Gulf Islands residents who want electoral reform in B.C. probably don’t need to reach out to their own MLA to show their support.
Saanich North and the Islands MLA Rob Botterell is, if not leading the charge on the issue, certainly at the front line. Botterell joined fellow advocates on a webinar for supporters Wednesday, Jan. 7, hoping to seize the opportunity presented after an all-party committee recommended a citizens’ assembly be created to knock around the particulars of how we all vote. Botterell and company think the timing is right to push the province toward proportional representation — and we agree.
We’ve seen what happens to the diversity of voices when the stakes of an election seem higher; in a winner-take-all system, voters naturally gravitate toward candidates more likely to win, rather than simply picking the candidate that best represents their values. No one wants to imagine they’d cast a vote and receive no representation in return, yet that’s precisely what seems to happen to every voter in the minority in such elections. The landscape thus inevitably slides toward two parties during crises — which seem to come one after another lately — and voters become discouraged, acutely feeling their own lack of representation. Fewer voters and fewer parties is a familiar-sounding path we would do well to avoid.
Proportional representation voting systems are designed so that the seats comprising a legislature closely reflect the popular vote. There are several flavours of “PR,” but the idea is to set up representation such that nearly every voter can be assured someone representing their interests holds office by the end. If a party gets X per cent of the vote, the system should deliver X per cent of the seats to them.
It should come as no surprise that a newspaper might support efforts to increase the number of voices in the legislature; we prefer a lively debate and compromise to a done deal. But Botterell pointed out that in a nearly unimaginable moment for any all-party committee, this one saw 93 per cent of the submissions on electoral reform specifically calling for proportional representation.
PR for our province is a compelling notion, and at minimum deserves to be hashed out by a citizens’ committee.