Themes from Consultation Meeting in Toronto Central
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: 117
Accountability
- False majorities make it hard to hold government accountable. Governments become arrogant.
- I see my candidates rarely. They’re not accountable.
Effective parliament
- Independent MPPs should have more power.
Effective parties
- There should be a low threshold for representation. New parties would lead to new ideas, increase youth participation, and increase accountability.
- If a party wins enough support to get representation, it should be allowed to sit in the legislature. One person’s fringe is another person’s passion.
- I oppose thresholds, because they disenfranchise the minority.
Fairness of representation
- Fairness in representation, both demographic and proportional, is critical. Without it, you don’t have a representative democracy.
- Proportionality will increase demographic representation, voter participation, and legitimacy.
- Demographic representation is just as important as geographic representation. Women and minorities are more severely underrepresented than the North.
- We should have twin ridings and twin lists, one to elect women and one to elect men. This would ensure gender parity. (Everyone would vote for both women and men.)
- We should not use quotas or zippered lists to elect more women. A drastic change would be opposed. Instead, we should remove barriers.
- People with disabilities should be fairly represented in the legislature.
- Governments should have the support of as many people as possible.
- I would like my vote to count for something in the governance of the country. Every vote should count.
- A new system should allow a greater diversity of candidates to be elected.
- Diversity of representatives doesn’t mean that we’ll be better represented. We could have a group of diverse but elite representatives.
Legitimacy
- For a government to be legitimate, women and minorities must be represented in the legislature.
- A higher turnout would increase legitimacy.
Simplicity & practicality
- Simplicity and practicality are very important.
Stable & effective government
- Majority governments do not result in stability if the majority is elected by 35%. The goal should be 50%+1.
- If we want stability, why don’t we have a king?
Stronger voter participation
- A new electoral system must engage young people in voting. Young people need to know their votes count. Young people are engaged in politics, but not voting.
Voter choice
- There should be a “none of the above” option on the ballot, which should be counted like other votes. This would result in higher turnout and make politicians pay attention.
- We vote too often not for someone, but against someone. We should have candidates that we want to elect and have a chance of winning.
- All systems are vulnerable to strategic voting.
Thoughts about Ontario’s Current Electoral System
Participants highlighted these advantages of First Past the Post:
- Our system is simple.
- We have a legitimate majority government in Ontario.
Participants highlighted these disadvantages of the current system:
- In our system, small groups in each riding choose our representatives.
- Our system is divisive and polarizing.
- Our system produces distorted results, manufactured majorities, and false winners.
- In our system, only those who vote for the winning candidate get representation.
- Our system does not elect enough women.
- Our system produces strategic voting. Parties scare you into voting for them so you don’t waste your vote.
- As a candidate, I was told that people couldn’t vote for me because I couldn’t win. People feel as though their voices aren’t being heard and their votes don’t count.
Thoughts about Other Systems
Participants made these comments about other systems:
- AV would be a small change from the current system, so ir would have a good chance of being chosen in a referendum.
- AV eliminates strategic voting.
“Centred Election System ” (P lease see the presenter’s written submissions for discussion of another system: “People-Land Democracy.”)
- In the Centred Election System, each voter has two votes. This gives voters more choice. Each riding elects two members by plurality.
- In a second round of voting, voters vote for a party. The results are used to give parties proportional voting power by weighing their votes.
- Representation by population is guaranteed by further weighing MPPs votes by the population of their ridings.
- This system is designed to avoid trade-offs.
- It provides local representation and majority winners using Alternative Vote.
- Members’ votes in the legislature would be weighted to achieve true representation by population. A dual-class vote structure would be used to distribute power in the legislature between the government and opposition parties.
- By allowing voters to cast two votes, MMP is potentially more inclusive. It will elect more women.
- MMP will appeal to young people, women and minorities, if local representation is balanced with demography.
- I slightly prefer MMP to STV because it is simpler.
- MMP has the best chance of winning a referendum if the ridings are kept the same. The adjustment seats should be an additional 40% (about 40).
- Party lists should be large to provide opportunities for women and minorities. If we have regional lists, there should be at least five representatives to a region, but preferably 10-15.
- In MMP, closed lists might be used to improve demographic representation but it may be a hard sell.
- Women and minorities will be represented even with open lists, as long as lists are long enough and party lists are created by primaries. Party bosses should not create the lists.
- Closed lists create a lack of accountability and a lack of voter choice. Adjustment seats should be filled by “best losers” instead.
- In MMP, a threshold should be low (e.g. 2%).
- This system ensures that voters decide which parties will form the government.
- The system bases representation on gender as well as geography.
- List PR is the best way to increase the representation of women.
- A straight List PR system is the simplest and best form of PR. It’s the “real thing.”
- Newly emerging democracies tend to choose PR.
- Culture can determine the stability of a PR system.
- PR is about trusting Ontarians to make good decisions.
- In PR, parties decide who forms the government when they form coalitions. Voters, not parties, should decide.
- In PR, the process of coalition-forming favours small parties. They often hold the balance of power.
- PR would lead to more parties, blur the lines of accountability, accentuate diversity, be divisive, and reduce stability.
- PR with closed lists has problems. I don’t want to see “party hacks” getting into office. Voters should make the choice.
- Why not create proportionality using a weighted vote? MPPs votes could be weighted by their party’s vote share. This would create proportional votes in the legislature without changing the electoral system.
- STV can provide fair representation and accountability.
- In STV, the district magnitude should be at least 5 to produce proportionality.
- In my view, STV is not completely proportional.
- STV (in Ireland and Malta) does not elect more women.
- In STV, we should not trade too much proportionality away for geographic representation or simplicity. I would recommend 7-15 members per riding.
Other Thoughts
If the Assembly recommends a new system
- The 60% threshold is inconceivable. It should be 50%+1.
Size of the legislature
- 150-180 seats would not be out of line with other jurisdictions.
- It’s the adversarial system that makes more politicians a hard sell.
Other comments
- Candidates with disabilities should be welcomed in political parties.
- People with disabilities should be able to vote independently and secretly, and participate equally in the electoral process.
- The Assembly materials, process, and possible proposal should be designed to be as accessible as possible.
- Political parties should include more women in their organizations.
- We should change the nomination procedure in parties. People who are rich always get the nominations.
- We should educate young people about politics from an early age. The only way to have a good electorate is to have an educated citizenry.
- We need electoral reform at the municipal level.
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