STV is not good for Bill Tieleman
Bill Tieleman's latest effort to undermine STV is curious indeed. Is he going after STV? Does he have something against Dave Meslin? Or maybe he's trying to tap into our sense of western alienation. Mr. Tieleman refers to Ontario 5 times, implying that those uppity Central Canadians should stay out of our referendum. Enough of the niceties - on to the arguments.
Bill Tieleman says "it does not allow voters to determine what fraction of their vote is to be allocated to each preference, meaning you will never know exactly where your vote went. Well, peope who voted Green in the last few elections know exactly where their votes went - nowhere. People who voted for people who weren't elected know where their votes went as well.
Frankly, Bill, I don't care what they do with my vote as long as we see more representative government. David Schreck warns that they'll chop my vote into fractions. For all I care, they can puree it and serve it back to me in a cocktail. I know enough about STV to understand how it works. Literally dozens of political scientists, the people who spend their lives studying this stuff, have endorsed BC-STV. I have confidence in Elections BC to implement it and am sure the parties will ensure counting is done properly. So, that is not an issue.
Mr. Tieleman takes Dave Meslin to task for saying that "the notion that STV will result in fewer women being elected" is ridiculous. Wisely sidestepping the argument, Tieleman cites Andrea Reimer and Anne Edwards who claim that STV will be bad for women. He concludes "I guess Meslin figures he knows more than two experienced British Columbian women politicians whose credentials are impeccable."
Maybe the answer is that Mr. Meslin is aware that Tricia Marwick, a member of the Scottish Parliament with first hand experience with STV said "of course STV is good for women". Maybe he's looked at the impressive list of endorsements on the stv.ca website and seen that it includes 4 NDP MP's (3 of them women), several dozen local politicians (many of them women), Judy Rebick, Naomi Klein, Maude Barlow, Jane Sterk, Ontario NDP leader Andrea Horwath and many, many other prominent women. So, Mr Tieleman, I would suggest that either you are extremely poorly informed on this point or you are making a disingenuous argument.
Next, Bill Tielman asks rhetorically whether the Ontarians would accept this system in Toronto. It's ironic you bring this up because STV was used successfully over several decades in two dozen American cities where it was credited with taking "power away from party leaders and give more of it to voters." Those party insiders who lost power plotted to get rid of it by undermining it and were successful when the "wrong kinds of people" (ethnic minorities and the occasional socialist) were elected.
Finally, Bill Tieleman claims that STV "obviously reduces local representation". Maybe this is only obvious to him. This report, produced for the Scottish Parliament found that "STV appears effective at maintaining linkages between politicians and local communities and indeed it is often criticised for fostering too localistic a political culture."
So, Bill, now that I've addressed your concerns, I'm sure you will want to meet with the NDP brain trust that is opposing STV and explain to them that you were wrong. Many of us are used to thinking of the NDP as the party that always takes the principled stand. We can't understand why you would oppose this progressive system. Stop the madness before it's too late.
I know what you mean. Tieleman has been beating this horse since STV popped up and his arguments just keep getting weaker. It's hard for me to believe that he actually buys the nonsense he's writing. Is there some other motive that he's not sharing with us? What STV does is maximise voter choice, and it is my favourite voting system for exactly that reason. Could it be that some feel that this is a negative? That voters should have their choices strictly limited by such politicos as Tieleman himself? I can't fathom it, myself.
It's not as though Tieleman actually believes this stuff about STV being bad for women. It's Ireland's national political culture that's bad for women. But he knows STV also elected women as 38 percent of Ireland's Euro MPs.
Dublin's City Council, elected on party labels by STV, has 29 percent women. (The London Assembly elected by MMP has 32 percent women.) And the Legislative Assembly of the Australian Capital Territory, elected by STV, is 41 percent women.
No, these are just debating points, not real reasons.
Perhaps his real reason is that winning an NDP nomination in a strong NDP seat is no longer the key to the old boys' paradise. You actually have to compete with other NDP candidates. Even with women.
A new young woman might actually beat one of Bill's old friends.
Unless he can convince enough voters that competition is bad for women. That was indeed the conventional wisdom in Europe in the 1950s, and 60s, and -- until Sweden changed to an open-list system and found it actually HELPED women. Turns out voters in Sweden, like voters in Canada, want to elect more women. Why not let them?
I've given the matter some thought an my conclusion is that there are a lot of 'true believers' that simply aren't democrats anymore. They've seen too many of the 'wrong type' of governments elected and have come to the conclusion that people are generally ignorant, unintelligent, immoral, apathetic or some combination of all four. They believe they are saving the peopel from themselves. The power brokers know best and a patina of democracy will suffice to keep people content. I have a certain level of sympathy for their lack of faith in people because there are an awful lot of uninformed, apathetic people out there. Fundamentally, though, I believe that democracy cannot be a spectator sport. If it is, it will wither away.
I should qualify all of this by saying I don't know Bill Tieleman so I'm not applying this characterization to him personally. Rather, this is an impression I'm getting from reading stuff by and talking to a lot of different people. His actions do seem to fit the profile, though.
I firmly believe that STV is right for BC. We're an independent-minded lot and the ability to vote past and through parties meshes well with an independent view.
I really, believe, though, that if BC-STV goes down, it could jeopardize PR movements across Canada for some time to come. And that would be tragic. PR is very important to democracy in BC but I think that Canada needs PR to survive. FPTP accentuates regionalism and favours region-centric parties. The Bloc Quebecois gets way more seats than it would under PR. How long will it be until another province-centred party appears, maybe in Alberta? If that happened BC probably wouldn't be far behind.
So here I am, in answer to all the questions about my position - I can't duck it any longer. I'm voting YES to STV. I'm a bit of a reluctant comer to it and I've got my issues about it. But I've come to the conclusion that it's the right thing to do, at least for my one vote!
About a week ago, I went to the www.trystv.ca website. Even though a random sample of people have not taken the STV style poll on the BC election, I counted the number of men and women that would be elected. At that time, I determined that about 31% of the winning candidates would be women. In the BC legislative assembly at dissolution, about 22 percent of the MLAs were women. I do think that if BC-STV achieves the 60% hurdle, in the first couple of elections at least 30% of the winning candidates will be women.
On to Bill Tieleman and David Schreck, two BC NDP honchos:
If I were living in BC, I would not be voting for the NDP this time. I'd rather vote for the Greens or BC Liberals. In theory, Tieleman and Shreck are running the First Past the Post campaign independently of the NDP organization. Unfortunately, the party leadership has not taken sides in the referendum debate. If the BC-STV fails to reach the 60 percent threshold and if the NDP forms a majority government, I can see Messrs Tieleman and Schreck being invited to work with Carole James.
I have always thought that the NDP represented average Canadians. With Tieleman and Schreck campaigning for First Past the Post, and with the BC NDP not taking a stand in favour of BC STV, I know that the NDP want to represent their own elite interests.
First Past the Post is for the party honchos;
BC-STV is for the people of British Columbia.
First Past the Post is for the party honchos;
BC-STV is for the people of British Columbia.
Absolutely.
If the BC-STV fails to reach the 60 percent threshold and if the NDP forms a majority government, I can see Messrs Tieleman and Schreck being invited to work with Carole James.
Now you're scaring me.
ReeferMadness, please check your PMs.
If BC-STV fails to reach the 60 percent threshold and if the NDP forms a majority government, I can see Messrs Tieleman and Schreck being invited to work with Carole James.
Now you're scaring me.
If you live in BC, I won't suggest how you should vote in the election. I won't scare you into voting for a party not to your liking. I am not the type of person that would automatically vote for a party because it fits an ideological profile that may be close to mine. Every party and candidate has to earn my vote in any election. The NDP--federally and provincially--is no exception.
Casper the Friendly Ghost says, "Boo!"
A leap too far. A non-sequitur.
A great many active BC New Democrats are working in the Vote For BC-STV campaign.
"Some" people in the BC NDP want to represent their own elite interests. Some Liberals are also opposed to BC-STV. In fact, in the 2005 referendum surveys showed that BC-STV had, as you would expect, more support among NDP voters than among Liberal voters. I expect the same will be true this time. Actually I hope I'm wrong. We need more Liberal voter support than we got last time.
