Thank you.
Thank you for coming to Iqaluit. Thank you for having me on this panel. It's an honour to be here.
I submitted a brief on electoral reform and I will speak quickly about what I propose. I will, for the most part, skip over the analysis of the various options that are typically discussed, except to say the obvious, which is that there are trade-offs and drawbacks to all of them, and you have the challenging task of not only picking one proposal out of the noise, but then trying to rally everyone to it.
I'd like to start by drawing attention to geography. It is easy for urban Canadians, when sitting around dreaming of electoral reform, to map the German system or the Irish system or whatever system onto Canada, but one defining characteristic of Canada is its widely dispersed population. Nunavut is, of course, the most dramatic example, but it is not just true for Nunavut or even just for the territories. Our expansiveness, combined with a long legacy of first-past-the-post elections, means localness is more important here than perhaps anywhere in the world. Even expanding ridings by 50%, as mixed member proportional systems might, hurts local representation in many parts of Canada. This may not be nearly as true in urban areas, which often have less distinct riding boundaries and where an average urban street can separate two ridings.
Alienation is an easy problem to have in Canada, and local representation, as local as possible, is key for voters to feel they can continue to be connected to government during elections and between them. Many Canadians in small towns or even small cities, and especially those in rural and remote areas, will feel a great loss if they are subsumed into larger ridings. This could hurt voter engagement of marginal groups; it's detrimental to the inclusion of aboriginal groups, farmers, and any other interest that struggles to be heard in a riding of 100,000 or more people, and it could be lost entirely in a larger riding. The solution is to have a hybrid system, which is a system with some single-seat ridings and some multi-seat ridings. This solution has also been proposed by a few others, as I'm sure you know.
I don't propose this as a one-issue solution. I think there are benefits to a hybrid system other than just balancing localness and proportionality, but while everyone seems to want to keep local representation, they propose larger ridings, and that concerns me. The problem here, or let's call it an opportunity, is that there is some difficulty in determining which ridings should remain single-seat ridings and which ridings should be merged. I don't think it's as simple as looking at physical size. There may be some urban ridings of a distinct nature that want to maintain their distinctiveness. There may be some rural or remote ridings that value the ability to elect multiple members over maintaining the most local riding they can, so I propose this decision to be the riding's choice—not just once, but on an ongoing basis.
What's at stake when deciding between a single-member riding and larger multi-member ridings are two important decisions. The first decision involves localness and proportionality. These are the two electoral reform features talked about the most. There is no way to maximize localness and proportionality at the riding level. To gain proportionality, there are some costs to localness.
The second decision, although much less discussed, is how constituents are represented, but I believe it is important in practice. There's no way to give constituents competition and choice among multiple MPs, as in multi-member ridings, while also keeping the strength of representation in small single-member ridings with an MP with a duty to serve all constituents. The larger ridings can only weaken an MP's feel for the riding, which would be at least 50% bigger than now, and it make it harder for constituents to identify with their MP.
These are very important factors that affect people's connection to their democracy, and what happens when you make that decision for them? Your five principles for electoral reform apply to the process as well as the outcome. Taking these important decisions away from voters and putting them up front in this process in electoral reform invites many people to be against whatever is proposed. Keeping this in the hands of the electorate means people aren't pulled in as many directions and are more likely to accept this change.
The mechanism I propose for this is a yes-or-no question at election time, asking voters if they want to stay as they are or change. In the first election, upon implementation, it would be a question of staying as a single-member riding or joining a multi-seat district. In the future, they could vote on switching back or on switching from one district to another. Leading up to the election, there would be a petition process to see what options should be put to voters. In most parts of the country, the primary merger option would be fairly obvious.
This is the short version of what I propose. This system has some unique advantages.
First, while mixed systems are not terrible, they are a blunt tool. Why impose a compromise system on the whole country when we can have location-specific solutions?
Second, it's the most democratic, because voters decide. It has a small initial step that leaves some future decision-making in the hands of voters, making it the most sellable to the public. Change must be incremental for the electorate to support the changed initiative. The best proposal in the world accomplishes nothing if it's voted down.
It's one of the few proposals that can possibly be initiated for the next election, since there are no changes to electoral boundaries. It just needs time for a petition process in each riding to have a merger option to vote on at election time.
It would improve proportionality on a national level, while allowing ridings to stay the same size as they are now, where and when that is considered important by those constituents. It is as proportional as people want it to be, and it's as local as people want it to be.
While it has a unique procedural element to it, what I propose will involve tried and true political systems in the actual election itself. Federal elections are not the place for experimenting with brand new election systems.
Our riding choice model is moderate, easy to sell to the electorate, balances localness and proportionality, and is strong on effectiveness, on legitimacy and voter engagement, and above all excels at being democratic, which is what this is all about.
Qujannamiik. Thank you.