Coalition Redux

Never ones to shy away from expressing strong opinions, Toronto Star readers weigh in again on the best way to try to defeat Mr. Harper in the next election:

Re: Pondering a union of moderates, Letters Jan. 10

Federal NDP Leader Thomas Mulcair and Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau must get their heads together. Prior to 2006, the federal conservative parties realized they were fighting each other. They became one party and have been in power ever since. In 2011, with a vote increase from approximately 37 per cent to 39 per cent, they went from a minority to a majority government.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper could win again in 2015 unless the left unites. NDP and Liberal issues and policies may vary slightly but they are heading in the same direction. If they don’t join, Harper will be one of the longest reigning prime ministers even though, by far, he is the worst prime minister ever, taking that title from (I’m sure) a relieved Brian Mulroney.

Let’s review some of his highlights. He promised to be transparent and accountable. Not so. United Arab Emirates allowed our military to use its military bases and hospitals, and they flew soldiers home at no cost to Canada. When Harper refused UAE commercial flights into Canada, we lost that privilege. This has cost Canada at least $300 million for an alternate airbase.

Harper wanted to buy 65 F35 jets from an American company, even though the U.S. air force wouldn’t because the jets were flawed. Because of Harper’s hawkishness, Canada was kicked out of the UN Security Council. He taught us that proroguing is not something you eat. He is the only prime minister in Commonwealth history to be held in contempt of Parliament.
Harper hired Deloitte Consulting for advice on how to handle finances. And yet before the election, he told us he had the means to balance the budget. He said he would be tough on crime, and then scrapped the long gun registry.

When Jean Chrétien’s Liberals chose not to fight in the illegal war in Iraq, Harper wrote a letter to the U.S. apologizing for Canada’s refusal. He promised Senate reform. Didn’t happen. Instead he stacked the Senate in his favour.

In 2011, the postal workers went on a rotating strike. Harper said that commerce relies heavily on the mail. So what did he do? He locked out the postal workers, so no mail was delivered. Sounds like a Monty Python skit.

He silenced the scientists for fear they may show evidence of climate change. Nothing gets said or done unless it goes through him first. Hence, the label he has acquired: Party of One.

John Vesprini, Stoney Creek

First, to paraphrase Churchill, “first past the post is the worst form of election possible, except for all the others.”

All proportional representation does is transfer power to small parties, far in excess of their voter turnout. That is one reason the NDP supports it. You will discover that, and express your malcontent, when a hard-right party wins a balance of power with 15 to 20 per cent of the vote.

Second, why is it that right-wing parties are routinely cited by letter writers with the “61 per cent voted against this government” and left-wing parties are not? Kathleen Wynne won a majority with 38.2 per cent of the vote, but none of the letter writers acknowledged that fact.

Based on election results from the last two elections, in Ontario Stephen Harper enjoyed the support of 44 per cent of actual voters, and 27 per cent of eligible voters, while Kathleen Wynne had 38 per cent and 20 per cent respectively.

Finally, the Conservative party did receive the plurality of votes cast in the last election, on a party basis. There are four parties on the left, which split the so-called “progressive” vote.

Two parties splitting the “right” vote cost us 10 years of Jean Chrétien’s Liberal government. Until the “progressives” unite, we will continue to get a government elected by a majority of Canadians, on a party basis.

Alan McDonald, Trenton

As I have said before, it is doubtful that a uniting of progressives will take place before the upcoming election. It may be seriously entertained afterwards, if Harper is re-elected with another majority. However, if that happens, I suspect it will be too little, far too late.

Thirst for personal power will have triumphed over the public good, once again.

UPDATED: Star Readers And Mandatory Voting

In response to a recent column by Susan Delacourt discussing mandatory voting, Star readers weigh in with their usual perspicacious observations, the majority in favour of a less radical solution to the problem of low voter turnout. Here is a small sampling of the responses:

Re: It's time for mandatory voting laws, Insight Aug. 30

Mandatory voting attempts to address only one symptom of Canada’s corrupt 12th century first-past-the-post (FPTP) electoral system under which most voters do not cast a ballot for a winning candidate. Mandatory voting will not correct this, but merely result in more votes which do not count to elect anyone. We will still have false majority governments that hold 100 per cent control over the House of Commons with much less than 50 per cent of the popular vote.