Oh yes, let's vote for BC Liberals advice, and pretend to be progressive, and pretend you are not telling people how to vote..
Tieleman writes that STV "breaks each single vote into fractions.
This is simply wrong. Many votes are never transferred, and stay with their top preference, intact.
He is also wrong to assert that individual voters cannot track their votes through the count. The count is deterministic and it is perfectly possible to track how an individual vote transfers.
And why would some votes stay intact while others fractionalize?
And why would some votes stay intact while others fractionalize?
When a candidate gets more votes than required to get elected, the excess votes transfer to the voters next preferences. However, to ensure that every vote for said candidate is treated equally, what transfers is a fraction of each vote, so we don't get a situation where some votes transfer (ie. count twice), and some votes don't (also would be impossible to fairly determine which votes would transfer, and which would not). So if say Jenny Kwan gets 10% more votes on the first ballot than the number required to win, 10% of every first place vote for Jenny Kwan transfers to the voters next preference (rather than having 10% of votes transfer in their entirety, and 90% not transfer at all).
The weird thing about this discussion is that it should be the Greens, not New Democrats, complaining that MMP would have been better for them than the current BC-STV map. The average District Magnitude of the present map is 4.25. As Michael Gallagher's book about Ireland's 2007 election notes, Fianna Fail got 46.7% of the seats on 41.6% of the votes, while the second party Fine Gael got 30.9% of the seats on 27.3% of the votes, and Labour also got a bonus while all others (including the Greens) got fewer seats than their vote share.
Thanks left turn, and am voting No to STV on May 12th for a variety of reasons.
And you have every right to do so, but I still don't understand why.
The weird thing about this discussion is that it should be the Greens, not New Democrats, complaining that MMP would have been better for them than the current BC-STV map. The average District Magnitude of the present map is 4.25. As Michael Gallagher's book about Ireland's 2007 election notes, Fianna Fail got 46.7% of the seats on 41.6% of the votes, while the second party Fine Gael got 30.9% of the seats on 27.3% of the votes, and Labour also got a bonus while all others (including the Greens) got fewer seats than their vote share.
Wilf, I think you're overanalyzing.
Party leaders, strategists and other senior insiders tend to what gets them the most power. Party members, on the other hand, are more likely to take a more principled position. The insiders prefer MMP because it keeps the power with the party and keeps it out of the hands of pesky voters.
There are senior BC NDP insiders who like FPTP because it occasionally gets them a majority government. This explains why the NDP membership endorsed proportional representation but it shows up nowhere on the website and isn't part of their platform. So, Carole James ignores electoral reform for years and suddenly, when it looks like STV might win, starts talking about MMP.
In terms of the Green Party, I understand that both Adrianne Carr and Jane Sterk strongly preferred MMP over STV. I also believe that last time, the Green Party stayed neutral, same as the two big parties.
I would say that the Green Party has come to the realization that a half loaf is better than none. STV in 2013 is better than maybe getting MMP is 2021.
Or maybe Sterk is listening to her constituency. Or maybe she's taking a principled stand.
Wilf:
1. Like I said before, STV pits party member against party member, not just against other party's members. In BC, politics is a blood sport, I do not see it getting women more involved in politics, I see it being a mechanism to get women less involved, as a matter of cfact.
2. Ireland wants their STV gone, why would we adopt it? Especially considering the old boy's net work it sustains in Ireland, which would happen here in a NY minute.
3. Huge numbers of candidates running for each electoral district in BC making electional processes impossible, and thus discouraging voters from voting even more.
4. Huge electoral districts, bigger than we already have, which means even less representation in rural areas and more domination from urban areas.
5. Having to use computer voting, as there is no way hand counting will work given the amount of candidates there will be. This is a negative push away factor for several reasons.
6. Having 2-5 elected MLA's fighting with each other in any given electoral district, and being concerned with only how they will keep being a representative, over the other 4, is not my idea of representation for the masses. Too much room for dirty tricks, and less for actual riding work.
7. Have 5 representatives from 1 party, as will be the case in some riding, is not my idea of fair representation. And it will happen of that there is no doubt.
8. Not going to go for the stupidity that is embodied in the acknowlegement that STV is perhaps not workable here in BC, but we can change it later to something else, thinking. It to me it is fools rushing in, plus a huge waste of tax payer's money.
9. Plus a few more personal biases that have been created because of the blind and/or short sighted supporters of it here, not meaning you Wilf either. But, I figure if they think it is a good thing, then I need to run from it as fast as possible, and advise as many people as possible to vote NO too.
The NDP has done it with FPTP -- 50% women candidates, well done -- provided 50% are elected. Usually male incumbents have better chances. With BC-STV, if four candidates are nominated in a district, two men and two women, will all the male incumbents win? I don't know. When you pit female party member against male party member, will women tend to win? The reason I think so is because 90% of Canadian voters want to see more women elected. But maybe BC is different? And then we come to the Liberals, with only 29% women candidates. If they nominate four in a district, will it be only one woman and three men? Maybe sometimes. But the women may do better than the men. If the male vote is split three ways and more women vote for the woman, she will survive the early counts while some of the men are eliminated. That's the tactic to win in STV: manage to get others to drop first. Yes, you're right, more competition might be bad for women if the Liberals run big name males and sports stars while their women candidates are unknowns. If BC Liberal voters fall for that, they will not elect as many women as the NDP does. Well, that's the case today anyway.
What makes you say Ireland wants to get rid of STV? I have seen no evidence of that. In their last referendum, when the largest party tried for obvious reasons to scrap it, voters voted to keep it. Currently STV hurts Sinn Fein, but they have not advocated scrapping it, nor changing to a more proportional system.
The Citizens Assembly decided to make it easy for lazy voters to vote, by using the Tasmanian ballot rather than the Irish ballot. In Ireland all candidates are listed alphabetically. In Tasmania they are grouped by party. If someone doesn't care to rank 14 candidates, they can just go 1, 2, 3, 4 on their party's candidates. But a lot of people who don't bother to cast wasted votes now will turn out to vote -- for the NDP in West Vancouver and the Okanagan, for the Greens and Marijuana Party and progressive independents everywhere, and likely a strong majority of these new progressive voters will give a second preference to an NDP candidate. Even in East Vancouver in the safest NDP seats where some NDP voters see no need to get off their butts and vote, they will have a reason to vote, when every vote counts.
You may call them huge, but they look okay to me. If you look at how large federal ridings are, and then imagine how much larger they will be if we adopt MMP federally, they will be the same size as a BC-STV four-seater.
The ballots can be re-counted by hand, if Elections BC uses computer tabulation to get a winner on election night.
You would really rather have only a Liberal MLA to do riding work in your riding? One of the great virtues of MMP as used in Scotland is that every voter has a day-to-day choice: go to your local member or one of your seven regional members, presumably one from the party you voted for, likely a woman member if you wish. If you have two NDP MLAs from your district, will they fight to represent you? In the Lower Mainland I expect they will share an office and you can see whichever you want. In other areas they may each take on half of the district, but you could still see the MLA serving the other part of the district if you prefer.
No, it will certainly not happen. There is no five-seat district in BC where one party could win 84% of the vote. Or do you mean five Liberals from the six-seater in West Vancouver? But that would take 72% of the vote. Based on the 2005 votes in West Vancouver the result would be three Liberals, two NDP and one Green. I'm not guessing, I have a spreadsheet.
Correct me if I'm wrong, Wilf but I recall someone (maybe you) saying that many regions that are currently represented by only one party will now be represented by 2 or even 3. For example, the 2 northeastern ridings almost always return 2 Liberals under the current system but under STV would likely return 1 Liberal, 1 NDP. Right?
Right. Other examples, all based on voters voting the same as they did in 2005, and putting those votes into the new districts based on the 2005 boundaries, which isn't precisely right but the best I can do:
Fraser Valley East, was solidly Liberal, would likely have been 3 Lib, 2 NDP.
North Shore - Sea to Sky, was four Liberals, would have been 2 Lib, 1 NDP, 1 Green
Okanagan - Shuswap, was solidly Liberal, would have been (unless more than 45% of the Green vote goes Liberal) 2 Lib, 2 NDP.
