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Showing posts with label proportional representation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label proportional representation. Show all posts
Tuesday, 29 March 2011
If Stephen Harper wins a majority on May 2 he will be given the keys to our Parliament and be able to do what he pleases. He will be able to jam legislation through the House without any check from the Senate, which the Tories now control.
For four years he will be able to show contempt for Parliament each and every day.
He will be able to do these things (and much, much more):
- Disregard the rights of our MPs to have proper information given to them in order to do their job properly and represent us, by refusing to vote his majority government in contempt of the House;
- Prepare and pass budgets based on fudged figures, projections that do not show the true costs of major items, and optimistic estimates of growth;
- Viciously attack and destroy any civil servant who dares to question any Tory initiative, including blatant breaches of our laws;
- Jam through massive further tax cuts for corporations, and so "starve the beast" for the next 20 years, putting in danger payments to seniors, and our health care program;
- Gut any regulations he wishes to;
- Continue his shameful use of taxpayers' money (our money) to boost his party and his standing.
A Harper majority poses a major risk to my country.
Jack Layton has addressed the issue of how we can avoid a Harper marjority on May 2:
NDP Leader Jack Layton is urging voters to think strategically when they cast their ballots, so they can get rid of Stephen Harper as prime minister..."The way to stop Stephen Harper from getting a majority is to take Conservative seats one by one, and defeat the MPs who are there. That's how you stop Mr. Harper from getting a majority," Layton said in Regina.
Jack Layton is calling on every voter who is concerned about Stephen Harper winning a majority and running unchecked over our rights and freedoms, and our democracy, to vote for country rather than party.
We can best prevent another Harper government by voting to defeat the Conservative candidate in our riding. And the best way to do this is to put country before party.
If in the 2008 election the votes won in your riding by the Liberal and NDP candidates were more than the votes won by the Conservative candidate, but the Conservative ended up being elected because of the split vote between NDP and Liberals, then you should vote for the party that won the most votes in 2008 so as to defeat the Tories. If that was the NDP, then vote NDP this time even if you are a Liberal. If that was the Liberal Party, then vote Liberal this time even if you are NDP.
I am going to follow Jack's advice in this election, and put my country ahead of my party in order to prevent another Harper Tory government.
Thank you, Jack!
O, Canada, we stand on guard for thee!
Saturday, 5 March 2011
If (as is unlikely right now) the Harper government's March 22 budget does not gain the confidence of the House and the government falls, there is a policy that the Liberals can announce once the writ is dropped that might leverage it into a strong minority government in the election.
Check the standing of the parties over the past 2 ½ years (2008 – 2011).
The national polls show the Tories with around 35%, with room to grow to around 40%. The Liberals gather between 27% and 32%.
Now the key: the Greens cluster around 10%, and the NDP seems to have settled in around the 15 – 17% mark.
Now consider just two battlefield provinces – BC and Ontario.
The Tories gather around 32% to 38% in BC, with the NDP in the 19% - 25% range and the Greens in the 10% - 16% range. The LPC is in the 20 – 25% range.
In Ontario the Tories polled in the 35% to 45% range, with the NDP garnering around 15% and the Greens between 7% and 10%. The LPC is in the 30 – 35% range.
Now consider a policy of the Liberals that could draw at least half the Green vote and one-third of the NDP vote to this party. This would boost the Liberal votes by around 10% to between 37% and 42% nationally, to between 32% to 47% in BC, and between 40% and 45% in Ontario.
The policy that could do this is one that offers voters who would normally vote Green or NDP a chance to change the rules of our elections in such a way that in all subsequent elections their votes would count for much more. It would help change the democratic deficit in our country that has lead to a Tory government that represents around a third of the votes cast, and yet has managed to disregard the wishes of the other two-thirds and govern in a right wing way.
What is this policy?
The Liberals should commit that if they become the government, they will immediately launch a Citizens Panel to examine the best type of proportional representation for federal elections, and that the Liberal government would table legislation for the change recommended by such a Citizens Panel.
This will attract voters who prefer the Green and NDP parties because such a change would give their votes in all future elections a much fairer weight.
The Greens would see Green MPs in Parliament in the following elections. The NDP would see a fairer representation of MPs than it currently gets.
And we would then have a system of governments which are forced to consider the wishes of a much broader spectrum of voters.
And the Harper Tories will be toast until they undergo their own revolution and purge the Reformer element which took over the old Progressive Conservative Party, and revert to a more representative set of policies that are much closer to the ones that party used to have.
All of Canada would gain.
Friday, 10 December 2010
The coalition government in Britain is proceeding with legislation to dramatically change the House of Lords. Out go some 800 doddering nobles; in come 300 Lords.
But the real change is that the 300 new lords will be elected by a system of proportional representation:
Crucially, elections to a new senate would take place using proportional representation, the electoral system long favoured by the Lib Dems.
