Plan B: The best electoral reform for British Columbia may be the simplest

{ Here's a question: what would the results of the 1996 and 2001 BC provincial elections have been if between a quarter and a third of the seats up for election had been in the form of multi-member districts of say, 4 members each? (3 in the Lower Mainland 3 in the rest of the province, for a total of 24 seats?) Well, in 1996 chances are the Reform Party would have picked up a couple of seats , the Liberals would have wasted fewer votes in the South, the Greens might have picked up a couple. Certainly, a more proportional result, and almost certainly a minority government, although it is difficult to say whether Campbell or Clark would have become the premier. In 2001, a 57% vote for the Liberals in terms of first preferences still would have allowed at least 4 or 5 additional opposition MLAs under such a system. Another question: would the adoption of such multi-member districts be so radical a change that it would require another Citizens' Assembly or even a referendum? My learned friends Wilf Day and Raymond Lorenz--see their excellent comments below--remind me that the BC Citizens' Assembly did do its homework in considering my own preferred option--regional districts with open lists--before settling on BC-STV. But in the event that the BC-STV proposal again fails to reach the double threshold required in 2009, I propose a much simpler fall back position that anyone can understand. Just have 66 single-member constituencies, with 6 4-member regional districts. No preferential ballots, no fancy voting formulae. Just a lot of re-drawn constituency boundaries, for which a tolerably impartial mechanism already exists. --MC}



On October 10, 2007 Ontarians will follow British Columbia's lead and hold a referendum on a recommendation by its Citizens' Assembly for electoral reform. As in BC, the government has set a double threshold for approval of the proposal of at least 60% of the provincial vote, plus a majority of voters in at least 60% of electoral districts. I am betting , however, that unlike British Columbia in 2005, the Ontario proposal will succeed, for two reasons. First, the Mixed-Member Proportional ("MMP") system advocated for Ontario is much simpler and easier to understand that BC-STV is ("One Ballot, Two Votes" as its brochure says.) Second, the Ontario Assembly has strongly recommended that "a comprehensive, well-funded public education program, beginning in May and continuing through to the referendum, is vital." It would be difficult for the Ontario government to be as lax in educating the public as the BC government was in 2005.

But what if in 2009 a majority of British Columbians vote for BC-STV , but once again fail to meet the double threshold? Should this merely be the end of the matter? Electoral reform is a movement across this country, as evidenced by the spate of commissions, assemblies and even a Supreme Court case challenging the constitutionality of our present system. I suggest that a 50%+ vote for BC-STV should be taken as a mandate for more modest electoral reforms. These would take two forms.

Plan B: a la New Brunswick?

The best electoral reform for BC in this event would be similar to the one recommended for New Brunswick: that is, keep about 2/3 (i.e. 60-66 seats ) as single-member constituencies--so that the line of acountability with a single member would remain in place. Then distribute the other 24-30 seats between 4-6 multi-member districts--e.g. 3 in Lower mainland and 3 in the rest of the province. The BC Citizens' Assembly didn't go for this because they a) wanted high proportionality, which would not be possible under such a system; and b)were anti-party--i.e. didn't want a reform that could strengthen party organizations that would control the party lists, as in most forms of MMP, with their province-wide closed party lists.

I disagree with both of these positions. First, I don't necessarily want high proportionality, just a bit more proportionality, such that governments will be forced to be more representative and the bar for achieving a majority government will be raised (thereby avoiding the electoral disasters of 1996, when a party with fewer votes got a majority and of 2001, when a party with 57% of the vote received 77 out of 79 seats). Second, I don't necessarily want to weaken political parties or party discipline --I just wish to avoid making them stronger. The worry about giving too much power to central party organizations or party hacks can be addressed simply by making the multi-member ridings either "open-list" ( i.e. a form of MMP where voters do the ranking) or first-4-or-5-candidates past-the-post (which would not be MMP but which would still reduce the number of wasted votes). In this way, the effects on party strength and party organization would be comparatively neutral.

An End to Corporate and Union Financing of Parties

The federal government and Manitoba have ended corporate and union donations, increasing reliance upon both public funding and individual donations. This can only be salutary in a province where ideological polarization is regularly exacerbated by warring political elites backed by union and corporate treasuries.

Taken together, these two reforms will force all parties to work harder to appeal to a wider cross-section of British Columbians. Consensus-building and inclusiveness, rather than exploiting divisions and capitalizing on "split votes", would become relatively more important in electoral strategy. Something closer to real majorities, and not just artificial ones, would determine the ultimate parameters of political power. At least, to a greater degree than has typically been the case during much of BC's turbulent political history.