Evidence of meeting #38 for Electoral Reform in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was pei.
Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Prince Edward Island, As an Individual
I'm not going to say this with absolute authority, but yes, I believe that there is. You're going to be in Fredericton next, you said?
Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Prince Edward Island, As an Individual
One of your presenters is going to be Dr. Joanna Everitt. She's a colleague of mine at the University of New Brunswick in Saint John. That's the area that she works in, so she will know. If she's not doing it directly, she will know who is.
I think Sonia Pitrie is the name that you want. I think she has done that work at Laval.
Liberal
Sherry Romanado Liberal Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC
Perfect. What I'm trying to do is pinpoint the motivating factors and/or barriers and how we can address each of those barriers. I think it's going to be a combination. The magical solution will be a combination of things that will increase women's participation.
I'm curious to see how many young women run for office. That is a double complexity.
We had, in the last election, and I've spoken to Elizabeth about this, a candidate for the Green Party in the riding next to mine. She turned 18 on the day of the vote. They had to actually verify whether she would be eligible to run, but she ran for federal office. The youngest woman ever, the youngest person ever, to run for federal office was Casandra Poitrasin in Longueuil—St-Hubert, my neighbouring riding. Kudos to her for having the chutzpah to do this.
I think it's a double challenge: getting youth engaged not just in terms of voting but in terms of wanting to run for office.
We've heard some other testimony—I love using this, because people give me dirty looks—about male, stale, pale candidates and MPs. I had to throw it in there, John.
Anyway, we've heard this. How can we get a little more diversity in the House? Is there any advice you would have on how we engage? We might use the same method, the same tactics, we use to engage women to run for office to get younger folks and visible minorities, those with disabilities, and aboriginals to decide to run for office. Do you have some points on that? Then I want to talk about mandatory voting.
Executive Director, PEI Coalition for Women in Government
I would also offer that in 2009, the Coalition for Women in Government undertook a study. One of the biggest reasons we had heard from women as to why they decided not to run was a concern about work-life balance. So in 2009, we undertook some national research that compared the work-life balance of MLAs across the country to P.E.I. We found that constituents in P.E.I. had very high expectations of MLAs. MLAs worked very, very hard. What we found was that when you looked at the statistics, women across all sectors were doing more work in the home, in addition to their paid employment.
It wasn't specific to women in government. It was just getting that messaging out there. In addition to that, we put forward 17 recommendations to government and political parties here in P.E.I. I'd be happy to share that research with you.
One of the things we found was that we've inherited electoral systems, parliamentary structures, that were developed at a time when women were not considered persons under the law and did not have the right to vote. It's not surprising, then, that these systems have failed to meet the needs of women or the realities of women's lives. In fact, they need some modernization to meet those needs.
I say that with the knowledge that men also benefit from many of these recommendations and chances as well.
Liberal
Sherry Romanado Liberal Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC
I know that one of the big factors we've heard, and you said it, is work-life balance.
I'm curious to see how many women who live in remote ridings, for instance, B.C..... My colleague Nathan flies, and it takes him forever to get to Ottawa and back.
It is not just women. How many folks determine that the time travelling to Ottawa is an impediment? Everyone can make more money; we can't make more time. Folks don't want to spend their lives in a plane. If something happens at home, and they need to get home quickly, it's a real problem. Halloweens are missed, birthdays, the first time sitting up, and all of that fun jazz. That has an impact.
I'm curious about whether there's been any research on remote areas compared to Ottawa and how hard it is to recruit people. Is there a correlation there?
Executive Director, PEI Coalition for Women in Government
Our research is mostly focused on the context of P.E.I., but I know that our friends at Equal Voice who have that federal focus have put forward some recommendations for modernizing systems to better meet those needs. I can't say for sure that it would adjust because of the remote and rural.
Liberal
Sherry Romanado Liberal Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC
Perfect. Thank you.