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Wednesday, 10 November 2010
Congratulations to Elizabeth May and a Call for Action to Messrs. Ignatieff & Layton
0 comments Posted by 2011 at 09:38 |
| Hat tip from Leonard Cohen |
Hat tip to drivingtheporcelianbus for bringing the latest on the court challenge to our antiquated first-past-the-post system to our attention.
Elizabeth May is to be congratulated for walking the talk of democratic reform by intervening in the court challenge to our election system:
Elizabeth May is to be congratulated for walking the talk of democratic reform by intervening in the court challenge to our election system:
Elizabeth May will be an intervenor in a court challenge arguing that the first-past-the-post electoral system contravenes the fairness required by Section Three of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Fair Vote Canada has also been granted intervenor status in the case. Spearheaded by L'Association pour la revendication des droits démocratiques (ARDD), a Quebec democratic rights group, the case (Gibb v. Quebec's Attorney General and Quebec's Director General of Elections) is currently being heard in the Quebec Court of Appeal, and is expected to go all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada.
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Friday, 11 June 2010
And that strategy is an election ceasefire, adopted by ordinary Canadians. This – if done by enough of us – is the death knell of Harper's new Tories.
Saturday, 5 June 2010
Kudos to RobSilver for laying out this stunning snippet of information gleaned from the bowels of the latest Angus Reid poll on coalitioning:
LIKE IT? CLICK HERE TO READ MOREWhen the results are compared to voting intent, "merging" the Liberals and NDP is supported by a majority of Liberals (54 per cent), materially more popular than among NDP supporters (40 per cent support) (to put this number in perspective, when Angus Reid last asked about such a scenario in October of 2009, they got 43 per cent of Liberals in favour, and 50 per cent opposed); an even larger majority of Liberals (57 per cent) are in favour of "strategic candidate support" between the NDP and Liberals (compared to 44 per cent support amongst NDP supporters). Both parties are equally enthusiastic about a "shared power" scenario (72 per cent LIB, 70 per cent NDP).
Friday, 4 June 2010
Here is one example of sloppy coalition talk (inexactness, lack of precision in the use of the correct terms, blurring different events into one through vagueness of articulation) from Scott Reid in the Globe & Mail:
Who would suggest the party should now sacrifice its identity in the face of an opponent who has three times proven unable to secure a majority mandate? A Prime Minister who has rarely been able to rally more than 34 per cent of public opinion to his side?
And here's another one, from Steve Janke in Angry in the Great White North:
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Wednesday, 12 May 2010
How could the NDP protect itself from being sucked into supporting policieis which are totally unacceptable to it in such a coalition?
In other words, how would Jack protect the NDP from selling out its basic principles?
He could do it by baking a three layer cake, or a Layton Triple Layer Coalition.
LIKE IT? CLICK HERE TO READ MOREHow will the new government work? It is impossible to say precisely, as we are in uncharted waters. Ministers from both parties will be bound by collective responsibility - meaning they must agree to support all Cabinet decisions - when it comes to key issues such as the economy, tax, defence, immigration, foreign policy and Europe.
And do a deal with Stephen Harper to prop up his government for the next five years.
Judging from the concessions Great Britain’s Nick Clegg has wrestled from the Labor and Conservative parties over the past week, Layton might want to rethink his approach and refine his bargaining skills.
Over the course of three minority governments, the NDP has failed to advance its cause of proportional representation one inch. In the current Parliament, Layton has been left at the altar of a coalition by the Liberals and routinely ignored by the Conservatives.
Now take a peek at what that fellow Clegg managed to pull off – the pushed and prodded his LibDems into cutting a written deal with the Conservatives which provides for significant electoral reform, both of the House and of the House of Lords.
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The following is the extract from the Conservative-Liberal Democrats (CLD) coalition agreement.
Note the following:
This is the extract:
6. Political Reform
Note the following:
- Recall of MPs – petition by 10% of voters can trigger this.
- House of Lords draft legislation to be brought forward by end of 2010, with single long terms and election based on proportional representation.
- Five year fixed terms but 55% vote of MPs can dissolve the House during a term.
- Political funding to be reformed to remove big money from elections.
- Power devolution ("radical") to municipalities and a review of municipal financing.
This is the extract:6. Political Reform
The parties agree to the establishment of five year fixed-term parliaments. A Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government will put a binding motion before the House of Commons in the first days following this agreement stating that the next general election will be held on the first Thursday of May 2015. Following this motion, legislation will be brought forward to make provision for fixed term parliaments of five years. This legislation will also provide for dissolution if 55% or more of the House votes in favour.
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Here is a summary of the major electoral changes in the coalition agreement:
• Referendum on the Alternative Vote system for general elections
• Fixed-term Parliaments - next election in May 2015
• 55% of MPs required to bring government down in confidence vote
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Tuesday, 11 May 2010
LIKE IT? CLICK HERE TO READ MORELeading the attack was the former Home Secretary David Blunkett, who had been urging Mr Brown to admit defeat since last Friday morning. Mr Blunkett warned that a "coalition of the defeated" would spell electoral disaster for Labour and accused the Lib Dems of acting like "every harlot in history".
