Electoral Reform committee  I don't have a problem with a reconsideration of the change after it has really had a chance to sink in. New Zealand's second referendum struck me as perfectly appropriate. The notion, though, that we should experiment in 2019 with a system and then have a referendum strikes me as inappropriate.

Electoral Reform committee  Absolutely.

Electoral Reform committee  I don't feel comfortable answering the question straight-up. British Columbia bought a system that was in some ways actually the most complex, from the point of view of the voter, in the sense of a preferential ballot with a long counting mechanism. I would hope that whatever is proposed, the lead discussion of this does not actually focus on its complexity.

Electoral Reform committee  Well, I accept that we do a delicate balancing in the federation. Why do we have the Senate floor for representation? Why are rural constituencies smaller in population than urban ones? We do a fairly delicate balancing, but I assume that it's the product of a process that takes all the interests into account.

Electoral Reform committee  First of all, I'm not sure that the mixed member issue is particularly central to the question you're asking. Are you asking about coalition government?

Electoral Reform committee  It isn't the mixed member, as such, that creates coalitions, but the fact that it is a proportional system. The additional member component completely compensates, at least within the realm of arithmetic, for any disproportion at the constituency level. I think the local representation component of electoral representation in the country is an oversold argument.

Electoral Reform committee  It isn't just Stephen Harper's uniting of the right. I've never been troubled by the fact that parliamentary majorities are most always “manufactured”, to use the term of art in academe. “False majorities” is a partisan label, I think. The facts that didn't seem to fit in 2001 concerned the ability of the party system to provide a reasonably healthy level of competition for office.

Electoral Reform committee  Whether that would be a change that lasts, I'll just say that I don't think it would guarantee them re-election, contrary to the view expressed in Policy Options.

Electoral Reform committee  I don't think so. Particularly to the extent that it is a change of formula, you are then changing the power balance among the provinces even without a change in the numeric constituency makeup of Parliament.

Electoral Reform committee  Touché, Mr. Boulerice. I underestimated. You may recall, as I mentioned in my notes, in the same edition, that none other than Tom Flanagan and Ted Morton argued for the alternative vote precisely to solve the disunion on the right. I think we all underestimated the resilience of the political order.

Electoral Reform committee  They have it within their power to do this if they wish to act unilaterally.

Electoral Reform committee  Yes, it is of value. Like all values, it is not absolute. The price of implementing that value can be too high. It is at least sometimes the case that the implementation of the value produces off-centre governments. But voters, including under PR systems, do value a say in the composition of governments.

Electoral Reform committee  Making these distinctions is often quite difficult, because particular behaviours by voters or by politicians frequently embody both elements. Other than in grand coalition situation, any government that is formed is going to be a partial selection from the entirety of the House.

Electoral Reform committee  I just want to make four big points, drawn from the five-page statement I sent last week. One is that I find it distressing that so much of the commentary on electoral reform represents the House as if it's a species of the U.S. Congress or some entity that is part of a congressional framework and not the constitutive chamber for the government, which inevitably it is in a parliamentary system.

Electoral Reform committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'll open by saying that some of the information you gave is as out of date as the photograph on my web page.