Yesterday's election:

[theweaselking]

Voter turnout: Record low at 59%.

Seats:
CPC up 16 to 143
LIB down 19 to 76
NDP up 7 to 37
BQ down 1 to 50
GRN down 1 to 0
Independent up 1 to 2

Votes:
CPC 38%
LIB 26%
NDP 18%
BQ 10%
GRN 7%

Note that the BQ gets 50 seats on 10% of the vote because they're only running in comparatively few ridings. In the ridings they're running in, they got 38% of the vote - same as the winning CPC, nationwide.

Comments

[j-v-lynch.livejournal.com]

I'd really like to see the voter turn out in a riding by riding basis.
My hypothesis is that it's lower in riding where the outcome is a foregone conclusion.

[silmaril.livejournal.com]

I saw 49% elsewhere; are you sure that is not a typo?

And I am guessing you will be unhappy with this. :-/.

[anton-p-nym.livejournal.com]

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/v5/content/election2008/national-ridings.html

That's the voting, riding by riding. I ran my riding, and found voting was down hugely and the NDP incumbant was a shoo-in, and my folks' riding, where turnout was down notably but nowhere nearly as much for a very close race.

I don't know if there's a pretabulated list for turnout ready to hand, but the numbers are out there.

-- Steve's a little disappointed, himself.

[jerril]

I'd say the 49% is a typo, because the CBC is reporting 59% and lamenting about how low it is.

I sure as hell think some of my fellow citizens are Teh Suck right about now. :P

[ironphoenix.livejournal.com]

67.5% turnout in my riding, and my Liberal got reelected. I did my part on both counts.

[jerril]

Oh, and BRING ON THE PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION WTF.

We'd be looking at:
CPC 117
LIB 80
NDP 55
BQ 30
GRN 21
Other: 5

Which would be certainly stop the Conservatives from doing anything stupid, although it would still leave the Liberals with the balance of power (NDP+BQ+GRN+Misc= 106, not enough to shout down the cons on their own)

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

59% sounds about right for record low. And I'm going with CBC.

As for unhappy with this: Well, kinda. The Conservative Party Of Canada are basically the US Democrats on policy matters, but their supporters have the brains and ethics of Republicans. Which is why the party works *so hard* to ensure that none of their true supporters ever, ever get a chance to speak freely and give the game away.

However, the CPC minority we had before, and the one we have now, aren't actually that bad, because the CPC have to walk a fine line - in order to pass anything, they need at least one other party to support them, meaning they can't go with truly wacky legislation, but since as soon as something fails we get an election, they can push a fair bit through on the argument that they might get a majority if the public sees everyone else stonewalling the elected party.

So, yeah. It's bad, but not as bad as it can be.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Proportional representation requires that a law be passed. Passing the law requires votes in the House. Votes in the house require MPs.

So, basically, you need a majority of people elected under the current system to vote against their own election.

(Also: With pure proportional representation, how do you select which MPs get in? From where? And, at that point, how does one take a problem to their MP when they have one? All addressable, certainly, but definitely in need of addressing. I'd rather see instant-run-off than proportional, personally.)

[anton-p-nym.livejournal.com]

BRING ON THE PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION WTF.

No. Hell no.

Proportional representation sucks; instead of tying candidates to specific ridings, it ties them to party whips instead. At least with first-past-the-post a Member of Parliament has a specific constituancy by which he/she/it is held responsible. PR not only does not work that way as proposed, it cannot work that way at all by definition.

If you want PR to work, you pretty much have to rewrite how parliament works in Canada... and given the political climate these days, I do NOT want someone rejigging our basic rights.

-- Steve'll admit that FPP ain't perfect, but thinks it's less imperfect than the Rube Goldbergian systems proposed to replace it to date.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

I like instant run-off. But it's a lot harder to calculate on paper.

[neobitch.livejournal.com]

I like to dream rosy dreams of proportional representation as well, but have zero hopes in it ever happening, for most of the reasons already touched on above.

[giza.livejournal.com]

I wish we had a poly party system here. :-(

PS:

[neobitch.livejournal.com]

The first issue I usually end up mulling over is the whole 'how would we decide which MP has which riding as their home riding?' thing. Round-robin choice/placement, like some unholy union of the football draft and Risk? Jibblyjibbly.

Plus, I voted the way I did because I wanted to support this specific candidate. I'm not sure I'd be so eager to vote if I voted for Fred and got some random dude from another province representing me, instead -- possibly from some other party, even.

It becomes voting for The Greater/Overall Good, and I don't know that we're sufficiently evolved to think on that scale, yet.

Re: PS:

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

It helps, for me, that my specific candidate is an incompetent embarassment, he's been that way so long that despite his previous employment as a Brigadier General he gets only about 5% of the vote from military vets, AND he's from the white supremacist party. It makes my choice clear: "Anyone who can beat him"

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Part of the problem is that your setup means that any third party is just vote-splitting, guaranteeing that your new party AND the previous party closer to our ideals both lose.