Okanagan - Boundary, was solidly Liberal, would have been 2 Lib, 1 NDP.
North Central (Prince George) was 3 Lib, would have been 2 Lib, 1 NDP.
Conversely, to be fair, the Capital District went 5 NDP and 2 Lib, but would have gone 3 NDP, 3 Lib, 1 Green.
I have yet to hear an argument against BC-STV that is sound. When campaigning on the street, I'll meet some normal folks opposed to it (and are willing to talk to me further) and it always turns out that they actually don't fully understand it. The No campaign is frequently dishing out lies and distortions, doing their best to keep the public misinformed. It is dispicable, because they are doing the public a disservice, and they are doing it with our tax dollars. It is truly unfortunate that people like Tieleman and Schreck can continue spouting blatant lies without any repercussions.
The Yes campaign uses stats, figures, and historical precedence to support our stance. The No side uses scare-mongering and appeals to emotion, with a few cherry-picked stats that distort the whole picture. No matter what happens in this referendum, these party hacks have forever shown their lack of integrity and I hope this shadow follows them to the end of their days.
- Niilo
Well Niilo, in fairness, it's hard to blame the no side for playing to their strengths. They have a crappy product in the form of FPTP. STV is great but not well understood. Thanks to the government and NDP, they were given a huge headstart in the form of only needing 40% to win. That means they don't have to sell anybody on anything, just spread fear, uncertainty and doubt.
So, when you factor everything in, you sort of have to figure that a bunch of political insiders are probably going to run a smear campaign. And if the unvarnished truth is inconvenient, that needn't be an obstacle.
Throughout the referendum campaign, Tieleman and Schreck have only attacked BC-STV. They say nothing good about their antiquated First-Past-the-Post voting system. I would hate to see these two bigwigs working in the premier's office if Carole James becomes premier. Maybe that's one reason why they love First-Past-the-Post. With it, these future backroom boys will exercise more power than the local MLAs who are supposed to represent their constituents.
I have to say, living in Scotland, this characteristic of the electoral system is a treat. When I had questions about the recycling program in my riding, I emailed each of my MSPs, each of whom returned a variety of results--including a Green Party regional MSP with a personal response. I was spoilt for choice for which member I wanted to approach depending on my personal politics. The idea is that they will fight for you, the consituent, not against each other. I've had a positive experience every time I've tried to contact an MSP here: completely unlike my experience in Canada when an MP or MPP has virtually no reason to respond to a person with marginal concerns, especially when that member might be a party bigwig.
Wilf, sorry, but your response lacked any affirmative push for STV as far as I am concerned.
Ireland apparently has had a history of stuffed ballot boxes and electoral fraud with STV. Hence the push to get rid of STV, that was defeated by MLA's and not the people and apparently there were problems with that vote too.
Scotland has MMP, not STV, so your words in that respect mean nothing to me by way of support for STV, moreover, what about the 100+k worth of spoiled ballots in the first Scottish election?
Absolutely NO computerized voting in BC, or indeed Canada, I don't care if they "can" be hand counted or not.
And I still see STV as elminating women from politics, just as it has in Ireland.
And I am not willing to go from 85 ridings to 20, with urban centres dominating the votes and even less accountability will happen, the MLA's can sluff it off on another and play the blame game all damn day. Rural communities will be excluded from consideration more than they are now.
Respectfully, your extremely hypothetical positives mean nothing in context of real BC people and elections.
I don't know if women were eliminated from politics when STV was introduced in Ireland. I don't think the Irish became Xenaphobic because they switched to STV. Does anyone have the stats on women's participation before and after the introduction of STV?
Here is a page that has some stats on women and politics in Ireland.
http://www.db-decision.de/CoRe/Ireland.htm
It would be hard to say how STV affected women's ability to be elected in 1929, because the public will to support women for political office at that time was very low (world-wide).
I am reading a great book ("The Politics of Voting" by Dennis Pilon) that looks at women's representation under various systems. Of note, the percentage of women elected in Ireland has been increasing since 1968 (the data in the book doesn't go earlier). In 1968, Ireland had about 2% women elected. Also of note, Canada is particularly high in comparison to the US and the UK (according to stats for the range of 1975 to 2005) - two other countries using FPTP. There seems to be a lot of public will in our country to finally give political equality to women.
However, before we get too cocky, Canada is ranked at 51st in the world (http://www.cbc.ca/news/interactives/map-world-womenpolitics/). The majority of countries that are beating us out are not using plurality (SMP / FPTP). They are using some form of proportional representation.
Australia also appears to have significant public will to elect women (even more than Canada). And, under STV (e.g., Australian Senate), they experience, in general, a much higher rate of electing women than their equivalant plurality elections.
Finally, it is convenient to point out Malta at 9% elected women, but what about India at 8%? India uses FPTP. Every system has its highs and lows. It's hard to take a single country across the world and apply its example to us, but if you look at the highs and lows world-wide, we have:
- FPTP: 8% (India) to 32% (South Australia)
- STV: 9% (Malta) to 41% (Australia)
- MMP: 6% (Albania) to 50% (Wales)
- Party List PR: 6% (Algeria) to high 40's (Sweden, Rwanda)
- Niilo
Thanks Vorshlumpf for the info on the representation of women.
A story that I will tell again is about when I went into a bank in Spain in 1991. All of the bank tellers were men whereas in Canada, most were women. I asked someone why all of the Spanish bank tellers were men. "Men handle the money." It was a chavinistic statement but fitting for a macho culture that was present in Spain at the time. I also learned that men who wore shorts on a hot evening were considered "gay." Straight men in Spain did not wear shorts at night-time. I don't know if they do now. Luckily, I was a tourist who was with a bunch of other young tourists wearing shorts. Therefore, we didn't get beaten up or called names.
Different cultures will have an effect on the results of elections. Places like Ireland and Malta may elect a lower percentage of women than Australia which uses a form of STV in its Senate elections.
Back to STV: Any voting system will have a range of percentage of women who get elected. Based on the results that Vorshlumpf listed above, STV seems to have wider range with a higher upper level of women's participation. If British Columbians support BC-STV by over 60%, women will probably represent at least 30% of the legislative assembly just after the first BC-STV election. They were at 22% when the legislature was dissolved.
So those Irish stats show even though there is a requirement for women within the party nomination, men are getting elected not women. A 15% increase since sufferage is not an increase to speak of.
Do not know how you can 30% would be women skinnydipper.
Wilf, sorry, but your response lacked any affirmative push for STV as far as I am concerned.
Ireland apparently has had a history of stuffed ballot boxes and electoral fraud with STV. Hence the push to get rid of STV, that was defeated by MLA's and not the people and apparently there were problems with that vote too.
Scotland has MMP, not STV, so your words in that respect mean nothing to me by way of support for STV, moreover, what about the 100+k worth of spoiled ballots in the first Scottish election?
Absolutely NO computerized voting in BC, or indeed Canada, I don't care if they "can" be hand counted or not.
And I still see STV as elminating women from politics, just as it has in Ireland.
And I am not willing to go from 85 ridings to 20, with urban centres dominating the votes and even less accountability will happen, the MLA's can sluff it off on another and play the blame game all damn day. Rural communities will be excluded from consideration more than they are now.
Respectfully, your extremely hypothetical positives mean nothing in context of real BC people and elections.
His positives seem to me to be far less hypothetical than your negatives. I think electronic voting is OK as long as there is a verifiable paper trail, but I have seen hand-counted at-large situations with municipal elections where there were 20 odd candidates on the ballot. Granted, they only had to be counted once, but I hardly see the potential number of candidates being a problem. Fringe parties (and in this context the Greens may or may not be a fringe party; probably not if they are able to run 82 candidates in FPTP) are unlikely to run in all ridings or run more than a couple of candidates in a particular riding. And there would be fewer candidates running overall across the province depending on what strategies each party used (how many candidates to run in each riding). Please explain why going from 85 ridings to 20 changes the urban/rural balance when the proportion of urban/rural seats doesn't change (if you think it does please explain how).
Scotland has both MMP and STV. It uses STV for local elections, like a number of other places.
