[fvc-wat-disc] Record article today (letters neded!)

[Paul Nijjar]

The good news: the Record article made the front page, above the
fold. 
You can read it online here:

http://news.therecord.com/News/CanadaWorld/article/239133

The not-so-good news: The article is misleading with respect to the
role of the party vote: 

"Thirty-nine seats would be filled proportionately according to the
votes parties get from the parties portion of the ballot. These MPPs
would come from a list drafted by the parties before the election
campaign begins."

and in the sidebar:

"In other words, voters would see a two-pronged ballot. They would
vote for a candidate the traditional way in each riding. They would
also show a party preference by voting for a party. Percentages of
party vote determine how the 39 seats are divided up."

These statements are totally misleading, and verging on incorrect.
They make it sound as if the list seats are allocated proportionally
to party vote, so if a party gets 30% of the party vote they get 30%
of the list seats. This is WRONG. If a party gets 30% of the party
vote they get 30% of the TOTAL seats (so if they won 24% of the
legislature via ridings they get another 6% of their seats through
the list). 

This is a subtle difference but it is very important, and LOTS of
people are getting the two confused. Worse, the Referendum Ontario
brochure also uses misleading wording that makes the same mistake.
The Record article does get the details right at one point (their
three step process of how the ballot works) but I think people will
still be confused. 

Please submit some letters to the editor clarifying this point. You
can submit them to letters at therecord.ca . They should be no longer
than 300 words, and should include your name, address and telephone
number. Most of the article is okay, so we should congratulate them
for finally giving the referendum some priority coverage.

(If you are still confused about the difference, I wrote a longer
explanation on my lousy blog: 

http://pnijjar.livejournal.com/22127.html)

- Paul







--
Paul Nijjar  http://www.fairvotecanada.org/WaterlooRegion
Next Referendum Info Session: Sept 11, 7pm
(Please use this Yahoo! account for future correspondence.)


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