Electoral Reform Committee on Oct. 5th, 2016

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Banff—Airdrie, AB]

I'm sorry to interrupt on that, but do you not think that might be something we see in other provinces if we went to the type of a system with proportionality, and would you see that being expanded? Would other provinces maybe vote a specific regional party in with just regional interests for that province? Would you see that being an issue if that were to happen?

[Earle McCurdy]

I doubt it. You might. There's still a pretty powerful...if you look at what information voters are exposed to in making a decision on how to vote, then I think that an awful lot still comes back to them seeing the party leaders on television every night. They see them on social media and stuff. A candidate who is not tied to a leader of a national party has a chance to get elected, but it's more of an uphill struggle.

Yes, you might, but I wouldn't think that would be rampant. In the current system, if somebody wanted to say, “We're for the Newfoundland separatist party“, then 40% of the vote could get you all the seats in the current system, at least on a proportional representation. It might get you a couple, but it wouldn't get you—

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you.

We'll go now to Mr. DeCourcey.

[Matt DeCourcey, Liberal, Fredericton, NB]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. McCurdy, for joining us this evening.

I've listened and listened to other witnesses come before the panel and suggest that moving to a PR system will increase voter turnout. Something I think we want to be striving for is greater voter engagement at the time of election and leading into greater democratic engagement between election periods.

If we look at the statistics across western democracies, whether in proportional systems or in single-member plurality systems, regardless of the type of system, then there seems to be a trend throughout western democracies of decreasing voter engagement and decreasing voter turnout.

Some of that could be due in Canada potentially to fewer people seeing themselves reflected in the Parliament that is elected. I think that is a goal that we have to strive for, enhancing diversity in politics. I had this conversation with Professor Bittner earlier today about whether that means enhancing diversity in the people we see and what they look like in Parliament, with men, women, indigenous persons, persons living with disabilities, and people from racialized minorities, or does it mean people who reflect different partisan views or different ideologies? We had a good conversation about the intersection and the diversion that those diversities represent.

I'm wondering if you have any insight into how we can focus our efforts more on encouraging parties to put forth more diverse candidacies. Professor Bittner said regardless of what system we move to, and even if you move to PR, you still need to find ways to have parties beholden or committing to putting forth more women candidates, more indigenous candidates, and more candidates from ethnic minorities.

[Earle McCurdy]

I think the mixed system provides at least the opportunities for parties to achieve that.

[Matt DeCourcey, Liberal, Fredericton, NB]

Any system provides the opportunity.

[Earle McCurdy]

Here are the difficulties I see. With the current system, I think all the main parties have district associations that have the autonomy to choose their candidates. As long as you have that, and they each have one seat, then how do you say that St. John's East has to have a woman, or has to have whatever? It's very difficult.

A party could very well have a policy in developing their list, and their list will have some diversity built into it by party rules, because presumably the list wouldn't be developed by a single district.

I assume your district association would have elected, or had the opportunity to pick, the representative, and whoever wins that is the candidate. That makes it very challenging to get balance.

In our party, we succeeded in the provincial election. We had 40 candidates, with 22 men and 18 women, and we very actively and aggressively courted women to run for us, and we came close to—

[Matt DeCourcey, Liberal, Fredericton, NB]

I think that proves the point that can happen under any system, and even my colleague across the way, Mr. Cullen, will I'm sure fill you in before you leave today on the bill in front of Parliament. No, he won't, okay. He's done that enough already. There are ways to incentivize or discipline parties should they make or not make the effort to encourage or see a more diverse slate of candidates run for office and hopefully be elected. As we've seen, when women are able to run for office, then they are able to be elected in equal order to men. That evidence has been presented to us on a number of different occasions.

Just in closing, it struck me when my colleague Mr. Aldag was asking you about the party's position here in Newfoundland that this conversation—as colleagues here around this table will remind us—has been ongoing in Canada since 1920, and yet we're still talking about it. We've had NDP governments elected in different provinces across the country that have not been able, or have not seen the desire, to change the electoral system either. Why is that the case in your mind?

[Earle McCurdy]

I think it's a bit of an esoteric issue, and that it's an issue for people who are of interest and are primarily people who actively engage in politics. I knocked on thousands of doors last fall, and I'm not sure anyone brought up proportional representation. It's not a grassroots issue. I guess over time there have been these results that have perhaps contributed to it, but parties ran in the last election saying, “Look, if we're elected, then that will be the last time you'll see first past the post. We're going to change that. We think it's time for a change.” I guess that has evolved over time. I can't say I've studied it closely over the years, so that's just a guess on my part.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thanks very much.

That closes our round of questioning. We really appreciate that you could join us, Mr. McCurdy, to get a party leader perspective on the issue. It is a new angle for us. I think you're the first active party leader who has appeared, and it's been valuable to have your input in that sense. Thank you very much.