I have mentioned on one of the boards that based on the www.trystv.ca results, about 30% of the winners would be women. I know the poll is not scientific. I do think that the people of BC will vote for women so long as women are interested in running. As a member of Fair Vote Canada, I get to vote for members of the Fair Vote Canada national council. Each year, I generally find that the percentage of women who get elected are close to the percentage of women who run as candidates for the national council.
If future BC-STV riding associations have nomination meetings using STV to select their candidates, I think that the percentage of women who get nominated will be similar to to the percentage of women who chose to run. That's if a political party has no reserved positions for women. Also in some urban ridings, with people trying to get nominated, they will try to sell memberships. Under STV nomination meetings, there could be a diverse range of men and women from different ethnic backgrounds. This is healthy for democracy. Also, based on my experience in using STV ballots in Fair Vote Canada national council elections, I find myself being more open to candidates who are different from me because of gender, ethnicity, religion, race, ideology, and region. The quality of the candidate matters more than the superficial characteristics. STV lets me focus on the quality of candidates.
I agree with that. I can also empathize with the low opinion of democracy we see from a lot of these FPTP supporters but I think you are right that it is a self-defeating strategy. They end up taking ridicuous positions like blaming people for voting for the Greens and splitting the vote while crusading against electoral reform which would directly address this problem.
This referendum has been an eye-opener for me on what Social Democratic actually means in the BC context.
How much money did the anti-FairVote disinformation campaign spend this time?
As for urban centres dominating larger districts, that's why I don't want federal STV in Ontario; I can see a three-seater district in which one candidate from each party would win, and they'd all be from Peterborough. But I don't see where in BC this is likely except maybe in Prince George if the Green Party support rose to the 25% level.
But if you want every vote to count, so every NDP voter has an NDP MLA to go to, which is basic to any PR model much as MMP as well as STV, then you have several MLAs representing the same area. So I really don't see the point of that objection.
Careful of that argument. That's a justification for most of the winning candidates on the list being Toronto males. That's what killed MMP in Ontario.
BC-STV guarantees regional representation with the 20 districts, and the number of MLAs per district are small enough that women won't get lost in the crowd.
As for urban centres dominating larger districts, that's why I don't want federal STV in Ontario; I can see a three-seater district in which one candidate from each party would win, and they'd all be from Peterborough. But I don't see where in BC this is likely except maybe in Prince George if the Green Party support rose to the 25% level.
I've had this conversation with people before. The way STV works (at least, as it's set up in BC) is that every current riding will still have the power to elect 1 MLA within their amalgamated ridings. The reason for this is that the population in each is about equal. For example, Okanagan-Boundary, a BC-STV riding, will be a combination of one mainly-rural riding (Boundary-Similkameen), one small city (Penticton), and half a city (Kelowna-Westside). A friend who lives in a small town in the rural riding was concerned that all three MLA's would come from Kelowna. However, thanks to the threshold each candidate must reach to be elected, each of those areas, or sub-ridings, has the power to elect one MLA. So, if local representation truly is the top priority for voters (which it isn't, but that's another discussion), a candidate of some sort will be elected in each of those sub-ridings. In order for more than 1 MLA to be based in Kelowna-Westside, voters from the other two areas would have to help them get elected. And, if that's what the voters choose, than that doesn't seem so bad (assuming they had other options - which I think is a safe assumption).
I guess my knowledge of Federal ridings isn't as great. I think there exists some significant differences in population totals between some ridings, correct? If so, then a Federal STV electoral system would need to address these differences.
- Niilo
In 1992, 68.3% of British Columbians opposed the Charlottetown Accord which the the elites and backroom boys of Canada wanted Canadians to support.
In 2009, elite backroom boys, Tieleman and Schreck, want British Columbians to oppose a voting system that was supported by average BCers at a Citizens' Assembly on electoral reform.
Oppose the antiquated First-Past-the-Post voting system; support BC-STV (Single Transferable Vote).
3. Huge numbers of candidates running for each electoral district in BC making electional processes impossible, and thus discouraging voters from voting even more.
I took the trouble to calculate the average number of candidates per seat in the Irish general election of 2007. It is 2.85.
Is BC going to be wildly different?
Malta does have slightly more candidates per seat than Ireland. They also have one of the world's highest turnout rates of around 94%, without compulsory voting.
The facts are reassuring. That's why Tieleman and Schreck stay so far away from them.
7. Have 5 representatives from 1 party, as will be the case in some riding, is not my idea of fair representation. And it will happen of that there is no doubt.
Presumably you know of some group of 5 adjacent BC single-seat provincial ridings in which 80+% of the votes have been cast for one party. Please tell us about it.
Remind, I will put my responses in brackets below your points.
Wilf:
1. Like I said before, STV pits party member against party member, not just against other party's members. In BC, politics is a blood sport, I do not see it getting women more involved in politics, I see it being a mechanism to get women less involved, as a matter of cfact.
(It does not "pit" anyone against anyone. You get your transfers from second and 3rd preferences. And transfers is what gets you elected. The pitbulls do not get transfers and do not get elected)
2. Ireland wants their STV gone, why would we adopt it? Especially considering the old boy's net work it sustains in Ireland, which would happen here in a NY minute. (Ireland does not want its STV gone. (Someone made that one up! There are old boys networks everywhere, have you heard of Kinsella and bc rail? A former cabinet minister from the governing party went to Jaol for corruption in ireland a couple of years back. Does that happen here? I think another guy from the govening party went to prison too. Here, political office seems to confer immunity)
3. Huge numbers of candidates running for each electoral district in BC making electional processes impossible, and thus discouraging voters from voting even more. (Ireland has exactly the same population as BC but something like 100,000 more voters vote! So we seem to manage with the long ballots. which are not that long, by the way)
4. Huge electoral districts, bigger than we already have, which means even less representation in rural areas and more domination from urban areas. (actually no, it means more competition so your mla will tour the area more and work hard for his voters so that they do not switch to another rep from his party next time. You will generally have a lib and a ndp mla among your reps so you will have one of your colour to go to and you will have one in government to go to too, a lot more choice, actually. )
5. Having to use computer voting, as there is no way hand counting will work given the amount of candidates there will be. This is a negative push away factor for several reasons. (Ireland uses hand counting, since the 1920's)
6. Having 2-5 elected MLA's fighting with each other in any given electoral district, and being concerned with only how they will keep being a representative, over the other 4, is not my idea of representation for the masses. Too much room for dirty tricks, and less for actual riding work. (not really, their best way to keep being a rep is to do good work for their voters. Remember nettelton who stood up to campbell? Or Korky evans who voted for stv last time? It is not necessarly the end of the road if you cross your leader in irish politics. More ideas get expressed within partys and independents often get elected if they are dumped unfairly from the party ticket)
7. Have 5 representatives from 1 party, as will be the case in some riding, is not my idea of fair representation. And it will happen of that there is no doubt.
(That is totally untrue. You would have to have more than 85% support for one party on first preferences and PERFECT transfering of preferences on the following preferences. Every voter would have to be mailed a list of who to vote for first and how to vote the preferences and follow it perfectly! and you would ALSO have to have 5 candidates for 5 seats. Anyway, in the real world they are only going to put up 3 or 4 candidates from any one party for 5 seats.
The horror that you discribe did happen in campbells first term under fptp. Remember?)
8. Not going to go for the stupidity that is embodied in the acknowlegement that STV is perhaps not workable here in BC, but we can change it later to something else, thinking. It to me it is fools rushing in, plus a huge waste of tax payer's money. (In ireland they use it for euro elections. I think there are about 4 ridings about 13 seats and 4 million people. Thats pretty big ridings!
9. Plus a few more personal biases that have been created because of the blind and/or short sighted supporters of it here, not meaning you Wilf either. But, I figure if they think it is a good thing, then I need to run from it as fast as possible, and advise as many people as possible to vote NO too.
(An interesting way to make a decision, cutting off your nose, etc, They tell me it is hurtful to self in the long term)
Not sure if this is somewhere else, but Tieleman is now the President of the No STV campaign:
"Bill Tieleman, president of the No STV campaign, said Friday that he thinks the latest poll results show the more people learn about BC-STV, the more they dislike it.
