Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I really want to say to all of you around the table that I can only imagine how gruelling this whole process is, but I also want to say how extremely important it is.
I spent the largest piece of my working life in various developing countries and saw the struggles of governance in those countries. I always thought our system was bulletproof, until I started to see what was happening in some of the European countries. I realized that the strength and credibility of liberal democratic systems is really very much in question in many parts of the world, not here—yet—but I think it is extremely important that we address the question of citizens' participation and, as a part of that, citizens' sense of agency. Many young people I spoke to prior to the last federal election said, “Oh, I am not going to vote; it doesn't make any difference.” We have a real challenge to convince those people that their vote does make a difference.
For that reason, I put emphasis on two of the five values you identified: first, proportional representation, so that there is a sense of citizen agency; and second, local representation, so that we know who at least one of our voices is. Putting these two things together I think adds up to a multi-member proportional system, of which there are clearly many variations. I encourage you to look carefully at that and to offer real hope that we will have a wider citizen participation in the future.
Thank you.