We are going to proceed with a short list of people who would like to intervene in the two-minute rounds, but of course, Mr. McCurdy, we are setting you free, and it was nice to meet you.

[Earle McCurdy]

Thanks very much, Chair, I appreciate it.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

We'll get going with this open mike segment with Ms. Ledwell, please, for two minutes.

[Jean Ledwell, As an Individual]

Thank you.

I would like to preface my remarks by saying that really I hope our Parliament, aided by yourselves, will take this decision. Just today, for example, in the New York Times, there was a fabulous article about the problems with going to a referendum. We've seen examples, and the most painful one we're all aware of now is what's just happened in Colombia.

The referendum may be on what type of voting system we should have, but people may participate in the referendum to solve or make other points, such as political points.

As a committee, I commend you for your work. Over 64% of our parliamentarians elected this time were elected from parties that said they wanted to move to some type of PR system. That's the first thing I'd like to say.

The second thing I'd like to say is that we have a system that was developed and evolved, and it has not continued to evolve. We're evolutionary creatures, and we're living in an evolutionary context in the cosmos. Our system has not evolved. We're still mired in a system that is militaristic, patriarchal, and based on lengths of swords between opposing, duelling parties. This has to come to an end. We are now not in a two-party system, and we're not two duelling elite lords. We are in a multicultural, multi-faceted system. It does not serve us well that we are still clinging to an old system.

I have not been involved in politics directly, but I've been involved in social issues my entire life, as was my father. I have to say that we are not reinventing the wheel here. Other countries and most advanced democracies have some type of a sophisticated system. I'm really speaking in favour of some type of mixed system.

I don't want you to think that I'm not capable. I have done a lot of reading and a lot of study, which is why I decided to say a few words. Women should speak up whenever they have a chance. I think that it's incumbent upon us. As a previous speaker said, it wasn't maybe a doorstep point, but it was a point well taken by many Canadians who feel disenfranchised.

As a person with a significant disability who has had many a problem trying to vote, I think, for God's sake, let's move to a digital electronic voting system soon so we you can just do it simply.

I think it's critical that, yes, it won't solve every problem we have, but it will certainly send a signal to our citizenry that there's interest in having diverse voices, diverse opinions, and diverse faces in our system.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Brake, go ahead.

[David Brake, As an Individual]

Hello.

I gather that you have a number of fine principles. The problem with the principles, and indeed it's a problem of deciding the system in general, is that you have competing principles at stake. If you have to ditch one, then I would say ditch simplicity. We're only likely to get a chance to fix the electoral system once in this generation. Don't go for a system that is easily explicable to people who in any case aren't currently engaged. Go for a system that will do the best job, and go for a made-in-Canada solution that solves as many of the problems as you can at the same time. For example, try to work in better regional representation. I would back the single transferable vote, but that clearly doesn't work for big areas with low populations, so work on that. Come up with a workable compromising solution that other countries haven't tried before because they haven't needed to. Similarly, work on having better representation for first nations people, women, and other minorities. Build that into the system by, if necessary, coercing parties into making lists that better represent people in the system you choose.

My point is these ideas have not necessarily been tried elsewhere, and they may not be easy initially to sell to people and to explain to people in a form of a referendum, for example. That's why we have representative government. You guys have been doing a lot of thinking. You've been talking to a lot of experts. The public has entrusted the government, broadly speaking, with a mandate to change the electoral system for months. For my money, that's good enough for me. I have a Ph.D., and I care about this stuff. I sat down and looked through the material, and I found it quite difficult to come up with my own idea of what I think these things should be. Asking the Canadian public in a limited scope of time to look at what I hope would be a reasonably complicated proposal is just too much.

If it turns out you come up with something that is really difficult and that the public doesn't like, then the public is perfectly entitled to turn around and vote to go back and choose something else. That's where I put my priority.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thanks very much.

Mr. Tarasoff, go ahead.

[Lev Tarasoff, As an Individual]

I'm an educator and a scientist, and I want to put forward a broader perspective that was already raised earlier in the context of the issues we're facing over the long-term, so-called, wicked problems of diversity, and climate change, etc. It was a discussion about the impact on the decision-making process. Another aspect we have to look at is the impact on alienation and buy-in. If we don't have an engaged citizenry, then we're going to see what's happening in the States. I don't think the U.S. is going to be well-situated to deal with these kind of problems. In Canada we could be heading the same way unless we have a system that promotes engagement. To me PR would be the only way. There are issues with the mechanics of it. With MMP you could play around with the lists. I think that's where there could be a lot of creativity with add-ons. It could be an open list. It could be people who are running in the ridings. There's a lot of play that I think you could work with. To put that context on, part of your role is going to be selling whatever system you're providing, and putting this long-term perspective on that I think is important.