He added that this referendum, people can see the actual larger riding boundaries – BC-STV would reduced the current 85 single-member ridings to 20 multi-member ridings, ranging from two to seven MLAs to be elected in each constituency.
“I think people now have an opportunity to see how this will work,” he said of the proposed new system."
http://www.vancouversun.com/news/polls+show+rejected/1577960/story.html
7. Have 5 representatives from 1 party, as will be the case in some riding, is not my idea of fair representation. And it will happen of that there is no doubt.
Presumably you know of some group of 5 adjacent BC single-seat provincial ridings in which 80+% of the votes have been cast for one party. Please tell us about it.
It won't take 80%, it will only take 30% or so of the people in a riding voting for the exact same people as their first, second, third and fourth choices, of any given party.
What do you mean the pitbulls do not get transfers?
Oh so they just want "electoral reform" then.
I have already clarified that I believe there will be upwards to 40 candidates running per each super riding that have been proposed to have 5-7 spots.
Nonsense, what province do you live in again? Certainly can't be BC. The MLA's will stay in the area, read urban settings, where the majority of votes are that will dictate who wins and who keeps on keeping on. They will compete for talking slots at Rotary and CoC, and such like, gatherings in the urban centres every wary. Moreover, you just supported my point (see bold) that it will pitt party member against party member, thereby creating more adversarial politics and less women participating.
That is not what is propossed with our STV, it is computer voting with hand count possibility if needed.
You just argued against yourself and supported my point, as far as I am concerned. More ideas do not get expressed in Irish politics, or there would be women's voices being heard.
(That is totally untrue. You would have to have more than 85% support for one party on first preferences and PERFECT transfering of preferences on the following preferences. Every voter would have to be mailed a list of who to vote for first and how to vote the preferences and follow it perfectly! and you would ALSO have to have 5 candidates for 5 seats. Anyway, in the real world they are only going to put up 3 or 4 candidates from any one party for 5 seats.
Funny, now you claim 85% whereas woodward above claimed 80%. While I understand it would only need 30-35% of the riding to vote for the exact same names for top spots.
yep, so why change and spend all that money if the results would be the same?
Ya, and how is the EU representation working out?
(An interesting way to make a decision, cutting off your nose, etc, They tell me it is hurtful to self in the long term)
Now Brian, if you believed that stuff about cutting one's nose off, you would not be voting Green Party this election now would you?
When you see people who are foolish in respect to most all they post, stridently supporting STV, it does not give it good credentials to support, there is even less incentive when they and others make partisan reasons for supporting.
No! you either do not understand or willfully misrepresent the system. I lived under stv. Your example is hopelessly incorrect and cannot happen in stv.
7. Have 5 representatives from 1 party, as will be the case in some riding, is not my idea of fair representation. And it will happen of that there is no doubt.
Presumably you know of some group of 5 adjacent BC single-seat provincial ridings in which 80+% of the votes have been cast for one party. Please tell us about it.
It won't take 80%, it will only take 30% or so of the people in a riding voting for the exact same people as their first, second, third and fourth choices, of any given party.
Remind, Ireland is not trying to get rid of stv.
Mary Robinson.
One of the most famous political women in the world came through Irish STV to beat the old boys network.
She was non party (not even a member of any party when she ran for president) and supported abortion and still beat the old boys.
At the UN it took the usa veto on her nomination to kill her career there and to get rid of her so presumably she was a danger to US interests
Please quit with the nonsense while you are ahead. Lies are lies and you should have the decency to retract the 30% one at very least.
Perhaps I misunderstand it then, as is see it only taking 30-35% of any given riding to vote exactly the same names for the the top 4 choices they want.
Are you denying Ireland has been asking for electoral reform?
One woman making "it" can happen under any political system, and one making it only in Ireland's STV does not make it a resounding testimony.
ETA cross posted with wilf will read his description.
Okay, then let's back up to the 16.7%, this would mean that if 16.7% of riding voted for exactly the same top 4, then 2 spots would go to the top 2 choices. And their 3 and 4th choices would go no where? But if we had another 16.7% that voted for the 2nd and 3rd exact same choices of the first 16.7%, but as their first and second choices, we would still have the same 4 spots filled by 1 party. Then the same would occur for the 5th spot, a mixture of a portion of the other 16.7%'s voters determining the top 4 spots could have in their top spots, the fifth candidate, and they would only need 8.32 % from others voting for their 5th chosen candidate. So to me this means they only need to have 40-50% of the riding to get the top 5 spots, which is closer to my estimate of 35%, than those of 80-85%.
In a 5-7 seater in BC, there will be minimum 5 Liberals, 5 NDP, 5 GP, 2-3 Cons, several independants, perhaps as many as each small town/city in the riding, in fact it could be upwards to 12, or so and maybe more, then we have the finge parties.
As I have stated here prior, I have run All Candidates Forums with 12 candidates running for 1 spot, when they were really up for splitting the vote and getting the BC Liberals in, if you times that by 4 more spots and you get 50 plus running, I was being conservative with my 40 candidates running estimate. This is BC politics we are talking about afterall. Moreover, there are currently 25 registered parties in BC, by just adding 4 more Libs, 4 more NDP and 2 GP and a extra Con, you get 36 potentially running in a STV riding, excluding the Independants.
In the 7 seat super region of the Captial District, mark my words there would be 5-7 Libs, 5-7 NDP, and 5-7 GP running, for a base line of about 20, then you can add 15- 20 fringe party candidates and then independants from each community. Easily 40 running, if not more. It will be "super" campaigns for the "super" ridings.
Funny, I was just at the the BCSTV Vote yes site, I see Berman, is obliquely endorsing/advertising on it. 'nuff said, still voting NO.
Thanks for the Irish EU information was interesting. But really what I meant how was it working for Ireland overall.
No, 16.7% of voters can only elect one MLA. That's the quota for a five-seater: the candidate is elected when he or she reaches quota. Their top choice would be elected. Their second, third and fourth choices would go no where.
Here's an easy way to explain the quota: in a single-seater with a preferential ballot it obviously takes 50% plus one to win. In a two-seater it takes 33.33% plus one. In a three-seater it takes 25% plus one. In a four-seater it takes 20% plus one. In a five-seater it takes 16.67% plus one. In a six-seater it takes 14.29% (one-seventh) plus one. In a seven-seater it takes 12.5% plus one.
No, their first choice would be elected, which your example assumes was the second choice of your first 16.7%.
Actually I read your latest post wilf, in the other STV thread, I think I totally get it now. Back to waivering again, I guess
No problem. In my experience the easiest way to follow how STV works is an actual example. It's no coincidence that the only places to adopt STV in recent decades -- Northern Ireland (which had lost it back in the 1920s), Scottish local councils, and New Zealand regional councils plus some local councils -- all had watched it working next door or across the water, in Ireland and in Tasmania plus other Australian examples. If BC-STV fails to get adopted, it's because you don't have a nearby example anymore. Maybe the pro-BC-STV campaign should be talking examples about how it used to work in Calgary and Edmonton, and still works in Cambridge Massachusetts. But it wouldn't help much; BC voters just aren't familiar with it.
If you want to give me a sample district to discuss -- perhaps your own -- I'll give you an example of what BC-STV would have done in that district in 2005, and an example of a similar Irish district's recent elections.
Remind, Ireland is not trying to get rid of stv.
Mary Robinson.
One of the most famous political women in the world came through Irish STV to beat the old boys network.
She was non party (not even a member of any party when she ran for president) and supported abortion and still beat the old boys.
At the UN it took the usa veto on her nomination to kill her career there and to get rid of her so presumably she was a danger to US interests
Please quit with the nonsense while you are ahead. Lies are lies and you should have the decency to retract the 30% one at very least.
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2009/0504/1224245892907.html
It should be noted Mary White was the first woman to be elected ever in the district of Carlow -Kilkenny 1st ever! in 2007, I know someone can let us know how many tried and failed. Mr. White?
Wilf, I would like to see how the Capital region, along with how a rural riding like PG would play out. However, again I stress, that slotting minimum candidates, will not give accurate depictions, and will thus be rejected by me as valid analysis. There will be huge slates if only for the first election. As the first STV election would set the stage for incumbent's wins.
