Shannon Bond/Staff Writer
British Columbians will do more than choose a provincial government on May 12. They will also vote on a referendum to change or maintain the electoral process.
Nick Loenen, co-founder of Fair Voting BC, made two presentations on the Coast last week about the proposed single transferable vote (STV) system to elect members of legislative assembly (MLAs).
"The BC-STV system is a way of really empowering people," Loenen said. "There is no system that is more fair."
But Rick Dignard, vice president for the NO BC-STV Campaign Society, disagrees.
"In theory it sounds wonderful: people not parties," Dignard said of STV, but "it's acting like two different systems and acts differently in different parts of the province. We do want people to get fully informed and you'll start to ask some serious questions."
Under the first-past-the-post (FPTP) system that has been used historically, voters elect a single candidate in each electoral area. Voters choose a single candidate on the ballot and the candidate with the most votes wins that district.
Under BC-STV, there would be 20 multi-member electoral districts with between two and seven MLAs per district, dependent on district size and population. Voters would rank candidates by preference. Elected MLAs would require a predetermined percentage of the vote in their specific riding based on a quota formula.
Loenen said STV would be akin to having 100 pennies to put toward a vote.
"All 100 pennies will go to your first choice candidate," Loenen said. "If that candidate is eliminated for not having sufficient support, all 100 pennies will be transferred to your second choice. Suppose that candidate is elected, but with a surplus and that the surplus is, for argument's sake, 10 per cent. It means that you have spent 90 pennies with that candidate and you still have 10 pennies left over and those 10 pennies will transfer to your next choice."
Loenen was a Richmond City councillor and member of the B.C. legislature through the '80s and early '90s and chaired the Reform Party of Canada's task force on electoral reform in 1997. He said the disparity of the current FPTP system makes politics "divisive, antagonistic and adversarial" while STV "promotes stability" and would make the legislature "a place to deliberate and discuss meaningfully and canvass and then take a vote" with more accurate outcomes because MLAs would be voting free of party control.
Dignard said he became interested in STV and took part in the B.C. Citizens' Assembly on Electoral Reform. The 80 men and 80 womenspent 11 months in 2004 studying electoral systems in use around the world, holding public hearings, accepting public submissions and finally reaching a decision. He did not agree with the recommendation to put BC-STV in a referendum in the May 2005 election. STV garnered 58 per cent support, two per cent shy of the 60 per cent required, or British Columbians would be using STV this May.
Those with NO BC-STV agree that FPTP is inadequate as an electoral system, but they do not think STV is the right alternative. Dignard offered some reasons why he thinks STV won't work, and the loss of local MLAs topped his list.
"For me, I put a high value on local representation, a person where the buck stops," he said. "Under STV, we will no longer be guaranteed a representative because of the size of proposed ridings."
The proposed district would include the Sunshine Coast, Powell River, North [Vancouver] Island, Alberni-Pacific Rim and Comox Valley and have four MLAs to represent it. Dignard said chances are likely that all four MLAs would end up elected on the island by virtue of them having more voters.
By having multiple numbers of candidates running in huge districts, Dignard said the onus is on citizens to learn about all their platforms.
"How can an independent [candidate] get their message and platform across?" Dignard asked, when established parties can put millions of dollars into the campaign efforts of their candidates. "You have to know what all these people stand for. You need information to make an informed vote. Choice is a great word, but people don't know who five MLAs are, let alone 20 candidates."
Loenen said the transferable vote gives voters the opportunity to shape the legislature, whereas now, more than 50 per cent of their votes are wasted because they did not choose the first candidate past the post.
In STV, "18 per cent at most will be wasted," Loenen said.
"Every existing riding will always retain numerical strength, with three to four candidates per party. Someone from the Coast should win," he said in response to whether the Sunshine Coast was assured representation.
Loenen said the important thing is that people have the choice.
"It's postal code versus political view. They might vote for, for example, someone in the Comox Green Party. The choice is theirs," he said.
Dignard said there are other electoral systems to choose from, and the mixed member proportional system would be a better option."It hasn't been around as long, but it's used in modern democracies," he said.
He said it still keeps some of the existing parts of the system we have now, but there is more transparency while it whittles out disparities found in FPTP.
For more information on both sides of the issue, visit www.stv.ca and www.nostv.org.
