How to fix our voting system?

[Machjo]

At least some voters consider it to be at least somewhat misleading for a politician to run on a first-past-the post system with a party name appearing on the ballot so as to give the false impression that we are in fact voting for a party and not a candidate.

One solution that is commonly thrown about to rectify this is in fact to make is such that they are in fact voting for a party, such as under a list system. Others are willing to compromise with an STV system (still misleading if a party name appears on the ballot since technically you're still voting candidate and not party). Others have suggested going in the opposite direction of removing party names from ballots so as to ensure that not only are we voting for a candidate, but that it is obvious that that is in fact what we are doing.

There are yet others who like the current system of voting for a candidate while appearing to vote for a party, as this gives the pluarlity party a clear and unfair advantage. What are your views on this?

Though I voted non-partisan plurality-at-large, I could just as easily go with non-partisan first past the post, seeing that it's really just a more limited form of non-partisan plurality-at-large anyway.

Otherwise, as much as I'd hate the party list, I'd still prefer that to what we have now, since at least it's not deceiving in that while it appears you're voting for a party, you also really are voting for a party too, unlike with partisan first past the post wehre it appears you're voting for a party but you're really voting for a candidate. Looking at it that way, the current system is probably the most deceiving and dishonest of systems we currently have.

 

[FiveParadox]

Re: How to Fix Our Voting System

I actually favour the status quo, provided Canadians better educate themselves on how our system of elections, and government, works. I feel that the single-member plurality system has benefits that are essential to peace, order and good governent, and that they cannot be replicated under other systems.

A Single Constituency, a Single Voice. Each constituency is represented by a single elected member of the House of Commons, and constituents know exactly who to go to for personal governmental assistance. Moreover, since each member must be individually elected (since they are not just selected from a party list), they are required to be responsive to the needs of active constituents. When a member is not bound to a constituency (as under a list system), he or she is free to ignore local concerns, instead appealing to a broad base to improve the party's national chances.

Effective and Stable Governments. Though this does perhaps seem less clear, still stuck in a short period of minority governments, the fact is that the single-member plurality system normally provides for majority governments. With the effective seat bonuses that the largest party tends to enjoy, Canadians usually enjoy a stable majority government. This also makes government defeats unlikely, avoiding frequent political crises (and the economic consequences that can accompany them).

Easy to Understand, for Voters and Representatives. It is easy for a voter to understand what's going on--the single-member plurality system lacks the strange complexities of the single-transferable-vote system, for example, and it prevents creating two tiers of members (such as occurs with mixed-member proportional systems). In a mixed system, list members are free to act in ways that are unpopular, and if high on the party list, they are guaranteed re-election nonetheless; whereas, the constituency members in that same House must act much more carefully.

The problem here is not with the voting system; the problem is with Canadians' understanding of the system and, perhaps, with party discipline that can at times be a bit too enforced. With the exception of measures that are clearly confidence issues, loosening party discipline (such as was the case during the 38th Parliament of Canada) might correct some common concerns without trashing the clear benefits above.

 

[earth_as_one]

Two rounds of voting. The first round determines the top two. The second round is a vote between the top two. The winner is always elected by a majority. First past the poll isn't democratic as the winner is seldom elected by a majority.

Also I trust cranky old people and paper far more than a voting machine.

 

[Machjo]

Re: How to Fix Our Voting System

I actually favour the status quo, provided Canadians better educate themselves on how our system of elections, and government, works. I feel that the single-member plurality system has benefits that are essential to peace, order and good governent, and that they cannot be replicated under other systems.

A Single Constituency, a Single Voice. Each constituency is represented by a single elected member of the House of Commons, and constituents know exactly who to go to for personal governmental assistance. Moreover, since each member must be individually elected (since they are not just selected from a party list), they are required to be responsive to the needs of active constituents. When a member is not bound to a constituency (as under a list system), he or she is free to ignore local concerns, instead appealing to a broad base to improve the party's national chances.