Remind is correct, just guessing, B.C. has 45 or so registered parties? everyone and their family pet will be on that ballot wanting a piece of action, totally wasting their time, mind you, but still wanting a piece non the less.
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2009/0504/1224245892907.html
It should be noted Mary White was the first woman to be elected ever in the district of Carlow -Kilkenny 1st ever! in 2007, I know someone can let us know how many tried and failed. Mr. White?
Thaks for this Ranger, I knew I had read repoorts in the past about this, but did not have any current links to support my apparently valid contention, so it seems I am not the liar here.
..Stephen Collins writing in this paper said that one of the conclusions which can be drawn from our sorry plight is the need for radical reform of the political system. He is not alone in that opinion.
We have in Ireland an electoral system, multi-seat proportional representation, which almost ensures that a broad range of the best brains and achievers in the country will never see the inside of Leinster House, much less the Cabinet room. At the same time, we have too many Dáil members.
The electoral system imposes a lifestyle on politicians which is directly inimical to good government and is a considerable deterrent to potential participants.
The skills required to massage a constituency seven days and nights a week have nothing to do with running a small European country with an open economy.
Ministers have to spend 20 to 30 hours a week attending local functions, holding clinics, going to funerals – they’ll lose their seats if they don’t.
Is it any wonder that Dáil deputies had to be paid to chair or convene committees – that work distracts from the string-pulling for constituents which is what they’re doing in those Dáil offices.
...Despite computers and secretaries, the work hasn’t changed down the years. Side by side with the massive local work-load of TDs in nursing their constituents is a weak and almost powerless local government structure. While this faulty system – too many TDs doing unnecessary work, and tired distracted Ministers – goes on, we pay our politicians – unbelievably – more than most others in the world.
Our electoral system is almost unique. Most modern democracies of western Europe have some variant of a list system, combined with proportionality.
...Looking at the Scandinavian countries, well-governed stable societies, some features stand out. Swedish ministers are required to live in Stockholm, devote themselves to their government work, but in return are placed at the top of their party list at the next election.
...There have been calls before now for change in Ireland...Party leaders – Garret FitzGerald, Albert Reynolds, Charles Haughey, Des O’Malley, Mary Harney, as well as Noel Dempsey and Micheal D Higgins – are all on record as criticising multi-seat PR as practised in Ireland, and/or calling for radical changes.
A proposal for change appeared in the 1987 Fine Gael election manifesto. Many articles have appeared in this newspaper and serious journals. Alas, most media attention has been confined to the “silly season”. This is no longer a silly season issue. We must face the unpalatable fact that this political system is a luxury we can no longer afford.
"Ministers have to spend 20 to 30 hours a week attending local functions, holding clinics, going to funerals – they’ll lose their seats if they don’t.
Is it any wonder that Dáil deputies had to be paid to chair or convene committees – that work distracts from the string-pulling for constituents which is what they’re doing in those Dáil offices."
In Toronto, municipal politicians are elected once every four years. Most of them get re-elected because they attend different community functions almost every day. These politicians are elected by First-Past-the-Post.
Point?
They are also not running a country, nor province, and it takes much less effort to politic in the area in which you live, as opposed to driving/flying across huge distances. Which is why I bel;ieve STV will damage the ability of rural peoples to have a voice. They will be shoring up their votes continuously in the urban vote rich areas.
Plus I must say, how are our cities politicians doing? Seems to me there are huge issues that need to be addressed and are not. When politics becomes all about staying in as an incumbent and less about actual work for the the betterment of people, then people are in trouble in any system.
What is your point ranger? That things are getting better in Carlow Kilkenny?
Or Lets use anolomys as proof?
I am sorry but yours is a pretty stupid line of arguement. Have you looked in Canada for any male only ridings?
Probably lots of them. Last euro election I voted in was about 15 years ago.
I gave my first preference to a green woman and she got elected in leinster.
Remind, Ireland is not trying to get rid of stv.
Mary Robinson.
One of the most famous political women in the world came through Irish STV to beat the old boys network.
She was non party (not even a member of any party when she ran for president) and supported abortion and still beat the old boys.
At the UN it took the usa veto on her nomination to kill her career there and to get rid of her so presumably she was a danger to US interests
Please quit with the nonsense while you are ahead. Lies are lies and you should have the decency to retract the 30% one at very least.
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2009/0504/1224245892907.html
It should be noted Mary White was the first woman to be elected ever in the district of Carlow -Kilkenny 1st ever! in 2007, I know someone can let us know how many tried and failed. Mr. White?
Gee sorry Brian I was just saying how good that was that they finally elected a woman so I guess the system really is good for women after all, at this rate they'll be catching up to Canada in no time!
A proposal for change appeared in the 1987 Fine Gael election manifesto. Many articles have appeared in this newspaper and serious journals. Alas, most media attention has been confined to the “silly season”.
That Fine Gael manifesto was 22 years ago, as was Garret Fitzgerald who was Fine Gael Prime Minister at that time. Unfortunately, Fine Gael heavily lost the 1987 election, and Garret promptly resigned. Four Fine Gael leaders since then don't make your list of those who want to change the system. Other than Micheal D Higgins, a Labour Party elder statesman, the others on that list are Fianna Fail leaders or their allies. Fianna Fail has always wanted to switch to FPTP which would favour them as the largest party, but few others agree. Anyway that article was about changing to a different system. From time to time Irish commentators have dreamed of a system which would free MPs and Ministers from the demands of serving their constituents. Since few voters would agree, nothing happens.
Well, there was Mary Harney, who led the juniour party in government for about 10 years. Any female party leaders in Canada been in government for that long?
You pick one riding to support your arguement.
Have you any clue at all about sampling?
And here in sweet Canada, some lowlife called Stronach a dog and got away with it. I seem to remember a bunch of babblers nodding their left wing male heads in approval.
By the way, all the mickey mouse alternative media papers here have calls in favour of stv. common ground, island tides, etc.
Big strong man media is mostly against.
If you do a headcount of babblers in favour and against STV, who is on your side of the female persuasion?
Remind perhaps? Who else? Michelle, Nanci, and a couple of female CA people are on the yes side.
Maybe you are being a bit patronising trying to protect canadian women from themselves?
Who is more likely to vote for stv, men or women. Answer women. (Least it was last time round).
So you with your little supercharged no vote are actually bashing the women down.
Well done. Maybe Harper will hire you after this.
Gee sorry Brian I was just saying how good that was that they finally elected a woman so I guess the system really is good for women after all, at this rate they'll be catching up to Canada in no time!
Fair enough. In the first BC-STV election I can imagine the Liberals and NDP running the maximum number.
I've done the complete results in the Capital Region, all 14 counts. However, my Babble screen crashes when I try to paste it in.
So I'll just tell you the outcome I got: Carole James, Ida Chong, Maurine Karagianis, Murray Robert Coell, Susan Mary Brice, Jane Sterk, and Charlie Beresford.
North Central is easy: Two Liberals (John Rustad, Shirley Bond) and one NDP (Deborah Poff).
Thanks wilf, interesting and I have much to think about, still.
I promised to refer you to Irish election results for comparable districts. Unfortunately Ireland has no seven-seaters in its parliament. (It has some municipal councils where seven councillors are elected by PR-STV with no wards, but that's not what I promised you.) By the way, when Ireland first set up their parliament, the one thing everyone agreed on was STV -- the British (to give the Protestant minority a voice), and the radical Irish (because all British and Irish radicals were electoral reformers and STV was the system they were promoting -- though they failed to get Britain to adopt it.) So the only question was the District Magnitude (small districts are less favourable to minority parties). And their first 1923 model was excellent: one nine-seater, three eight-seaters, five seven-seaters, nine five-seaters, four four-seaters, six three-seaters. Of the 147 MPs, almost half were from seven-seaters or larger. As time went on, conservative governments shrank the District Magnitude.
A comparable five-seater: Cork South-Central.