What I say to my classes is that if you haven't voted, then it's hard to stay engaged if your vote doesn't count. My vote hasn't counted. I just want to contradict the earlier point. I can understand why not everybody's vote gets to count. In PR it would count, right? I've been voting for 36 years, and not once has my vote really counted in a federal election. I would also echo the point that we don't need simpler systems. If you look at the Australian system, it's crazily complicated. Canadians aren't any stupider than the Australians. It doesn't have to be a complicated system, but we don't need simplicity.

The last point is on the mechanics. We don't have to get it exactly perfect. I'm a scientist, and you learn by experiment. If we went with MMP, then I think the issues would be around how you do the lists. You could say we're going try a few different things and explore. It doesn't have to be fixed in stone. They can take that kind of scientific approach to help make a transition. We're never going to get it perfect on the first try, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try it. Kids would not grow up that way.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you.

We'll hear from Liam O'Neill now, please.

[Liam O'Neill]

Hello again, everyone. I'm back.

To start off, the biggest problem with MMP that I see is that if you have top-up seats and someone who gets elected decides they no longer support that party, there is a bit of a conflict of interest. They get elected based on party support, but if they no longer support that party, then what do you do with them? Are they still elected? If they are, then they're not really representing the people who voted for them.

I still believe in proportional representation. I believe STV is the best system. I believe there are two main problems with STV. One is the complexity, but, as we said, that's not a reasonable reason not to use it. With STV, I think the remaining biggest problem is representation in rural areas.

There are two solutions to that. The best solution is to increase the number of MPs in the House so that it's more proportional. Obviously, a lot of people don't like that because it's going to cost more taxpayer money to have more representatives.

The other solution is to keep it at one member in certain places, like the territories and Labrador, and to use the alternative vote system in those smaller places. As much as I don't like that because it's not proportional, it's in a fewer number of places and it can represent people's first choice. If they can't do that, then in my opinion it's not very democratic, certainly not very much a representative democracy.

As well, I want to say that it's a bit frustrating sitting here and hearing such good questions from you and not being able to answer them.

I think we're going to wrap up early. If anyone wants to ask me some of the hard questions they haven't figured out answers to, feel free to, but I realize you probably want a break after such a busy schedule.

Thank you for listening, and good luck.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you very much.

We'll listen now to Mr. Norman Whalen, please.

[Norman Whalen, As an Individual]

Welcome to Newfoundland, and thanks for bringing the good weather.

Let me first tell you a little about my background. I got addicted to politics when I saw Joe Smallwood speak from the back of a pickup truck when I was about 10 years old.

During my university days in law school, I was an avid NDPer and had the good fortune of working with Tommy Douglas. Had I been old enough in those days, I probably would have run for the NDP.

In 1974, I ran federally for the Liberals, and, in the nineties, my oldest son ran for the Green Party, all in St. John's East. In the last election, my son ran for the Liberals in the same riding.

I have supported the candidates of all the major parties, including the Green Party, financially and with work. I have always tried, absent a national issue, to vote for the best candidate. I think that is a very important thing to do—and I'll get back to that very briefly.

I think it's also important to try to recognize somehow the fact that there are large numbers of people who vote for candidates who don't get elected—and I'll touch on that very briefly inside my two minutes.

I value very strongly the idea that the person you vote for represents the riding, the district, the people who are in that district. That's why people get the chance to vote for the person they want. The preferential ballot helps that happen because it's the vote of at least 50% plus one of the people in the riding. If that system, which I prefer, had been in place, Jack Harris would probably be sitting in Ottawa and not my son. One of them had 45% of the vote and the other had 47% of the vote. However, it is important to note that the other people's votes should have been counted.

There was a system in place before the Harper regime that recognized in some way the votes of individuals, because parties were funded on a percentage of the vote they actually received. At least that helps us get to that representation. We have too short a time to get into it now, but I think there are strong and compelling reasons that a preferential ballot, as opposed to percentage system, is the right way to go. There may be some way to meld the two, but eventually we'll have a Green Party in Ottawa.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you, Mr. Whalen.

We'll say hello to Nick for you, for sure.

[Matt DeCourcey, Liberal, Fredericton, NB]

We said hello to him yesterday in Halifax with his travelling committee.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Mr. Roth, please.

[Peter Roth, As an Individual]

I don't have too much new to add to the discussion. I just wanted to say that I think it's really unfortunate that right now in Atlantic Canada, despite a very diverse vote, we have 32 Liberal MPs and there is no opposition. No one, as Mr. McCurdy said, can stand in question period and ask the government opposition questions. I think that's really unfortunate.

I think in proportional representation, we'd have that opportunity.