Effective and Stable Governments. Though this does perhaps seem less clear, still stuck in a short period of minority governments, the fact is that the single-member plurality system normally provides for majority governments. With the effective seat bonuses that the largest party tends to enjoy, Canadians usually enjoy a stable majority government. This also makes government defeats unlikely, avoiding frequent political crises (and the economic consequences that can accompany them).

Easy to Understand, for Voters and Representatives. It is easy for a voter to understand what's going on--the single-member plurality system lacks the strange complexities of the single-transferable-vote system, for example, and it prevents creating two tiers of members (such as occurs with mixed-member proportional systems). In a mixed system, list members are free to act in ways that are unpopular, and if high on the party list, they are guaranteed re-election nonetheless; whereas, the constituency members in that same House must act much more carefully.

The problem here is not with the voting system; the problem is with Canadians' understanding of the system and, perhaps, with party discipline that can at times be a bit too enforced. With the exception of measures that are clearly confidence issues, loosening party discipline (such as was the case during the 38th Parliament of Canada) might correct some common concerns without trashing the clear benefits above.

I guess we're somewhat similar in our support of a simple candidate-based plurality system. It would seem where we differ most is in whether to have party names on the ballots. The way I see it, the ballot shoudl be very straight-forward and crystal clear to all as what they are voting for. When you add a party name to a candidate-based ballot of any kind, you are giving a false impression that he is in fact voting for a party when in reality he is not.

By keeping our current system minus party names on the ballot, would this not make the system even simpler, even more clear to the voter as to what he's actually voting for?

 

[Trotz]

Proportional Representation (with threshold of 5%) and Party List and non-plurality (i.e. you need 51% of parliament when it comes to voting on issues),

i.e. win 10% of the popular vote and you get 10% of available parliament seatings. Get 3% of the Vote and tough luck, as you did not get the minimal of 5%, you cannot sit in parliament nor get 5% of parliament seats.

The most democratic system in my opinion - beyond adopting a direct democracy at least.. I'm not fond of FPTP in Canada as it leads to "wasted votes" and it has clearly failed in that we've been stuck with minority governments and FPTP was a system designed for stability (i.e., plurality majority government - not minority governments).

FPTP is also undemocratic in that it promotes 'big tent' parties, by which, they naturally ignore 98% of issues in the countries.

In a PR system, an immigration, environmentalist, christian, monetary party, i.e., would be democratically viable providing more than 5% of the population votes for them (surely there are in Canada in regards to certain issues!)

 

[Cliffy]

I thought our voting system was fixed (rigged).

Proportional Rep is the way to go, but the corporate and ruling elite would never let that happen. They will throw billions of $ at preventing it.

 

[Machjo]

I can see that among those who want to change the system, there appear to be two opposing ideas along a spectrum. To one extreme is the non-partisan approach (i.e. scrap the parties, or at least weaken them considerably), and to the other is a pure partisan approach whereby the party reigns supreme.

The common point of agreement I can see seems to be that the plurality voting system in a partisan parliament is clearly unjust since it's essentially giving some parties more power than they ought to even though no one ever even voted for a party, and so both opposing reform ideas share in common the idea of sorting that problem out.

One other solution I could see would be to introduce both systems thus:

1. Each voter, when signing in to vote, would be required to choose a local-candidate ballot or a national-party ballot, and his choice would be registered, the reason to be explained below. Just to clarify, the candidate ballot would have no party name on it, and the party ballot would have no candidate name on it.

2. Those who choose the local-candidate ballot would elect their local candidate as per plurality vote; and those who choose the party ballot would vote for the party representation of their choice.

3. In Parliament, each local-candidate would represent his constituents as they do now, one man one vote, and all of the votes of that part of Parliament comprising the local-candidates combined would be equal to the percentage of all the votes nationwide cast for a local candidate.

