Alberta Views, Jan/Feb 2023
Ravulaparthi, a Calgary activist, gave a commendable appeal for PR.
He described the instances of serious mis-representation that First Past The Post has given us.
He mentioned false majority governments and listed Ralph Klein's victory in 1993 , Rachel Notley's in 2015 and Ontario Doug Ford's in both 2018 and 2022.
He did not mention that Klein also won a false majority in 2004. His party took 47 percent of the vote but 75 percent of the seats.
Ravulaparthi wrote that the such false majorities mean that "a single party can implement a policy that only 35 percent of the electorate support."
Ravulaparthi is an optimist -.
When Klein was elected in 2004, turn-out was only 45 percent so actually he was elected by only 21 percent of eligible voters.
Doug Ford in 2022 received votes from just 18 percent of eligible voters.
And actually the lowest percentage of the vote that produced a majority government was 38 percent of votes cast that the Chretien government received in 1997. This government received support of just 26 percent of eligible voters.
(see
https://montopedia.wixsite.com/montopedia/post/canada-s-minority-rule-federal-fptp-produces-odd-results-and-always-has)
Ravulaparthi mentioned how the single-winner FPTP means that there is an artificially-created rural-urban divide.
He gave instances of the lack of representation of the minority voters, of how United Conservative Party voters in Edmonton-Highlands-Norwood and the NDP voters in Livingstone-Macleod have no voice.
the election stats in the last election back up his claims:
Edmonton-Highlands-Norwood Conservatives got 26 percent of the vote (4000 votes) but no voice
NDP got 63 percent of the vote and the district's one seat.
Livingstone-Macleod NDP got 21 percent of the vote (5000 votes) but no voice.
The Conservative candidate took 71 percent of the vote and the district's one seat.
Actually other district show more glaring examples of mis-representation:
urban - Edmonton districts
Conservative vote almost totally un-represented, the UCP winning just one seat in Edmonton
Edmonton Castle Downs Conservatives got 36 percent of the vote (7400 votes) but no voice
NDP got 46 percent of the vote and the district's one seat.
majority of votes were not used to elect anyone.
Edmonton Decore
Conservatives got 40 percent of the vote (7400 votes) but no voice
NDP got 48 percent of the vote and the district's one seat.
majority of votes were not used to elect anyone.
Edmonton McClung
Conservatives got 36 percent of the vote (6600 votes) but no voice
NDP got 44 percent of the vote and the district's one seat.
majority of votes were not used to elect anyone.
Edmonton-West-Henday
Conservatives got 42 percent of the vote (8300 votes) but no voice
NDP got 44 percent of the vote and the district's one seat.
majority of votes were not used to elect anyone.
Rural districts
UCP took most of the rural seats
In almost all cases the UCP candidate received a majority of the vote but in a few cases the majority was insubstantial.
In Lethbridge East (which is only notionally considered to be rural) the UCP got just 52 percent of the vote, the NDP taking 39 percent (8800 votes).
Banff-Kananaskis the UCP got just 52 percent of the vote, the NDP taking 39 percent (8900 votes).
Strathcona - Sherwood Park (which is only notionally considered to be rural) the UCP got just 53 percent of the vote, the NDP taking 32 percent (8700 votes).
The strong NDP vote was ignored and received no representation in each of those districts.
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FPTP is a double-edged sword
the 8700 NDP voters in Edmonton-South-West got no representation.
In that district the UCP candidate got 900 more votes to win the district's one seat.
He took only 46 percent of the vote.
The Alberta Party took 12 percent of the vote so the NDP and AP vote together (if it would be together) was more than half of the vote in the district, thus more than the UCP vote even if it joined with any other party (other than the AP).
In Sherwood Park, the 10,700 NDP voters got no representation.
In that district the UCP candidate got 1400 more votes to win the district's one seat.
He took only 45 percent of the vote.
The Alberta Party took 13 percent of the vote, so the NDP and AP vote together (if it would be together) was more than half of the vote in the district, thus more than the UCP vote even if it joined with any other party (other than the AP).
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And FPTP is not only responsible for a rural-urban divide but for
an Edmonton-Calgary divide.
In Calgary the UCP candidates got just 53 percent of the vote but 88 percent of the seats.
The NDP got 34 percent of the vote but only 12 percent of the seats.
In Edmonton we see an almost total reversal of those stats and just as bad mis-representation.
The NDP candidates got just 53 percent of the vote but 95 percent of the seats.
The UCP candidates got 35 percent of the vote but only 5 percent of the seats.
In those two cities, two thirds of the vote was identical -- about 33 percent to NDP and about 33 percent to UCP.
But you would not know it from the seat results.
Only one UCP seat and three NDP seats were matched in each city out of 20/26 seats in each.
When actually as a minimum the NDP should have taken 9 seats in each city and the UCP as a minimum should have taken 7 in each city.
This would have been much factual result than the ying-yang lobsided victories that we see in the results.
Proportionally, the NDP should have taken 9 seats in Calgary and 11 in Edmonton;
the UCP was due 14 in Calgary and 7 in Edmonton.
Instead the NDP took only 3 seats in Calgary and 19 in Edmonton;
the UCP took 25 in Calgary and only 1 in Edmonton.
in other words
Calgary seats should have gone UCP 14 NDP 9 but went UCP 23 NDP 3
Edmonton seats should have gone UCP 7 NDP 11 but went UCP 1 NDP 19
so FPTP did not only artificially produce a rural-urban divide but also an artificial Calgary-Edmonton divide.
In fact the rural vote/seat ratio is no worse than the mis-representation in the cities --Calgary versus Edmonton
Rural (estimated based on regional vote percentages)
proportional actual under FPTP
NDP 10 seats due 2 members elected
UCP 27 seats due 39 members elected.
Other 4 seats due 0 seats elected
So the NDP is just as badly under-represented in Calgary as it is in the rural areas.
The UCP is just as badly over-represented in Calgary as it is in the rural areas.
But all in all, Ravulaparthi made some good points and kudos to Alberta Views for giving space at all for PR.
(Meanwhile most of the other publications are trotting out the old defend-the-status-quo, attack-the-reformers propaganda.
One even lately published a columnist saying the repeated voting for speaker in the House of Representatives in the U.S. was demonstration of failure of PR when in fact
- PR had nothing to do with it (it was just multi-round majoritarian system, with no proportionality.)
- if FPTP had been used as the writer calls for, a Democrat would have been elected Speaker over the will of the Republican party, which holds more seats.
Imagine the outrage that would have erupted in that case, then but at least it would have been very visible proof of the failure of FPTP, which many districts experience but it is not noted in the hoopla of seats won - reports seldom mention that the majority of votes cast are being ignored in many districts, with disastrous dis-proportionality resulting in the overall representation.
Meanwhile the monthly Millwoods Mosaic, published by Arnim Joop, carries an on-going series of articles written by me, which speaks often of PR and how Edmonton and Calgary once used PR before sliding back into the FPTP dark ages.
see https://www.mwmosaic.ca/
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