Thank you very much.
It's a pleasure to see many of you again, this evening. Thank you for visiting me in my new home.
Since I am representing the federal NDP here, I will be doing most of my presentation in English, but feel free to ask me questions in whatever language you want. I'll just speak French sometimes.
Like many Canadians and Yukoners, I believe our first-past-the-post system is outdated. Too often it makes people vote against what they don't want rather than vote for what they want. It also seems to fuel voter apathy by making Canadians feel like their vote doesn't count and that their voice isn't being heard with our first-past-the-post system where a bunch of votes are discounted. Of course, many of those Canadians ask why they should go vote if their vote will not be counted. Proportional representation, where every vote makes a difference to the outcome of an election, would make our Canadian democracy stronger.
Proportional representation can take many forms, many of which maintain regional representation, which is important in a country the size of Canada and most certainly very important in the north as well. As a long-time member of the NDP, I'm very proud to be part of a party that believes in constantly striving to make our political system fairer and more representative.
Back when I was still an MP and sitting alongside some of you, my colleague Craig Scott put forward an opposition motion in December 2014. It sought immediate and sweeping electoral reforms, calling for the current voting system to be replaced by the mixed member proportional system. Although his proposal wasn't adopted, it did meet with some support.
That shows how hard and how long the NDP has been working on the issue of electoral reform.
The NDP is a firm advocate for electoral reform that makes every voter count. We believe that proportional representation is the best choice for Canada and for Canadians.
This system offers Canadians the chance to truly make their vote count. Instead of a system that only requires a certain threshold of support to be met, whether it's a simple majority or a clear 50%-plus-one majority, proportional representation ensures that political parties with popular support are given a fair share of the seats in Parliament. It is not the case right now. It hasn't been in Canada since the foundation of this country, and it's definitely time for a change.
Proportional representation is a tried and tested voting method. Over 80% of OECD countries use a form of this method, including countries like Germany, Sweden, and New Zealand. Many countries that have proportional representation also have local representation, which is essential in a geographically large country like Canada.
Political parties working in proportional representation systems have learned to do something we all want to do more: work together and find areas of common ground.
The current system promotes partisanship. I saw that during my time in Parliament, and, colleagues, you no doubt still experience it on a daily basis. Oftentimes, defending a particular ideology takes precedence, becoming more important than standing up for the interests of Canadians. And yet that is the very thing parliamentarians are elected to do.
By voting for a party and a candidate, Canadians would also get to vote for their preferred local representatives instead of having to choose between local advocates and a political party, which is very often a hard choice to make.
Electoral reform is an important issue also for equality-seeking groups like women in Canada. Nancy Peckford wrote in a 2002 report for the National Association of Women and the Law that Canadian women would be well represented in a proportional representation system. Canadian women have fought for the right to vote and the right to run for office. We're still fighting for equality. Having a structural change in our voting system would give women a better chance of having their voice heard and being represented. Right now women are still under-represented in Parliament. Key decision-makers and elected representatives have not always been responsive to women's demands for political, social, and economic equality.
I would suggest that if there were more women in Parliament, we'd probably already have a national program for affordable day care. But we're still very under-represented, so there's still a lot of work to be done there. It's possible to have lists where you would include more women, so a more representative electoral system would result in greater numbers of women in office. As well, other jurisdictions with a proportional representation electoral model are more co-operative across party lines to achieve equality for women.
Proportional representation is a unifying principle among a variety of voting systems, so many countries require party lists to have equal numbers of men and women presented on the list. This is one kind of structural reform that is needed to promote women's equality. An important first step was done by the federal government by creating a gender-equal cabinet, but there's still a long way to go.
In conclusion, I just wanted to say a few words on ranked ballots, or alternate voting. It's been presented as a system that would be more fair and give Canadians a chance to be heard. But that's only on the surface. Ranked ballots are simply a variation on first past the post ballots, so even though ranked ballots ensure that one candidate needs a 50%-plus-one majority to win, the other 49% of voters are left without a voice in the new Parliament. We're basically very close to the situation that we're decrying right now. That's why ranked ballots, to me, and for the NDP, don't seem to be a solution. They only perpetuate the flaws in the current electoral system that people want to see changed.
With proportional representation, each party receives the same share of voices in a Parliament as the votes that people cast for that party, so it's fair.
Our current first-past-the-post system distorts the outcome of an election by giving false majorities to parties that haven't won the confidence of the majority of voters. This exaggeration of electoral results has created an unfortunate sense of voter apathy. With a vote under proportional representation, every vote counts, because your party vote is tallied whether your chosen candidate wins or not.
Thank you very much for your time.