4. The party leader of each party would also get a seat in Parliament, his parliamentary vote being worth the percentage of party votes cast in his party's favour in the election.

5. Parliament as a whole would be officially non-partisan, and so it would have a caucus of the whole rather than party caucuses, and Parliament as a whole would have to vote for the PM and Cabinet, for instance. Party MPs however would participate in the caucus like any other MP, and could be chosen as PM or as a cabinet member like any other MP. The only difference is that the vote of an individual Party MP is likely to be worth much, much more than that of a non-partisan MP.

6.In the event that a non-partisan MP's seat becomes available between elections, only those who'd voted non-partisan or who hadn't voted at all in the last election would get to vote in the local by-election. The reason for this is to avoid double dipping. After all, the vote of those who'd voted for a party in the previous election would still be held by that party's MP in Parliament.

7. Political parties would be free to change their party leader at any time, which by implication means that, since the Party leader is always the Party MP in Parliament, that the Party MP in Parliament could change at any time too.

I think the above could be a way of ensuring that those of us, like myself, who'd rather vote for national unity by voting for a truly non-partisan Mp would have the chance to do so, whereas those who'd rather promote national disunity by promoting partisan divisions would also have the opportunity to do so.

In the end, we'd truly have a democratic system and thus the government we'd deserve, for better or for worse. But at least it would be a just system and not a deceptive one like the one we have now.

As for complexity, it would be a very straightforward system at the grassroots. You choose your ballot and then check a box. And even at the higher level it would not be that complicated. As long as you can do fractional maths, you're OK.

Any thoughts on such a system? I think the big plus with it is that it would give people a chance to choose for themselves whether to vote candidate or party. That is a choice we don't currently have now. For example, if I have a party name under the candidate of my choice on my ballot, then how do I endorse him without implicitly endorsing his party too? The solution above would eliminate that problem since if you choose a candidate ballot, there would be no party name on it.

 

[taxslave]

At least some voters consider it to be at least somewhat misleading for a politician to run on a first-past-the post system with a party name appearing on the ballot so as to give the false impression that we are in fact voting for a party and not a candidate.

One solution that is commonly thrown about to rectify this is in fact to make is such that they are in fact voting for a party, such as under a list system. Others are willing to compromise with an STV system (still misleading if a party name appears on the ballot since technically you're still voting candidate and not party). Others have suggested going in the opposite direction of removing party names from ballots so as to ensure that not only are we voting for a candidate, but that it is obvious that that is in fact what we are doing.

There are yet others who like the current system of voting for a candidate while appearing to vote for a party, as this gives the pluarlity party a clear and unfair advantage. What are your views on this?

Though I voted non-partisan plurality-at-large, I could just as easily go with non-partisan first past the post, seeing that it's really just a more limited form of non-partisan plurality-at-large anyway.

Otherwise, as much as I'd hate the party list, I'd still prefer that to what we have now, since at least it's not deceiving in that while it appears you're voting for a party, you also really are voting for a party too, unlike with partisan first past the post wehre it appears you're voting for a party but you're really voting for a candidate. Looking at it that way, the current system is probably the most deceiving and dishonest of systems we currently have.

Regardless of what the current practice is called and how it operates in theory many people do vote for the party and could care less what the candidate's name is. Mostly this is done by dippers , at least in B.C.
For some it wouldn't matter what you called it they would still look for the party name and vote accordingly.

 

[Cliffy]

Regardless of what the current practice is called and how it operates in theory many people do vote for the party and could care less what the candidate's name is. Mostly this is done by dippers , at least in B.C.
For some it wouldn't matter what you called it they would still look for the party name and vote accordingly.

Not just those who vote NDP. The average intelligence of Canadian voters is sadly lacking as evidenced by the types of governments we have had to put up with. Which is why democracy (the tyranny of the majority) doesn't work and which is why the ruling class would have it no other way. Sheeple have proven to be the greatest asset of the ruling class.