In your brief, you've set out that you think we should hold the referendum, if we hold one, accompanying the 2019 election. We were told by Marc Mayrand that a stand-alone referendum would cost $300 million. You're suggesting that we want to make sure there's a lot of money for public education, so clearly there's a really significant cost to a stand-alone referendum as opposed to having money for public education about why we're changing the voting system. But implicitly in your brief, although you didn't actually say it, doing it the way you suggest would mean that the current Prime Minister would have broken an election promise to ensure that 2015 is the last election held under first past the post.
I personally worry about the level of public cynicism and skepticism about politicians keeping their promises. I also have a lot of skepticism about whether we'll get this chance again after an election in which someone has made the promise. What happens when it's no longer a campaign promise? Do we get back to it ever again?
Do you have any comments?
If there's time, I'd love to hear from Brendon on the same point.