To fix our broken democratic system, we must go back to basics and change how we elect our MPs. We must modernize our electoral system to ensure representation that is in close proportion to the actual votes cast. Proportional representation (PR) shifts the balance of power back toward the people and away from political parties. It’s like flipping a switch that shines the light on us.

Fraudulent robocalls to deter voting would have no impact under a proportional electoral system because votes cast matter more than the arbitrary boundaries of ridings. Each enlarged riding would have multiple MPs.

When voters believe that their votes really matter, they will naturally vote in larger numbers, without being coerced into doing so. This is evident in the 80 plus countries that have successfully implemented an electoral system which achieves some level of proportionality.

At least ten authoritative public studies have been undertaken in Canada on electoral reform, including the comprehensive 2004 Law Commission of Canada Report on Electoral Reform, commissioned by the Liberal Party of Canada. Each study recommended that Canada’s FPTP electoral system be replaced by one providing equal effective votes for citizens and proportional representation in the House of Commons.

The neoliberal fiefdoms of the U.K., U.S. and Canada still use FPTP because they can manipulate it to retain control over governance. Mandatory voting will divert our attention away from implementing an effective solution to Canada’s democratic deficit. Canadians must not let themselves be led astray.

P. E. McGrail, Brampton

Why does Susan Delacourt resort to mandatory voting to increase voters’ participation when a perfectly democratic and rational approach would provide a valid reason for people to vote?

Proportional representation would make every vote count, decrease the polarization of Parliament, reduce the frequency (and costs) of elections and the need for by-elections. Canada would then join the majority of democracies in the world.

In a multiparty, pluralistic society, FPTP is a bankrupt system that most often silences the voice of the majority of the electorate. Vested interest are the reasons for Canada sticking with it.

It is time for the media to support rational and well informed demands to change the present system at all levels of our government.

Bruna Nota, Toronto

If it’s true that “four of every ten Canadians” chose not to vote in the last federal election then it would be a great mistake to compel such uninterested people to cast a ballot. Do we really want to count the votes of those who are forced (by law) to vote and probably represent the lazy, uneducated and could-care-less class of citizens?

The results of such mandatory legislation would certainly have serious, unintended consequences.

George Dunbar, Toronto

UPDATE: Lori Turnbull, an Associate Professor at the School of Public Policy and Administration at Carleton University, offers her views on mandatory voting here.

Rick Salutin on Proportional Representation

The problem with parties is they don’t exist to represent the views of the public, or even sections of it, or even their own members. Maybe they once did, or maybe not. But now they exist to win elections. They’re “election-day organizations,” to quote political scientist Donald Savoie. They take public opinion into account mainly in their strategic calculations.

Is some form of proportional representation the answer to the 'democratic deficit' reflected in the above excerpt from Part 2 of Rick Salutin's series on democracy?

Salutin admits to an ambivalence about a reform he once enthusiastically embraced. The most popular version, called the Single Transferable Vote, is explained by the writer:

You indicate your second, third, etc., choices along with your top choice so if your No. 1 is at the bottom and gets dropped after the first tally, your vote is transferred down the line until a set of winners — ridings are larger but total numbers of reps stays the same — emerge. It’s complex but it means most votes actually matter and something proportional emerges.

In my mind, that version would be effective only with a very engaged and informed citizenry, something that I'm not sure we have ever had in Canada, and certainly absent in the current political landscape, where complex ideas are reduced to cartoonish stereotypes, a strategy that the Harper Conservatives seem to have perfected, aided and abetted by buffoons in the media, Ezra Levant and the rest of the crew at Fox North being prime examples.

Until Canadians manage to cure their addiction to sound bites and simplistic bromides and platitudes and begin demanding substance and integrity from our politicians, I very much doubt that any systemic reform will be effective.