a primer on voting systems for matt gurney.

Sarah Lambert

Editor-in-Chief of Women's Post, Co-Editor-in-Chief of The MASON Magazine, and blogs at thelaughingmedusa.com.

Originally published on The Laughing Medusa.

Last week Matt Gurney of The National Post wrote an article in which he argues that Elizabeth May’s support of the Supreme Court challenge to Canada’s voting system, and her championing of proportional representation (PR) in general, is the same as declaring her seat in the House of Commons unconstitutional because she only received 46% of the votes in her riding. Unfortunately Mr. Gurney seems to be confusing proportionality with a majoritarian system. So, as a PR advocate, I feel the need to provide a brief primer on voting systems in order to set the record straight.

There are three basic models of voting systems. Our current system, first-past-the-post (FPTP), is an example of a plurality model of democracy. All it requires is for a candidate to get more votes than anyone else in order to win their seat. Depending on the number of candidates in the race an individual could “win” their seat with less than 10% of the votes. Among voting reform advocates, this is thought of as the lowest or least fair form of democracy because, unless you vote for the successful candidate, your vote is essentially wasted. It was invented in 1225 and most developed countries ditched it long ago in favour of majoritarian or proportional systems.

Majoritarian systems, as the name suggests, require a candidate to obtain a majority of votes in order to win a seat. This means that up to 49% of constituents could still cast a vote that doesn’t elect anyone. However, it has numerous advantages over a plurality (a subject for another article) and for elected bodies where parties do not exist, such as Toronto’s city council, it is more feasible to implement than PR. For that reason I’m part of a group of voting reform advocates called RaBIT who are advocating for a majoritarian system called IRV (instant runoff voting) for Toronto’s municipal elections.

Proportional representation allocates seats based on the popular vote. This makes it the superior system for electing representative bodies where parties exist. Each party receives the same percentage of total seats as they do votes so nobody’s vote is wasted. Several provincial referendums have been put forward in Canada that proposed changing to a form of proportional representation. While none of these referendums were successful they did provide examples of how PR could work in Canada. Between the various referendums two forms of proportional representation have been put forward: STV (the single transferable vote) and MMP (mixed-member proportional). However, unlike Matt Gurney suggests, neither of these systems would require a candidate to receive a majority of votes in order to win their seat.

Under STV, several ridings are grouped together to form one, large riding. Each of these larger ridings elects several MPs. Parties release a list of candidates for each riding. Voters then choose which party they want to vote for and rank their preferred candidates from that party. Each party then receives the portion of seats from that riding based on the percentage of votes they receive. Say that Elizabeth May’s riding was merged into a 10-seat riding and the Green Party received 40% of the votes in that riding, the four Green Party candidates who had the most votes would be elected ensuring that almost no votes are wasted. However, no Green candidate would necessarily need to receive a majority of the total votes in order to win a seat.

MMP works a little bit differently. In this system most seats are elected as they are now: through a plurality system based on geographic ridings. However, new “list” seats are added, giving voters a second vote. First, you vote for a candidate in your riding and then you vote for your party of choice. These party votes are tabulated and the list seats are then allocated among the parties based on the percentage of votes they receive to ensure that the government reflects the popular vote. These seats are filled by candidates from a list provided by the party. So, if the Green Party received 5% of the votes but did not elect a candidate in any riding they would receive the number of seats necessary to give them 5% of the total seats. However, as MMP preserves the plurality method for electing our geographic MPs, Elizabeth May’s 46% would still have been enough to get her elected.

Under PR the Green Party would have received 9 seats in the last election, rather than 1. So, not only would 46% likely have been enough to elect Ms. May under STV or MMP, her party would be better represented in the House of Commons. And, as she said: “The key issue is not that [the first-past-the-post-electoral system is] unfair to the Green Party. It’s unfair to democracy. It’s unfair to voters, and I think it’s a big reason for the decline in voter turnout.”