC
I would like both of you to answer this one.
You mentioned there are drawbacks to MMP or proportional systems, so on the flip side—Professor Breslaw, first I'm going to ask you if you can explain your math to me again so I can write it down—wouldn't creating MPs with weighted votes have all the same drawbacks as proportional seats? The reason I'm asking this is that if my vote is only worth, say, 0.4 or 0.8, Ms. May's is worth 2, and someone else's is worth 7, I'm 0.7 of an MP versus how she's 2 MPs.
I'm just saying that in terms of all of the problems that entails in terms of two-tiered MP systems. I'm just throwing that out there because I love the idea—it's simple; I love it—but I'm just wondering what the drawbacks would be.
2 p.m.
Professor Emeritus of Economics, Concordia University, As an Individual
You'll get over it.
2 p.m.
Voices
Oh, oh!
2 p.m.
Professor Emeritus of Economics, Concordia University, As an Individual
I'll take the two for one because I don't want to cut you in half.
Having extra MPs in Elizabeth's camp keeps her having a single vote, but we have these extra votes lying around. They haven't been elected; they are costly—you have to pay their pensions—and it doesn't serve any other purpose besides the same idea of giving Elizabeth the double vote. That concept is simply the idea of how we get proportional representation in a manner that is realistic.
This committee is doing all this work. It has to report by December 1. The electoral officer has said that a new system has to be in place by the spring if it's going to go into effect for the next general election. Generally, large changes are painful. A small change like this—and it doesn't feel small to you, but it really is—where we're just changing one thing, the actual weight of the voting in the House—can actually occur and can actually have consensus. None of you will lose your seat, because your seats are going to be determined in exactly the same way as they were determined before.
