I'm just going to wrap up with a few reflections on referendums, which have been quite a new phenomenon for us in the U.K. and might be of interest.
The electoral reform referendum in 2011 was a classic case of proxy voting. The real issue on the ballot paper became the unpopularity of the junior coalition party, the Liberal Democrats. In contrast with New Zealand, where voters had an opportunity to consider the pros and the cons of the status quo, first past the post, in the U.K. we were just plunged into a negative discussion about the one non-proportional system that was on offer. The voting system was of low interest, and voters had no prior knowledge to come to grips with the issues. The campaign was too short. It was a low interest, low information, low turnout—41%—referendum.
In contrast, the Scottish referendum campaign, which was looking at the potential independence of Scotland as a country, lasted for two years. It gave voters the time and space to come to grips with the issues in some detail and to become knowledgeable. The stories of heated debate about technical issues around the currency arrangements at bus stops and in the pub are all true. People had enough time to get really informed and knowledgeable. It was a high information, high interest, high turnout referendum at an 86% turnout. The evidence shows that the political capacity building that took place during that referendum has sustained itself, with more Scots now taking part in formal and informal political activity.
Finally, there is the EU referendum campaign. The formal campaign just lasted for four months. It was very short. This is in our report entitled “It's Good to Talk: Doing referendums differently after the EU vote”. We did polling throughout the campaign. People said they didn't feel well-informed about the issues at the start of the campaign in February. Only 16% felt well informed or very well informed. That rose to just one-third with a week to go before polling day. Obviously, that's reporting how informed people feel. It's not scientific, but it does give us a good indication that people didn't feel informed. The issue mattered hugely to everybody in the U.K., and so the turnout was high at 72%, but it was a low interest, low information, high turnout referendum.
Done well, referendums can hope to achieve high-quality public information and debate in the run-up to polling day. Done badly, a referendum can obliterate any chance of meaningful public and political debate, as the ballot topic is completely overtaken by proxy issues. Reflecting on comparable examples, and the particular time constraints of the Canadian process, where there's a real practical deadline around implementation, we cannot see how a good referendum is achievable here.
We'll conclude our remarks there. Thank you.