Mr. Morrow makes some valid points that I would agree with like eliminating “overhangs” he is right this is complicated to an “average” citizen that does not study this kind of thing, but he makes closed vs open lists a much larger issue than it really is. This is not a debate that citizens in New Zealand, Scotland or Germany have, this is debated between academics that are a very small part of our democracy, their are positives and negatives to both kinds of lists, keeping the seat total below 130 will be more important to an “average” voter than “open” vs “closed” lists, if anything is going to screw things up for Ontario it will be entertaining changes to satisfy all the spocks with PHD’s who think they know what’s good for the average voter. Let the Citizens put MMP out there the way they need to for the people! after all that’s who will be using it.

I’m curious to know why you think overhangs are an unnecessary complexity. It seems to me that it would be more complex not to allow them. If, for example, five of your party’s constituency candidates win their election, but your party would normally only be allowed four MPPs, and overhangs are not allowed, what happens is that one of your winners must be declared defeated. There are ways to do it (winner with the least margin, for example), but if I was a voter in this riding — or the candidate — I wouldn’t be very happy about it.

Unless there’s a method I’m not thinking about (there might very well be).

Marc — typically, a party would simply keep their “bonus” seats, as is the case in Scotland and Wales. But increasing the list seats from 30 to 33% largely ensures that parties get their fair share. Re-calculating the 2003 results (a pretty high distortion, where the Libs won 70% of seats on 46% of the vote) using a 135-seat, 67/33 model, you get:

LIB: 60 local + 4 list = 64 total (47%)
PC: 24 local + 23 list = 47 total (35%)
NDP: 6 local + 14 list = 20 total (15%)
GRN: 0 local + 4 list = 4 total (3%)

I’d have prefered fewer and paralell seats. This system will still cause minority governments.

Greg,

I fully agree with the points raised here. I think that another major problem with the OCA proposal is the issue that closed lists prevent independent/non-affiliated candidates from holding seats in a third of legislature. Freedom of association also entails freedom not to associate, and limiting the access of independents to a section of the legislature is most likely unconstitutional on these grounds.

I will be writing the OCA urging them to reconsider the particular model of MMP they have selectd as well.

The average variance between seats and votes in the last four Ontario elections was 18.4% – that means the winning party’s share of Legislature seats was 18.4 points higher than its share of the vote.

The CA’s current proposal for MMP and its inclusion of overhang seats would create a very close match between seats and votes. As Greg notes, however, the price would be considerable as 30% of the elected members would reach the House through compensatory seats and would owe their election to their party’s decision to rank them high on its compensatory list.

Rank and file members do have substantial control over the nomination process in single member constituencies now, and they can still have significant influence on the choice and positioning of candidates if the compensatory seats are allocated by region rather than across the province.

I’ve run the figures for an MMP system very similar to that proposed by Greg, using five electoral regions with fairly clear common lines of interest in southern Ontario; a smaller electoral region in northern Ontario; and no overhang seats. If no votes shifted through the use of a dual/vote system as proposed by the CA, the last two Ontario elections would have yielded a Conservative minority under mMP in 1999 and produced a more subdued Liberal majority in 2003 than under the FPTP system actually used.

For just two elections, the variance under this regionally-based MMP system would have been 8.4% compared to the actual result of over 18% – a very marked difference. I’ll post the number if I get to them, I believe a longer-term set of simulations would show an average variance down around 6%. This is within range of many PR electoral systems now in use around the world. It would no longer be possible for an Ontario party to win a massive majority of Legislature seats with voting support in the low 40% range and continuation of three or more viable parties in the House. And the system would have the advantage that the MPPs elected from the compensatory lists would have a regional mandate and a direct link to party members in their region, not just be the choice of central party brass.

If you want to lobby your MPP you can always go to the Ontario Members of Provincial Parliament contact list.

I would agree with most of your analysis and recommendation, particularly with the 135 seat model and eliminating overhangs.

I am still uncomfortable with any kind of list system which is party determined, and I would prefer that the regional or top-up seats be filled by the non-winning party candidates with the highest popular vote in the region. They can legitimately claim that people voted for them, and it puts more voters votes into the legislature.

Thanks,
Jim

Will the Citizens, at the very last moment, change this many components of their model?

If not, perhaps they would simply look at open regional lists in five large regions, changing nothing else.

East (Durham and east) 26 (18+8)
Toronto + York 35 (24 + 11)
Peel-Halton-Hamilton-Niagara-Brant 28 (20+8)
Southwest 28 (20+8)
North (incl. Muskoka) 12 (8+4 or 9+3)

On a recalculation of the 2003 vote, the only overhang is one extra seat in Toronto.

As reassurance, maybe they might cap overhangs at two per region, total 10, maximum 139. This would ensure regional balance is not seriously upset, while maintaining very good proportionality.

But if they keep their present model, I still expect it will get well over 60% support.

Wilf,

“But if they keep their present model, I still expect it will get well over 60% support.”

I have great respect for your knowledge of and passion for electoral reform. But sometimes when one thinks something is so right (obvious, even), one forgets to question their assumptions. And it’s under those circumstances that we are left wondering what went wrong because we were so sure of ourselves.

I think you are suffering from this a bit here. You want MMP to succeed so much and you believe that the general desire for fairness, for more women/minorities, will be enough to compel 60% of the population to endorse change. I think that’s wishful thinking.

Already, you are seeing high-ranking Liberals (Greg Sorbara) and Tories (John Tory) attacking the OCA recommendation.

The OCA would be wise to eliminate as many negatives as possible. I would argue that the only “negative” they should tolerate is an enlarged legislature. But even here, you need to fight the simple rhetoric with simple rhetoric. People don’t want more politicians, understandably. But all the OCA is recommending is undoing what Mike Harris did and restoring the legislature to pre-1999 size (and that should be the tag line — and to be precise, doing so means restoring the 27 lost seats, which actually gives a legislature that is 134 seats).

If a bigger legislature was the only negative and the argument for doing so is crystal clear — undoing one of the bad decisions of the Harris era, then you might have a chance of success.

But unfortunately the model as designed by the OCA needlessly opens them up a host of other criticisms. The chief among them is that voters don’t get to choose which “list” members get elected, giving people the impression that the system helps parties more than people.

But it need not be the case and is simple to fix. You may be right that the OCA won’t change as many things as I’ve suggested at this point (although I know there was some support for the 33% list seats, and it boggles the mind why the OCA thinks it is OK for their STV model to have 135 seats but the MMP model should only have 129).

-Greg

As a strong supporter of First Past The Post I sincerely hope you MMP backers let the entire voting public in on your debates like this. That way it will ensure ordinary voters are scared sideways by “overhangs” “distortions” “average variance” and other critical issues so much that they say no thanks to MMP.

What’s Black and Blue and Floats in the Gulf of St. Lawrence?…

Answer: a mainlander who’s told one too many Newfie jokes. A note to federal Conservative party supporters: when your party leader and a provincial premier are engaging in a war of words for the hearts and minds of the voters……