Electoral dysfunction, yet again

[simplefulllife]

Electoral dysfunction, yet again

Greens deserved more than 20 seats - voting system also punished New Democrats, western Liberals and urban Conservatives

Once again, Canada’s antiquated first-past-the-post system wasted millions of votes, distorted results, severely punished large blocks of voters, exaggerated regional differences,

Comments

[gromm]

The trick of course, is that we aren't supposed to be voting for parties, but for people. We should be voting for someone to represent our little corner of the country in Parliament, not for a national leader.

Now, I would personally like to see my local green candidate representing Burnaby-new westminster, but my neighbours weren't as cooperative.

At the same time, if the overall national ballot determined how many seats each party would have, how would we determine where those MPs would sit? Would a Green MP represent Prince George-West, and a Conservative MP represent Vancouver-East? I think that wouldn't work, because that would be completely counter to the interests of the people in those regions.

[simplefulllife]

That is a balance that the systems must handle. BC-STV is that sort of mixed system between proportional and area representation.