Editor:
Re: “No time for PR snow job,” June 8.
John Gleeson calls for “Less cheerleading, less browbeating, more honest analysis.” Thank you, John. Electoral reform is an important subject. It is about good government. What produces the best form of government?
There are those who defend first-past-the-post because, we are told over and over, like a mantra, it delivers stable government and keeps extremists at bay. But where is the honest analysis in that assertion? On the face of it, there is plenty of contrary evidence. Doug Ford – stable? Donald Trump – free of extremism? The last provincial election – a smooth transition?
Measuring stability also requires measuring the shelf life of public policies. Under our system, a new administration’s first order of business is undoing what previous governments have done. Then, most policies are short term, designed with an eye on the next election. Long-term planning suffers. Our governments tend to be like the person who does not think beyond the next paycheque. How stable is that?
In contrast, consider how proportional systems function. They do not suffer such structural defects; they deliver better long-term governance. Why is that? Proportional voting systems yield chronic coalition government, which means the majority of cabinet seats in successive administrations remain occupied by members of the same political parties. Unlike us, such countries do not throw out all the bums to bring in a whole new lot of bums. Changes in government tend to be modest, incremental, less polarizing.
In the recent Ontario election, the Conservatives gained seven percentage points of the votes. Did they gain seven per cent more seats? No, they gained 46 per cent more seats. It is not the voters, but our voting system that produces wild swings in government. The claim that we have stability and PR does not is a bogus claim void of honest analysis.
Nick Loenen, Garden Bay
