After the General Election of 2015, many critics of the Single-Member Plurality system (a.k.a. “First-Past-the-Post”) complained that having an absolute majority with only 39.5% of the vote is wildly undemocratic. This 39.5% gave the Liberal Party 54% of the seats in the House of Commons, which in essence is an unchecked dictatorship. Unlike the American system where the executive and legislative branches are greatly separated (and can be home to two opposing parties), the Canadian system allows for the Prime Minister to lead both. This unchecked power by the Prime Minister can be seen by the people as a risk to the democracy of the nation, or a chance to push through a legislative agenda that they support. Nonetheless, over half of the electorate
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However, I believe that Single-Member Plurality is the best option for Canada, not only from a position of ‘fairness’, but also from an efficiency standpoint. Single-Member-Plurality is by far the easiest voting method to understand and it nearly guarantees that extremist or narrowly ideological parties do not get elected.
Of the four voting systems, proportional representation is by far the favourite of activists against Single-Member Plurality. Arguing that it would represent Canadians much better than the current system, it fails to recognize three key problems that proportional representation would cause: who voters are actually voting for, the way in which elected members could be held to account, and how governments are to properly function once they are …show more content…
Earlier on I used Utopia City as an example of how one party can be over represented in a democracy, and how that will create an even greater imbalance within the democracy. However, if the opposite were true and the votes were split three ways almost evenly between the respective parties, then a coalition would be necessary to govern. This problem actually became a reality when New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark formed a coalition government with a smaller party and ended up giving the leader of the other party a position dubbed “the Minister of Foreign Affairs outside cabinet’,which is, a minister that isn’t bound by the concept of cabinet collective responsibility. Not only did this create uncertainty within the coalition, but it caused for uncertainty within the government and an election was called less than three years later and she lost. It is extremely difficult to push through legislation when the party in charge is constantly changing. However, due to the reasons regarding severe unfairness in the distribution of seats, accountable representation, and coalition stability, Single-Member Plurality is able to effectively do away with two of these three problems and combat the third adequately.
The second key option being presented by those in favour of electoral reform is Alternative Voting, where the candidates are on a list and you rank them from 1st to last. Deemed more democratic than Single-Member
However, I believe that Single-Member Plurality is the best option for Canada, not only from a position of ‘fairness’, but also from an efficiency standpoint. Single-Member-Plurality is by far the easiest voting method to understand and it nearly guarantees that extremist or narrowly ideological parties do not get elected.
Of the four voting systems, proportional representation is by far the favourite of activists against Single-Member Plurality. Arguing that it would represent Canadians much better than the current system, it fails to recognize three key problems that proportional representation would cause: who voters are actually voting for, the way in which elected members could be held to account, and how governments are to properly function once they are …show more content…
Earlier on I used Utopia City as an example of how one party can be over represented in a democracy, and how that will create an even greater imbalance within the democracy. However, if the opposite were true and the votes were split three ways almost evenly between the respective parties, then a coalition would be necessary to govern. This problem actually became a reality when New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark formed a coalition government with a smaller party and ended up giving the leader of the other party a position dubbed “the Minister of Foreign Affairs outside cabinet’,which is, a minister that isn’t bound by the concept of cabinet collective responsibility. Not only did this create uncertainty within the coalition, but it caused for uncertainty within the government and an election was called less than three years later and she lost. It is extremely difficult to push through legislation when the party in charge is constantly changing. However, due to the reasons regarding severe unfairness in the distribution of seats, accountable representation, and coalition stability, Single-Member Plurality is able to effectively do away with two of these three problems and combat the third adequately.
The second key option being presented by those in favour of electoral reform is Alternative Voting, where the candidates are on a list and you rank them from 1st to last. Deemed more democratic than Single-Member