As you can see, the two main parties each ran three and elected two. Everyone else ran one; and Labour and the Greens knew they were competing for the one left-wing seat. On the first count, incumbent 69-year-old Fianna Fail John Dennehy (who had edged out Kathy Sinnott by six votes in 2002) was in seventh spot, thanks to 32-year-old local Fianna Fail councillor Michael McGrath who had topped the polls in three local elections and now stood second in his first run for parliament. (A classic case of a candidate running one time too many -- John Dennehy's 20 years in parliament were enough, voters said.) Incumbent Green Dan Boyle, first elected to parliament in 2002 thanks in part to transfers from Labour, stood eighth although his vote share declined only slightly, but a new Labour candidate (and Cork city councillor) gained and moved up to fifth spot. Centrist Fine Gael had done poorly in 2002, losing one of their two seats when Deidre Clune (first elected in 1997) lost her seat. This time they regained their second seat, and Deidre Clune stood fourth on the first count. As you can see here, by the sixth and final count Deidre Clune had moved up to third when those who had voted for the third Fine Gael candidate preferred her to the FG incumbent Simon Covenay. The Labour man had dropped to sixth after the Fianna Fail transfers, but overtook the third Fianna Fail man on the final count thanks to transfers from Green's Dan Boyle. (As a minor point, note that the Sinn Fein transfers had no impact: they slightly preferred old John Dennehy and the Green's Dan Boyle, but not by enough to save either.)
For a three-seater like Prince George, see Tipperary North. As you would expect in a more rural area, local loyalties are big. Michael Lowry, aged 55, had been one of their MPs for 20 years. He had been a Fine Gael MP for three terms when Fine Gael kicked him out. Local voters didn't care and kept re-electing him as an independent. This time he stood first with votes to spare. In third spot was Fianna Fail's Maire Hoctor; she had first been elected in 2002 after serving on county council. Ahead of her in second spot was her fellow Fianna Fail incumbent Michael Smith, aged 68, first elected in 1969. In fourth spot was local councillor and Fine Gael hopeful Noel Coonan. Fifth was Labour's Kathleen O'Meara. This is not a Labour area, but as you will see, Labour voters decided the outcome. Kathleen O'Meara had run for parliament twice before, never elected, and had stood ninth of nine elected to her local council back in 1999. An interesting count. Michael Lowry's surplus transfers changed nothing, nor did any other transfers until the final count when lots of Labour voters made Noel Coonan their second choice, vaulting him into office, and also gave Maire Hoctor enough second preferences to push her above her fellow FF incumbent into third place, electing her while Michael Smith lost his seat. This made sense. Labour and Fine Gael had been coalition government partners in 1994-97 and previously, and were running on a agreed coalition platform this time. And some women who voted for Kathleen O'Meara made the only other woman on the ballot their second choice. Michael Smith, like John Dennehy, had run one time too many.
Remind is correct, just guessing, B.C. has 45 or so registered parties? everyone and their family pet will be on that ballot wanting a piece of action, totally wasting their time, mind you, but still wanting a piece non the less.
Since only a few parties will run more than one candidate in each riding and there will be fewer ridings, there will likely be far fewer candidates overall. I doubt there are 45 registered parties (and even fewer that run in more than a few ridings), and I suspect that under STV there would be fewer parties as a number of them might merge in order to give themselves a better chance of making the quota. There may then be more than three parties with a change of winning at least one seat.
There are 26 resgistered parties in BC. And numerous Independants
The first ballot will be huge, subsequent ballots most likely not.
They write party affiliation beside party name. So I am not sure what the problem is.
Municipal elections here in victoria are harder because they invent names for the "partys" and you have something like 7 votes.
That means that the largest minorithy "slate" wins everything.
In STV you have just one vote so party slates do not have such massive power. In the first STV election, the candidate numbers may approach those of a municipal election but party affiliation WILL be incicated so just ignore those that you are unfamiliar with.
Brian
In Ireland, yes. BC-STV goes one step further: they group the party's candidates together, as is done in Tasmania, making it much easier to vote by party.
Thank you, wilf.
So that makes it much easier than in Ireland. (Ireland has candidates listed alphabetically). Most people are going to rank the people in their party, plus a few people locally plus a few people they respect. (In my opinion). Even if you just rank the people in your favorite party, it means your party cannot any longer just foist someone on you. And which of the party candidates does best is really good feedback for the party itself.
So it raises the calibre of candidates generally. (In my view).
In Ireland, yes. BC-STV goes one step further: they group the party's candidates together, as is done in Tasmania, making it much easier to vote by party.
Tieleman's friend David Schreck has reached a new low in dishonesty:
So go to that site, and you will see:
The Minister added that, while the electronic voting project has now been brought to a conclusion, there is still a considerable need for electoral reform which can best be pursued by bringing forward proposals to establish an Independent Electoral Commission in Ireland. . .
The Agreed Programme for Government contains a commitment to the establishment of an independent Electoral Commission which will take responsibility for electoral administration and oversight, implement modern and efficient electoral practices, revise constituency boundaries, take charge of compiling a new national rolling electoral register, take over the functions of the Standards in Public Office Commission relating to election spending, and examine the issue of financing the political system.
But no mention of changing the voting system.
It looks more like procedural changes. It certainly doesn't appear that it's part of the mandate to change the system.
In fairness to Mr. Schreck, perhaps he didn't really intend to deliberately mislead people. Maybe he was so excited he found a way to discredit STV that he didn't read the whole page. Or maybe he's just not too bright.
Remind is correct, just guessing, B.C. has 45 or so registered parties? everyone and their family pet will be on that ballot wanting a piece of action, totally wasting their time, mind you, but still wanting a piece non the less.
By just guessing I take it you mean you're just pulling stuff out of your ass like normal. If you can't even be bothered to research a readily accessible fact like there are 32 registered parties, how much credibility do you think you have?
But of the 32 parties, how many are running candidates. Well, here is the list and I count 15 parties but a lot of them are running only a couple of candidates. Plus independents.
So, how many candidates should we expect on a ballot? Well, if you check out trystv and look at the capital region (which would be the largest electoral district), you'll see there are 24 names - 7 each of Liberal, Green and NDP; 1 WCC. 1 Refed and 1 independent.
Does that mean those of us in the CRD would be looking at 24 names? Probably not. Unless the parties want to waste money and dilute their votes, you'd likely be looking at something like (at a maximum) 5 NDP, 4 Liberal, and 3 Green candidates. Add in the other 3 and you have a total of 15. Group the candidates by party and the ballot is manageable. And that's for the largest district in BC. Might there be larger ballots as more parties and/or independents realize they at last have a chance? Perhaps. But the people who claim you're going to see 40 names on a ballot are out to lunch.
The list i found had 26 registered parties, and that is a lot, but now it appears as if there are 32, as such, it brings us even closer to have 40+ candidates running, especially in the larger seat ridings.
And I see you carefully admit that, while pretending you are not.
So go to that site, and you will see:
The Minister added that, while the electronic voting project has now been brought to a conclusion, there is still a considerable need for electoral reform which can best be pursued by bringing forward proposals to establish an Independent Electoral Commission in Ireland. . .
The Agreed Programme for Government contains a commitment to the establishment of an independent Electoral Commission which will take responsibility for electoral administration and oversight, implement modern and efficient electoral practices, revise constituency boundaries, take charge of compiling a new national rolling electoral register, take over the functions of the Standards in Public Office Commission relating to election spending, and examine the issue of financing the political system.
But no mention of changing the voting system.
Oh wilf, you are making me sad here, I would say that implimenting modern and efficient electoral practices is talking of changing the electoral system, and I see they are getting rid of the notion of computeized voting which is being suggested in BC for STV.
The vote yes crowd here has been busy stating the Irish are all happy with their STV, when such is not the case.
Now I understand why Pilion was just over there speaking at the Universioty of Ulster.
Remind is correct, just guessing, B.C. has 45 or so registered parties? everyone and their family pet will be on that ballot wanting a piece of action, totally wasting their time, mind you, but still wanting a piece non the less.
By just guessing I take it you mean you're just pulling stuff out of your ass like normal. If you can't even be bothered to research a readily accessible fact like there are 32 registered parties, how much credibility do you think you have?
But of the 32 parties, how many are running candidates. Well, here is the list and I count 15 parties but a lot of them are running only a couple of candidates. Plus independents.