Monday, 10 May 2010
But what is surprising is the apparent hubris which the Tories displayed with regard to one of the key demands of the LibDems: electoral reform.
It seems that the LibDems were offered something laughably inadequate during the negotiations, and only after Brown change the game with his resignation notice and the Labour Party offered true electoral reform as a possibility, did the Tories scrap their earlier thin gruel and try to put some substance on the table.
The Cat wonders why the Tories were so arrogantly sure of the strength of their position that they could dream of their first insulting offer. Surely they must have realized that less than 40% of the voters had cast votes for them, while the bulk of the votes were cast for parties on the left of the political spectrum? Operating from a smallish base is not a recipe for arrogance ...
Labour offers LibDems a Bird in the hand and perhaps another in the bush
0 comments Posted by 2011 at 13:03
But Labour has topped that with the now trademark Gordon Brown doubling up negotiation style – not just one electoral reform offer but two:
Labour is understood to have offered the Lib Dems a bill to introduce the Alternative Vote system, followed by a referendum on full proportional representation.
And the key difference is that the LibDems can guarantee at least some electoral reform in a hurry, through legislation before the next election, with the prospect of further changes to the AV system if the referendum is successful.
LIKE IT? CLICK HERE TO READ MOREGordon Brown announced tonight that he is to step down as Labour leader but wants to remain in No 10 for a few more months as part of a coalition deal with the Liberal Democrats.
Sunday, 9 May 2010
While Lord Tebbit, the former chairman of the Tories, was harrumphing that Cameron was perhaps going a little too far with his "love-bombing" of Nick Clegg, dissent is raising its head amongst the Liberal Democrats over a firm commitment to electoral reform as part of the Tory-LDP deal:
LIKE IT? CLICK HERE TO READ MOREThe Liberal Democrat leader, who has been warned by senior members of the party not to form a pact with David Cameron without a "significant" offer on electoral reform, will again meet with his MPs and the party's federal executive to discuss the state of the negotiations.
And now it seems that Gordon Brown, keeping his eye on the key issue of electoral reform, is offering Clegg not one but TWO public referenda:
Mr Clegg found himself wooed by both Tory and Labour leaders yesterday. He met with Mr Cameron in the evening having earlier spoken by phone as their teams of negotiators continued talks. He was then asked to attend a face-to-face meeting with Mr Brown at the Foreign Office. It is thought an 11th-hour agreement with Labour would include an immediate commitment on a referendum on the "alternative vote" system, with further discussions on a second public vote on proportional representation.
So far, we've heard that Brown has offered TWO cabinet posts for every one of the three which Cameron had offered Clegg.
Now there might be TWO referenda.
Can we expect more doubling, as Brown fights for his political life?
The Cat gets it: Nick Clegg believes in Vampire Politics, not in Proportional Representation
0 comments Posted by 2011 at 09:27This post tells why Clegg is not pushing a referendum on proportional representation in talks with Cameron, why the Labour counter offer will fail, and why a Canadian professor can keep Gordon Brown in his post as prime minister for the next two to four years.
After years of finding themselves shut out of power because their support is spread more evenly over the British political and geographic spaces than that of their rivals, the Tories and Labour, the LDP set a goal of trying to gain more seats in parliament by advocating electoral reform through some type of proportional representation (PR).
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Friday, 7 May 2010
Using the soft-spoken former prime minister Major as a messenger, Cameron is aiming at a binding agreement between the Liberal and Tory parties which would allow him to govern with a comfortable majority, while implementing some key policies of the Liberals and inviting some Liberals into the Tory cabinet.
The chances of that happening with Cameron are declining rapidly.
The right wing of the Tory party is surfacing, warning Cameron away from meaningful electoral reform, because they know that PR is the kiss of death for the minority Tories, who would be outvoted for decades to come by the progressive left of Britain:
Cameron will have to tread carefully with his party because he is facing a revolt from the right over the election result and over the apparent failure of the leadership to consult the party.
LIKE IT? CLICK HERE TO READ MOREAs a first step he is planning to meet the backbench 1922 committee next week, although it is without a chairman after
So the bargaining has started. Clegg, leader of the Liberal Democrats, has given Tory leader Cameron the right of first negotiation because the Tories won the most seats and had the highest percentage of votes of the three major UK parties.
Cameron opened the bidding, hoping to get in first before the Labourites cemented a deal with the Liberals.
However, his first set of offers strikes The Cat as being clumsy, arrogant and self-serving. It is highly probable that the hubris in this opening offer might just be enough to sink the chances of the Labour Party allowing Tories to rule.
The key is that Clegg is not the only person to make the decision of whom to crown as king. His party's MPs will be a decisive influence on this decision.
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