[fvc-wat-disc] MMP questions

[Brian Tanguay]

Excellent questions, for sure. I'll contact Jonathan Rose of the
Citizens' Assembly to try to get some answers to nos. 0 through 6. I
think we have to accept the fact that there may not be any answers - yet
- to at least some of these questions. I'm not sure just how detailed
the report is going to be ... and this of course will provide a target
for unsympathetic critics in the media. 

I can provide tentative answers to a couple of general questions:

1. On the question of second-place majorities (as happened in BC and
Quebec a couple of times each in the last 15 years, where the party with
the second-most votes won an outright majority of seats): majority
governments of any kind are unlikely to occur under MMP, so the issue of
second-place majorities can be relegated to the realm of speculation. In
systems that don't allow for overhangs (like Scotland and Wales), there
is a remote theoretical possibility that this could occur, but it is
probably less likely than, oh, the chances of the Maple Leafs winning
the Stanley Cup in our lifetimes (apologies in advance for a sports
analogy to those who have no interest). This situation has certainly not
occurred in either Scotland or Wales; it can't occur in Germany or New
Zealand, both of which allow for overhangs. In the proposed system
(given what I know about it), the more relevant issue is the possible
deviation from proportionality in election results. Because the system
doesn't allow for overhangs, if one party cleans up in the constituency
races, then the results are going to be pretty far from proportional
(or, in another sense, equitable). This IS what happens in Scotland,
where Labour has tended to win a disproportionate share of the
constituencies. Still, no party in Scotland has won an outright
legislative majority in the three elections held since 1999.

2. On the issue of MMP and the election of women: it's true that
electoral reform is no guarantee that the proportion of successful women
candidates will increase. Cultural and institutional factors play a
crucial role here: Ireland, with STV (a system that tends to produce
very proportional results), elects very few women (13.3%). Greece, with
list PR, elects even fewer (13%). BUT, again, we should look at New
Zealand as a model here: in 1993, with a first-past-the-post electoral
system, 21% of the country's MPs were women. In 1996, with an MMP
system, 29% of MPs were women, with most of this increase coming from
the party list portion of the ballot. Some people might say that an
increase from 21% to 29%  isn't all that impressive, but NZ now ranks
14th out of more than 150 countries in terms of the proportion of women
elected (Canada ranks 49th). Ontario's experience is likelier to 
resemble that of New Zealand than Bolivia's. By the way, there are 26
women MPPs in Ontario (25% of the total).

OK, I apologize for lecturing everyone on a nice, sunny Sunday. But I
AM an academic (occupational hazard)!

Cheers,
Brian

>>> pnijjar at sdf.lonestar.org 5/4/2007 9:10 AM >>>

 	I have some questions about the proposed system for Ontario that
I 
would like to clear up for the information night, and I hope people on
the 
list have been following the decision closer than I have:

 	0. Is there protection against the "decoy list" attack in this 
system? If so, what is the protection?

 	1. My understanding is that parties need not run any riding 
candidates in order to to appear on the party ballot in every Ontario 
riding. Is this correct? If so, what criteria are used to determine
what 
parties appear on the ballot?

 	2. If the referndum passes, will it be re-evaluated at some set

date? If so, how will the evaluation be done?

 	3. Does marking only one checkmark on the two-checkmark ballot 
spoil the ballot?

 	4. Will list MPPs have the option of opening offices in 
constituencies? Will this be mandatory? Will people be able to take
their 
concerns to either the riding MPP or some list MPP?

 	5. Can list MPPs defect to other parties or sit as
independents?

 	6. Are there any geographic representation guarantees for the
list 
MPPs? Could they all come from North Bay, for instance?

 	7. Does this version of MMP offer any guarantees against 
second-place majorities? (My guess is that it does not, partially
because 
we got rid of overhangs. However, I could be wrong.)

 	(If these questions sound familiar it is because many of them
were 
raised in the Law Commission of Canada's report.)

 	While I am here, maybe I can ask some questions not direcly 
related to the new system, but which I would like to know in
preparation 
for public speaking:

 	0. A big reason we are going with a closed-list system is to get

more women elected. But if you look at
 	http://www.ipu.org/wmn-e/classif.htm 
you will see that other countries using MMP systems don't do that well.

Germany and New Zealand do okay, but others (Bolivia, Venezuala, etc)
do 
poorly. This undermines the argument that parties will be ashamed to
run 
unbalanced party lists. Other than saying "Ontario is sophisticated and

civilized" what is the response to this?

 	1. Will people who are Ontario citizens out of province on Oct
10 
be allowed to vote in the referendum?

 	2. Are there any known cases of second-place majorities where
the 
party that finished second in seats actually got over 50% of the vote?

- Paul

--
Paul Nijjar - http://www.fairvotecanada.org/WaterlooRegion 
Next electoral reform info night: Tuesday May 8, 7pm
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