Was the electoral reform process flawed in Ontario?
Ever since the lopsided referendum defeat of the "Yes" side last month in Ontario, there have been hundreds of criticisms (and even conspiracy theories) on why MMP went over like a lead balloon. Now I won't get into it [again] as my post mortem views are well known on the referendum, however, I do have to agree with June Macdonald, President of Fair Vote Ontario, when she said two days ago in a press release that there were "three design flaws in the referendum process". For the record, of the three factors she mentioned, I believe this one below had the greatest negative impact on the outcome:
“Second, the public education program was glaringly inadequate. The referendum was triggered by a recommendation from the Citizens’ Assembly, which asked that the public education campaign include the Assembly’s rationale for recommending MMP. Unlike the British Columbia referendum, the Assembly’s report was not distributed to all households – in fact, the government stopped printing the Assembly’s summary brochure several months before the referendum, blocking widespread distribution to voters.”
11 Comments:
quit whining...it didn't even come close.
Isn't that what a blog is for?
Here's my thoughts from going door to door, first, the voting population is 50% in Ontario, thats horribly low.
So the 60% of those who voted against MMP were those who were politically active. As politically active people know, the important thing is not losing an election, it is the potential of NEVER getting absolute power again.
So the two main parties won't vote for it because they know that even when they don't win, its only a matter of time before they will, so its important to keep the status quo.
I heard every excuse under the sun for voting against it, however, almost to a person they were articles that geezers had read in the local rag. Most of them 'know nothing about it' but put their faith in what was written by some journalist-it's amazing to me how gullible old people are!
As Parizeau said about the 'native and immigrant vote', I'll say about the 'geezer factor'. It's the old 'its good enough for me young man, it ought to be good enough for you'. And of course all the others couldn't be bothered voting.
That's pretty general and theoretic and maybe way too critical but hell, I had to be polite while talking at the door so enough of that BS. Thats why its important to start with the young uns, those who haven't been indocrinated into the system for decades (and yes, it is indoctrination)
I know what you mean. When speaking to a tonne of old folks up north and in the Miramichi at campaign stops (during last election), it was almost like a lot of this stuff was completely foreign to them.
It reminded me a lot of the reaction my brother used to get when he talked about the details of his job to people (i.e. SAN switching, IOS Software, etc.) and he is electrical engineer with Cisco system. Go figure.
Oh, btw mikel, I see the Sask NDP are finally adopting an election plank that you, yourself, said the NB NDP should have taken ownership of a longtime ago (well, at least last year):
Saskatchewan NDP pledge for Citizens Assembly
I think the Ontario defeat will calm the talk of electoral reform down a bit in the rest of Canada.
Actually, to the above, I think the post above shows thats not the case. This is quite simply a case of 'the more you know about it the more horrified you'll be'. Essentially Canada's electoral system hasn't changed a whit (picked up some lingo from the oldies:) since 1854.
Get this (something else never mentioned by the press): Afghanistan and Iraq now have better representational systems than Canada. Former communist countries switched to 'our' system right after the fall of the wall, for ONE election and then changed to proportional representation they were so horrified by the inequities.
Combine that with the fact that Canada has an even more concentrated media system than even the United States and quite simply there is no way to argue that a single referendum settles it.
I think the NDP everywhere should 'own it', in New Brunswick nobody knows anything about it, thanks to Irving, so even if they talked about it it woudln't do much for them.
But this is only going to get bigger, the NDP in Saskatchewan know what Ontario knows-you have to at least have the process. In fact I suspect it will gain even more speed, just like I think we would see more national referenda if canadians had voted the way the government wanted them to in 93.
That's why I'm a little surprised in NB, there is virtually NO chance of it being adopted, even less than ontario, so cancelling it is a big deal-but I suppose the government figures that since the media doesn't talk about it then nobody will remember it anyway.
Many of the other provinces left have scenarios where it doesn't matter, in Newfoundland and Alberta the ruling parties get most of the votes anyway, and in Nova Scotia, much like Canada, by a fluke they are minority governments anyway.
I've heard that even Quebec is talking about it. People should realize that its not 'the masses' that decide this stuff, its the politically active, and once a group of people get politically active enough the govenrmetn can't ignore them. That's whats pushed this so far, not the 'average joe'.
Put it this way, it took about five hours in total of direct conversation with my dad to finally come to the point where he said he understood it and why it was a good system. How many people do you think have invested five hours in it?wrxuyg
I think it's time fairvote did an end around the media in NB and started recruiting potential advocates. At least mobilize enough individuals to form a chapter for cripe sake.
It's not their fault New Brusnwickers are so apolitical and apathetic. Even among bloggers, the most likely to 'whine', this is the only one that even mentions PR regularly-and you're anonymous.
It's hard to form a chapter when nobody cares. Keep in mind that during the last election the parties even had trouble finding enough candidates and the NDP couldn't.
The NDP is understandable, but that the others couldn't find a couple of people in a riding to run for an office which, quite simply, is probably one of the best jobs you'll find in the province.
But don't worry, now that the referendum is done in ontario, I've got a little scheme that you'll be hearing about soon enough. The media isn't all that unfriendly, well, I guess I should say that we're about to find out how unfriendly they are:) But there are still bloggers, and the CBC (although I got better reception on a past project with Irvings than I did with CBC).
True. However, my [un]anonymous self has spoke and exchanged a few emails about the situation with Larry Gordon himself.
And what was the verdict or gist? Canadaeast prints letters from all over now so there is no reason that Fairvote couldn't at least send letters, but I can't remember seeing any of them.
Called it a long time ago...
http://uncommonsensecanada.blogspot.com/2007/05/another-doomed-attempt-at-democratic.html
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