My name is Duncan Graham and I'm a retired geography teacher and very active with a worldwide organization that's intent on democratizing the United Nations. There's a proclamation we have in this context that also applies to my ideas in Canada, that we are a rich mosaic of ethnicities, languages, and culture, but we are also the brotherhood and sisterhood of humankind. So you might keep that context in mind when I'm for proportional representation, but against the idea of a national referendum.
A few quotes came to mind when I thought about being able to talk to you. There's one of Churchill's where he declared of democracy that's it a pretty poor system; the only thing going for it is it's better than anything else. We all know that one. There's another saying, though, that isn't as often quoted. He mentioned, on the other hand, on the values of democracy, that his despair was increased every time he talked to the average voter.
These thoughts came to mind with not having a national referendum.
The other visionary idea that I would propose for thinking outside the box is that the four candidates in a constituency should all go to Ottawa—Liberal, Conservative, NDP, Green—and in Ottawa they would vote according to the percentage of the vote they got, so that every vote would really count. Instead of quadrupling the number of constituencies, the size of the constituency could be quadrupled. There's no mathematical problem with it, but that's thinking outside the box and probably far too visionary for your intellectual—