Themes from Consultation Meeting in Owen Sound

This is a summary of thoughts expressed by members of the public who attended this consultation meeting. If a point was made by more than one participant, it is included only once in the summary. The comments below sometimes contradict one another because they reflect the diversity of the viewpoints of participants.

Number of public participants: 35

Thoughts about Principles

Accountability

An electoral system must make it easier for people to hold governments accountable.
Accountability means that government officials have to justify their actions to the voters and listen to the views of others.
A strong opposition can help hold the government accountable.
People should vote for a person, not for a party, to ensure personal and local accountability.

Effective parliament

We need more voices in parliament. Parliament is too polarized right now.
An effective opposition is not necessarily an adversarial one. The opposition should discuss issues instead of acting to gain political advantage.
MPPs should have freedom to vote as they wish, not necessarily with their parties.

Effective parties

Political parties have too much power.
Political parties should define and represent policy alternatives which accurately reflect the views of the population.
Small parties should be represented. A party that wins a certain percentage of votes (e.g. 3%) but fails to win a seat should be awarded a seat.

Fairness of representation

Geographic representation is important, but fairness of representation, such as proportionality (seat share equals vote share), is more important.
Both geographic representation and proportionality are important.
Representation by population is the most important part of fair representation.
We need more diverse representation. Our legislature does not reflect our diverse population, especially in terms of gender equality.
The results should reflect the preferences of all voters, and in a proportional way.
We should have multi-member districts to represent better the local diversity of views. (We could have a district magnitude of 5.)
The Assembly should consider the division between urban and rural issues.

Legitimacy

The system is legitimate when the results represent what people want.
Legitimacy is reduced when votes don’t count and there’s strategic voting.
Legitimacy cannot be achieved without proportionality.

Simplicity & practicality

Simplicity is not enough. A more complicated system is worthwhile if it supports other principles (e.g. voter choice, fair representation, voter participation).

Stable & effective government

In Canada, we associate stability with majority governments, but coalitions are effective and stable in many places in the world.
Coalitions may take longer to reach decisions, but they take more views into consideration.

Stronger voter participation

An electoral system must promote participation.
More people would vote if: they thought the system was legitimate; they thought they were fairly represented; they thought their votes counted; they had more choice; MPPs could vote independently of their parties.

Voter choice

People should be able to vote for what they believe in (instead of strategically). They would vote the way they really wanted if they thought their votes would elect somebody.
Voters should be able to express more on their ballots, e.g. first and second choices, or separate preferences for parties and candidates.
Voters have many reasons for voting for a candidate—party identification is only one of them.

Thoughts about Ontario’s Current Electoral System

Participants highlighted these advantages of First Past the Post:

It is simple.
Our system provides geographic representation.
We vote for a person to represent us.
Our system has been used for a long time.

Participants highlighted these disadvantages of the current system:

It encourages strategic voting.
It does not allow for truly fair representation. It does not count all votes.
It discourages voter participation and accountability.
The system favours an adversarial, polarized style that does not attract women to office.
It gives the winning party a great deal of power even though a majority may have voted against it.

Thoughts about Other Systems

Participants made these comments about other systems:

Alternative Vote (AV)

AV allows voters to vote with their conscience and express their true preferences.
It lets voters vote for smaller parties.
It gives voters more control over who represents them.

Mixed Member Proportional (MMP)

MMP gives voters more choice and allows them to express their true preferences.
It preserves local representation while allowing parties to represent policy preferences in a proportional way.
It produces coalitions which increase cooperation among parties and better reflect the views of the population.
In MMP, local representatives should be elected by a majority.
There should be an equal number of local and adjustment seats.
If we had MMP, the district magnitude could be 5.
In an MMP system, party lists for adjustment seats should be made up of candidates running in constituencies (e.g. “best losers”) so they are not picked by party elites.

Proportional Representation (PR) systems

PR creates a strong opposition. The party in power has to listen to the views of other parties.
PR tends to produce minority and coalition governments which act by consensus and are more attractive to women.
PR gives representation to more parties. This would better reflect the views of the population.
In a PR system, parties have to court all voters, not just a select few.
Party lists can be used to improve demographic representation.
In a PR system, every vote counts. This reduces strategic voting, encourages voter participation, and increases voter choice.
PR gives political parties too much power.

Single Transferable Vote (STV)

STV is likely to produce governments that best reflect public opinion.
STV reflects voters’ views of candidates rather than their views of parties.
Under STV, every vote counts; there are no wasted votes.
Under STV, politicians would be more accountable to voters.

Other Thoughts

If the Assembly recommends a new system

A 60% threshold in the referendum is too high.
A public education campaign will be needed before the referendum.
The referendum question should be broad enough and simple enough to be widely accepted.

Size of the legislature

We don’t need to expand the legislature. We can just change some of our electoral districts.
We should increase the size of the legislature by the minimum amount necessary, and only to ensure proportionality.
The legislature or the ridings or both may have to be enlarged.

Other comments

We should consider the role of independent candidates. (How would they get elected under a new system?)
We should consider how elections are financed. Unions and business should not be allowed to dominate the funding of politics.
The voting age should be lowered.
Electoral reform is the first step towards political reforms, like recall.
I am resentful of the fact that the media and educators have taught us that we have the best system, when in reality we don’t.

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