I'm just going to ask a quick question on mandatory voting. I love the fact that we're now looking at it and instead of just saying that it's a participation issue, we're saying that parties would have to focus on issues rather than on getting out the vote. It's really changing the way we do politics, because often during the campaign, especially at the beginning of the campaign, or even before the campaign has started, some people say, “Where's the beef? Where do you stand on this? Where do you stand on that?” That's what people want to know. They don't want to wait until it's drawn out. They want to know where you stand on specific issues.
What are your thoughts on that?
Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Prince Edward Island, As an Individual
If that's what happens...and I'm not convinced that it will. I think there's a difference between Australian political culture and Canadian political culture that may explain the Australian example. It may not be because of the mandatory voting. We have a correlation, not a causal relationship.
I don't know the answer, but I don't see the evidence yet.
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
A lot of the different things we've discussed quite frequently we've now heard your comments on. I appreciate that. I have a couple of questions.
First, there's one thing that I don't think we've heard any discussion on; if we have, I haven't caught it. It's about the mandate, I guess, that was in the Liberal platform. One of the other things besides proportional representation or mandatory voting, which we've discussed, and I think online voting has been mentioned a couple of times as well, was the idea of a preferential ballot as one option that would be considered.
I don't think I heard any of you comment on whether that would be an appropriate system or type of voting. I'd like to hear your thoughts on preferential ballot and whether you think that would be a positive change, whether it would be a negative change, or whether you're indifferent towards it.
I'll start with whoever wants to start.
As an Individual
I'll jump into this one.
The lower house in Australia uses preferential voting. I think the important thing to remember about preferential voting, from my perspective, is that, sure, it feels better to the voter when you cast your vote, because you don't have to vote strategically. But that is the only problem that preferential voting solves compared with first past the post with just a single X. You don't have to vote strategically. You can list the parties in your order of preference, and it's an accurate representation of a voter's wishes.
In the Australian experience, it does consistently lead to people who can go their whole lives with their first-preference vote never counting. It creates voter inequality between different voters. Some voters have their first-preference vote count and some voters only have their second- or third- or fourth-preference vote actually count.
I think the inequality it creates between voters is unfair. It's still a winner-take-all system. There are winners and losers. It turns some voters into winners, “Oh, great, my candidate got elected.” Some voters, however, just have to suck it up, “Hey, the person I wanted didn't get elected.” With proportional representation, everybody's first-preference vote counts equally.
I think preferential voting should be off the card. The five values of this committee point very strongly toward proportional representation. Let's make this discussion about which model of proportional representation you're looking at.
Conservative
Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Prince Edward Island, As an Individual
Without disagreeing with Anna, there is one other advantage. That is, we live in a conservative country in terms of our understanding of our electoral systems. We're reluctant to change. We've seen initiatives in other provinces fail, such as in British Columbia; there's here in Prince Edward Island; in New Brunswick it just went onto a shelf and didn't go anywhere. I actually worked on that commission.
One of the reasons is that the changes being proposed tend to be seen as very complicated and hard to understand. The one thing about a preferential ballot—I don't know that it mitigates what Anna said, but at least it has this value—is that people get it. If it were the case that a changed system adopting a preferential ballot happened, and people saw that the change was not so scary after all, then I think the next step of going to the more radical change would be a lot easier than to jump from where we are now to the radical change.
So it's at least that. It does not change, in any substantial way, the distribution of parties in the assemblies, which becomes a huge problem for people particularly supporting proportional representation, but it's at least a change that people can understand and are probably more willing to accept.
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
Okay.
Ms. Wilson, do you have comments on a preferential ballot?
Executive Director, PEI Coalition for Women in Government
About the preferential ballot, we did recommend to the Special Committee on Democratic Renewal when we presented last October that regardless of any of the systems put forward, a gender and diversity lens should be applied to all of them to see how they would meet the needs of women and diverse groups. That's all I really have to say around the preferential ballot.
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
Okay.