So, how many candidates should we expect on a ballot? Well, if you check out trystv and look at the capital region (which would be the largest electoral district), you'll see there are 24 names - 7 each of Liberal, Green and NDP; 1 WCC. 1 Refed and 1 independent.
Does that mean those of us in the CRD would be looking at 24 names? Probably not. Unless the parties want to waste money and dilute their votes, you'd likely be looking at something like (at a maximum) 5 NDP, 4 Liberal, and 3 Green candidates. Add in the other 3 and you have a total of 15. Group the candidates by party and the ballot is manageable. And that's for the largest district in BC. Might there be larger ballots as more parties and/or independents realize they at last have a chance? Perhaps. But the people who claim you're going to see 40 names on a ballot are out to lunch.
Wow! you can say "Probably not" and claim this is a fact?, I pulled that number from a conversation with someone very high on the food chain at elections B.C. a couple of months ago, so no, I didn't research that point because I thought it was moot, the last time I did check there was more than 30 and I know it fluctuates, the parties you mentioned are "only running" as you put it under FPTP, as I said expect many more and the family dog under a BCSTV election, ballots in Australia can have up to 50- 60 candidates on it, no, not making that up, but you can get mad at me as if somehow I created that mess too.
Wow! you can say "Probably not" and claim this is a fact?, I pulled that number from a conversation with someone very high on the food chain at elections B.C. a couple of months ago, so no, I didn't research that point because I thought it was moot, the last time I did check there was more than 30 and I know it fluctuates, the parties you mentioned are "only running" as you put it under FPTP, as I said expect many more and the family dog under a BCSTV election, ballots in Australia can have up to 50- 60 candidates on it, no, not making that up, but you can get mad at me as if somehow I created that mess too.
At http://www.ec.gov.au one can see that in the 2007 election in Austrlia, in Senate contests under PR-STV, in New South Wales there were 79 candidates for 6 seats, and in Queensland 65 candidates, again for 6 seats.
However, in Australian Senate elections voters have to rank every last candidate for their vote to be counted. They have the option of selecting a party and accepting its ranking of all candidates. Most of them outside Tasmania accept that option.
Candidates are grouped by party on the ballot. I expect that most voters are mainly interested in the major parties that get elected, and are not unduly confused by the listing of multiple candidates for Family First, What Women Want, the Citizens Electoral Council, the Non-Custodial Parents Party, The Fishing Party, The Australian Shooters Party, and The Australian Fishing and Lifestyle Party, etc., etc.
The ballot in Tasmania, where most voters prefer to rank their own candidates, carried a more realistic 28 candidates for 6 Senate seats.
BC-STV proposes that voters will be able to rank as many or as few candidates as they want, and candidates will be grouped by party. Since voters in BC will probably party-hop at least as freely as those in Ireland and parties will be subject to the same mild pressure to limit their candidates, ballots in BC will likely resemble those in Ireland where in the 2007 general election the ballots in 3-seat ridings carried from 7 to 11 candidates, in 4-seat ridings 8 to 14 candidates, and in 5-seat ridings 10 to 16 candidates. Six parties elected candidates in Ireland, several independents were elected, and several more parties ran.
If you ignore the blood-curdling political fantasies of Tieleman and Schreck, you will save yourself a lot of adrenalin, and you won't miss anything important.
A more realistic 28 candidate slate, LOL. Yep, even a low amount such as that will really get people involved in voting, not so much me thinks.
Grouped by party. I see in a 7 seater maybe 15 candidates from 3 parties and maybe half a dozen more from other parties and independents. No different from many at large municipal elections.
For those still undecided, this website is informative without bells and whistles and hoopla.
http://www.understandingstv.ca/
http://www.abc.net.au/elections/federal/2004/guide/senatevotingsystem.htm Voting Options
Many people view the Senate ballot paper as a daunting challenge. After all, in NSW at this election it will be around a metre long and consist of 78 candidates distributed across 30 columns. This is in fact small compared to past ballot papers in the NSW Legislative Council. At the 2003 state election, the Legislative Council ballot paper, while shorter with only 15 columns, contained 284 candidates. In 1999, problems with electoral laws saw the ballot paper spread across three rows, consist of 81 columns and 264 candidates and cover a ballot paper one metre by 700mm.
Wow! you can say "Probably not" and claim this is a fact?
Ranger, I'm going to type this slowly so that you might get it. When I said "probably not", I wasn't claiming anything as a fact. If you're a careful reader, there are two ways you might recognize that.
The first is the word "probably". Do you often use the word "probably" when stating a fact?
The second is that I was talking about a hypothetical occurrence in the future. I often use the words possibly and probably to describe future hypothetical events because I don't know for sure what's going to happen in the future.
As Vice President of the Spin Factory, I thought you should understand this for future reference.
I don't know what number you mean but by now, I don't have a lot of faith in the noSTV team. Maybe you can do better than something you heard from someone on a food chain. Seems to me it was not long ago that somebody was misrepresenting Andrew Petter and he had to step in himself to correct the record. Was that you?
The number of registered parties is not moot and it was very easy to find; but the number that is more important is how many of those are actually running candidates. And many of the ones that are running candidates are running only 1 or 2. I understand facts aren't all that important at the spin factory but maybe you could make an allowance for us.
WRT Australia, that's interesting but hardly definitive. What logical reason do you have to believe that the total number of CRD candidates go up by 150% because of STV?
Exactly!
Are there any stats that show how many parties ran how many candidates in our last election in 2005?
From there you would have some solid stats to debate by. I don't remember seeing 26 or 32 candidates on my last FPTP ballot???
I would suggest that common sense needs to enter this debate. If we are going to say that the number of candidates is going to increase by large numbers, then maybe this idea should be supported by some forecasts of where these candidates are going to come from.
Again, you must project BC-STV against the reality of what could or would happen in BC. Everyone has their own crystal ball, but if you are going to make a solid case, you need to paint your prognostication with some convincing facts to support.
AT
he did!
He did?
I can see how the first STV election might have more candidates than later ones. But I have no access to the first Irish STV election.
However, Scotland held its first municipal STV elections in 2007. Glasgow has always been the hotbed of radicals of every stripe, in the past usually frustrated by Labour's faux-majority sweeps. They should have all let loose in 2007.
Let's look at the number in their four-seater wards:
Linn 11
Greater Pollok 9
Craigton 10
Govan 11
Southside Central 9
Anderston 9
Hillhead 10
Partick West 9
Garscadden 10
Drumchapel 10
Maryhill 8
Canal 11
East Centre 13 (hmm, 12 counts)
Shettleston 11
Baillieston 11
North East 10
Not as many as I expected.
Wilf,
Again you add the facts needed to bring fear and myth to its knees.
Great job, I have really enjoyed the debates where you have contributed.
AT
Great job, I have really enjoyed the debates where you have contributed.
Fans like this encourage me to add more on that first Scottish STV election.
Disregarding the outlier case, the largest are five districts with 11 candidates each. Who were they?
Labour 3, in each case. (You expected 4, to give voters more choice? In the Glasgow context that would have looked arrogant: Labour expecting to sweep all the seats again.)
Scottish National Party 1 (in four wards, but in Baillieston they ran two and elected two.)
Liberal Democrats 1
Greens 1
Conservatives 1
Tommy Sheridan's Solidarity Party 1
Scottish Socialist Party 1
A conservative splinter "Scottish Unionist Proudly Scottish Proudly British" 1
Other (an independent in three wards, a British National Party in one, and once a second SNP.) 1
In Baillieston the SNP had 1.66 quotas on the first count, and Labour had 2.30 on the first count, so on the ninth count the SNP's second edged Labour's third by 0.10 of a quota. With 0.88 of a quota exhausted by then, transfers were less of a factor than you'd expect. The Conservative ran sixth, but 73% of his voters had no second preference. Tommy Sheridan's man ran seventh, but his voters scattered 54% exhausted, 20% Labour, 19% SNP, and even 6% Conservative. Eighth was the Lib Dem woman but her votes also scattered 41% exhausted, 25% Labour, 15% Conservative, 12% SNP, and 7% for Sheridan's man.