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Tom Monto

STV as part of MMP is the way to go

Updated: Nov 16, 2020

Mixed Member Proportional is where supplemental members are declared elected to overcome unfairness created by district elections. But there is no law that the district members must be elected through First Past The Post in single-member districts.


In fact, using STV to elect the district members would aid the proportionality of the result and necessitate fewer supplemental members or ensure that the use of supplemental members would produce an eminently superior fairness.


CBC writer Aaron Wherry (“Let this be the last time parliament debates electoral reform (at least for a while)” CBC, Nov. 13, 2016) laid out how electoral reform is complicated by the differing secondary aims of the Canada's major parties. Although all say they want a fairer system, they impose conditions on the change.


These are:

- the adoption of MMP (the NDP has pretty much set in stone its demand for this particular alternative to FPTP)

- a system that produces a result proportional to the popular vote (as the New Democrats and Greens desire)

- a system that is relatively simple (as the Liberals desire).

- avoid un-manageably large ridings (a Conservative concern),

- maintain the geographic link between MPs and voters (a Liberal and Conservative concern)

- avoid giving more power to political parties (another Conservative concern).

- no increase in number of MPs, or only a small increase (unspoken but probably to some degree on each party's mind)


As well, a referendum would have to be held before adoption of the new system, is a demand of the Conservatives and Bloc Quebecois.


Luckily, STV used within an MMP system addresses much of these.


STV produces mixed roughly proportional results at the district level, that is, in each district in which it is used. This produces overall chunky proportionality that could be refined by the use of MMP's supplemental members.


STV's overall proportionality is increased if STV is used in multi-districts that together cover all of a province - the province being used as the basis of measure of the popular vote. By Constitution, the seats for each province, the number of MPs for each province are regulated. So absolute obedience to the popular vote would not be constitutionally possible under our Constitution. At least that is what I surmise.


So the best the supplemental members could be is to be placed in the provinces where the provincial result is the most out of whack. Thus STV, with no multi-district crossing a provincial border, each multi-district self-contained within one province, would be a good start on the proportionality desired by the NDP and the Greens, while preserving obedience to the constitution.


STV would provide a much fairer representation than the present FPTP and might even be good enough. But if NDP want MMP supplemental members to polish the result, why not? As long as it is within the rules of the Constitution.


How many supplemental members would there be? If the number of district MPs is not changed, then any supplemental members must be additional seats in the House of Commons.


If the additional member are taken out of the existing MPs, then the number of ridings would be reduced across the country, forcing a re-distribution. Redistribution of seats is often a rancorous affair, one where charges of gerrymandering and selfish partisan greed comes up. And if the ridings are to be redesigned, then why not take advantage of the opportunity and change districts into multi-member districts where possible?


Certainly, ridings in a city can be grouped to make a multi-member district with ease. Distance from one end to the other end of the new district would not be an issue.


As well, many city voters already recognize the need to switch. Victoria voters have already voted they want change from FPTP, so that citizens there would be expected not to object to a change away from FPTP. And if asked it may be likely that a majority in other cities would be seen to share the same outlook.


No one can say that a small or middle-sized city, one with even as many as 11 MPs, as Calgary has now, would be too large to cover by one district. If one mayor can cover such a city, then 6 to 14 MPs should be able to do it, by sharing the load if they have to.


Rural areas for the same reason might also be amenable to the grouping of ridings to make a multi-member district. A large county with enough voters to be eligible for multiple MPs overseen by a reeve (or a mayor as in the case of Strathcona County) is not too big to be made into a single district. If a reeve or mayor can oversee the whole thing, then surely two or more MPs could.


A county too sparsely populated to be eligible for an MP would have to be combined with another county(ies) just to make a district with enough population to be eligible for one MP. Combining it with as many counties as it might take to form a multi-member district might make a district that is un-manageably large. So a single-member district might be necessary in each of these cases. The election of a single member would create unfair representation, as it does everywhere now under FPTP, and that is where the supplemental members would be important.


The use of multi-member districts might make redistribution easier. Drawing 8 single-member ridings where 11 used to divide a city would be more difficult than simply making the city one district and giving it 11 members or even simply making it two districts - one district with 5 and one district with 6 members.


A different blog, "15 percent Supplemental members not enough", predicts that the usual recommended number of supplemental seats would do little to address the rampant unfairness produced by FPTP in single-member districts. Simply using supplemental seats to copy the popular vote, when supplemental seats make up only about 15 percent of the total seats, would likely still ignore parties with less than 20 percent of the vote in a region.


And if supplemental members are used to compensate for unfairness, by more being awarded to the parties that suffer the most unfairness, then that would necessitate a somewhat complicated apportionment system. Such apportionment is made more complicated by constitutionally-guaranteed provincial representation.


Multi-member districts would still maintain the geographic link between MPs and voters that is an aim of the Liberal and Conservative parties. The use of city and county boundaries would root the new multi-member districts in realities right on the ground.


STV would also address the desire by the Conservative party that the new system would avoid giving more power to political parties. STV has been praised in all its application as a system that gives voters both more power and more freedom. Independent members are frequently elected in Ireland's STV elections. A couple were when Winnipeg elected its MLAs through STV. None were when Alberta used STV in provincial elections but that was the choice of the voters.


There would be no party list of candidates with seats awarded as per general party vote tally. Independent blocks of voters would directly choose not only which party will take seats but also directly choose which candidate among that party's slate will be elected. These blocks would be natural constituencies. They would not be artificially created heterogeneous collections formed by district boundaries as presently. They would be formed voluntarily by the voters themselves simply by casting their votes, thus self-sorting themselves into interest groups, natural constituencies.


Country-wide Referendum would be un-necessary

The government has the right to change the electoral system. Each of the provinces west of Quebec have changed the electoral system used in provincial elections and each did so without holding a referendum.


STV has the advantage that it is district based and thus can be brought in partially. An MMP system must be brought in across the board, unless each province is allowed to choose its own form of federal representation. Such would be possible. And it has a precedent - in the old days say WWI, before universal adult suffrage, the provincial electoral system was used to set conditions of suffrage for federal elections.


Regarding electoral change, one or two provinces could set the pace by adopting MMP/STV within this borders and thus give concrete example of the democratic advance such a system would give over those provinces still using FPTP.


Aaron Wherry, the CBC writer whose article was the springboard for this essay-blog, said that "A threshold for change would have to be set — say, majority approval by voters in seven of 10 provinces, representing 50 per cent of the population, as the Supreme Court set for implementing Senate elections — but a public vote would, one way or the other, effectively end the discussion (at least for a while)."


But if the government opened the way to separate provinces adopting MMP-STV on a provincial basis, an overall threshold would not be required. No divisive country-wide referendum would be necessary. Even a partial change away from FPTP would be good for the country.


Any city or county that adopted STV, any province that adopted MMP-STV in its borders, would help proportionality in general across the country. And the sooner, the better.


Thanks for reading.

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