Professor Desserud, I want to get your comments, as a political scientist, on the process that's been undertaken here. Is there anything we should be doing to improve the process as we move forward on these consultations and make the kinds of decisions we'll be making?
Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Prince Edward Island, As an Individual
I don't dare say you should have a referendum on it, with the comments on that. No, I'm joking.
The idea that you've taken your committee on the road is absolutely fantastic. I wish more parliamentary committees did that. I worked with the Senate on their Senate reform committee, and that's the recommendation I've been making to them: get the Senate committee on the road and people will understand the process a lot better. Having you folks here is wonderful, and I wish we saw you and other committees more often. I think what you're doing is the right way to go right now.
Liberal
Matt DeCourcey Liberal Fredericton, NB
Thank you, everybody, for being here.
Professor Desserud, thanks very much for highlighting the issue of citizen and voter engagement.
I'm struggling to identify what exactly it will take to better engage people at the ballot box. The decline in voter turnout is a matter that is afflicting western democracies across the world. In Germany the MMP system has seen a steady decline over the years; Ireland with STV, a steady decline; Japan, MMP, a steady decline; PR in Netherlands, a steady decline; New Zealand, after a slight bump in their first MMP election, a slight decline; the same in France with the two-round election majority system, the plurality system, or however you want to perceive that; and also in the U.S. and Canada. We're all seeing voter turnout on a trend of decline.
We have evidence to suggest that a move to a PR system could help bump voter turnout by upwards of 3%. That same testimony from André Blais suggests that strategic voting, though reduced in a different system, is effectively shifted to another consideration. Citizens are likely to express greater fairness in the election; however, their overall satisfaction in democracy isn't necessarily enhanced, and governments, although they may represent a more diverse viewpoint in Parliament, do not necessarily reflect the average policy preference of voters.
What are we to do?
Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Prince Edward Island, As an Individual
I have been saying that the current system is a major cause for the decline in civic engagement, but I probably should qualify that it's not just that, and it may not be even the most important factor. The most important reason, I believe, citizens are becoming less and less engaged is that governments are less and less capable of doing the things that need to be done. Their constraints are incredible. The windows of opportunity that they have, the wiggle room that they have in entrenched systems is smaller than probably it has ever been in our history.
There are just too many complicated issues with international trade, monetary policies, and so forth, that make it very difficult for governments to say, “Okay, we're going to have a complete 180° turn and have all these new policies.” They get in power and they realize that they can't, and therefore, they're constrained. The public sees governments becoming less and less effective in their ability to do these things. It's not a simple question of making promises and not keeping them. I suspect that politicians are far more sincere than the public sometimes think. They actually do want to make those changes, but when they get into power, they realize just how incredibly difficult that is.
That is a huge question, and it won't simply be solved by electoral reform. This has been a perplexing question for western democracies for quite some time. A lot of people have been thinking very carefully about it, but I don't know anyone who has come up with an answer of how we move to a system where our governments are able to actually fulfill the mandates they set out for themselves.
Liberal
Matt DeCourcey Liberal Fredericton, NB
This may stray a bit from our mandate, but I think we have the opportunity to echo the things we hear, and they could be the purview of other committees, such as the committee that Scott and Ruby sit on that evaluates the procedures of the House and whatnot, or your work on Senate reform.
Can you give us any advice on where else our governing system should look to address changes that can enhance the democratic experience for Canadians?
Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Prince Edward Island, As an Individual
I was asked, and you may remember this, by our government in New Brunswick to see if there was a way we could have better involvement and civic engagement in the legislative process, and I did do a report on that a few years back. Again, what I focused on was the committee system, and I had two points that I made.
One was that the more the parliamentary committees, in this case legislative committees, were out in the community involved in making presentations, having people make presentations to the committee, having hearings like you're doing now, and were away from the capital, the better the sense they would have of what was concerning people, and perhaps come out with more creative solutions. That in turn would create—and you can tell me whether I'm right or wrong about this by the way—committee camaraderie.
You guys all get along well. I see you laughing over there.