[giza.livejournal.com]

Agreed.

What we really need is a federally-mandated breakup of each political party into numerous smaller parties, just like what happened to Ma Bell back in the 80s... except that the people who would need to do this are going to be the ones affected.

It's like the fox guarding the henhouse.

[holyoutlaw.livejournal.com]

59% would be a record high turnout for the US, which just goes to show how little a "beacon of democracy" we really are.

[kadath.livejournal.com]

YOU ONLY HAVE LIKE A MILLION PEOPLE HOW HARD COULD IT BE?! ;P

(The husband and I have been following this election pretty closely, since we're trying to make Canada our adopted homeland in the next few months. I reeeeeeally don't like the idea of the Conservatives gaining a couple seats every election in a slow creep toward a majority government. D:)

[neobitch.livejournal.com]

I'm halfways hoping that at some point I'll live in a riding where I'll find it more important to vote strategically/counter to my usual lines than, "Ah, I think this guy will do good things, AND he's running for my party, even better!" I think it would be a good experience for me.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Instant run-off involves all kinds of extra counting and tracking that doesn't happen in a standard election.

(And, as I've said before: The CPC are, policywise, left of the Democrats, but their support base is the same as the Republicans because people in Canada who would support the Democrats in the US have a sane, centrist party to support in the Liberals. The only people who are willing to go as hard-right as the Democrats are the people who'd prefer Republicans, but who also know that the parties whose positions actually *match* the Republicans get completely trashed. So they hold their noses and vote CPC, despite CPC not being anywhere near extremist enough for them, and the CPC desperately tries to keep them from speaking because they're trying to pretend they actually have core supporters who aren't stupid as they attract disaffected Liberals.)

[kadath.livejournal.com]

Harper's a neocon. I know the signs because I'm soaking in it, but Canadians don't seem to notice because y'all still have faith in humanity or something. I don't want him or his ilk to come anywhere close to a majority, because even if he goes down in flames as soon as he shows his true colors, he can still do a lot of damage with creeping corporatism.

I have a great deal of affection for Canada and I want to save from our contracting our neocon plague because, even if it doesn't kill your body politic, the recovery is hell.

[spartonian.livejournal.com]

Your placeholder government looks to still be holding their place.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

That's what they're for.

[matgb]

In the UK, it definitely is, same electoral system likely leads to same result.

[matgb]

Depends on the system—the Irish system (also uses for the AUS senate, in Malta and it used to be used in some UK seats) is a combination of instant run-off (called preferential voting in most non American literature) and multi-member districts.

A multi member district strengthens the constituency link (loads of studies on that in Ireland), as you can vote for a different candidate from the same party, voting a crap MP out while still supporting your party, etc.

Oh, it also weakens whips, not strengthens them.

Given that the Canadian Parliament has the same basic settings as the UK and Irish Parliaments, you wouldn't need to touch basic rights (unless there's something very weird in your constitution I don't know of, and I doubt that), adn there's substantial precedence for it (STV, as the system is called, has a UK precedent and Canada uses the Westminster system).

And yes, I am heavily involved in the campaign to introduce it over here, and I can defend it as a specific voting system against virtually every criticism I've seen, including complication. Even counting the votes isn't that complicated if you know what you're doing, and election officials should damn well know what they're doing.

But for list based PR systems, I agree completely, which is why I reject them utterly.

[matgb]

You'd need to change th voting system. Single member simple plurality districts create a two-party system.

Break the parties up, in each district it'd come down to two party fights and a bunch of also rans, there'd be about ten years of complete instability with a "wholly false picture of the balance of power between the parties" in the meantime. Better to change the system—copy the Irish.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law

[cmseward.livejournal.com]

Ireland hasa faily workable proportional representation system, but it takes them a week to figure out who won, and they have a tenth the population *we* do.

[torrain.livejournal.com]

...seriously?

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

The 2004 election had absolutely unheard-of record numbers of voters: 56.70%

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

PS: John Kerry got more votes than any other presidential nominee in the history of the USA. Bush, if you accept the Diebold 10% fudge factor, beat him only slightly.

[madfishmonger.livejournal.com]

What is with people not voting? I sure as hell am not leaving the descision of who runs my country up to the rich (who couldn't give a shit about me) or to the lazy.

[dolston.livejournal.com]

The CPC is in the same situation it was two years ago. No party will vote them down on a confidence motion since nobody else is ready for another election.

Dion will likely be gone as the Liberal Leader meaning that the Liberals as a party will side with the CPC or abstain in confidence votes like the did previously allowing the CPC to govern like a majority for the next 10 to 16 months. Once the opposition starts showing signs of life again, the economy will likely be improving or at least not have collapsed like the rest of the Western World's so Harper will call another election.

And so the cycle of life is complete!

[sivi-volk.livejournal.com]

The idea for pro-rep in Canada: Have larger ridings. 208 MPs from ridings, 100 from pro-rep, selected by voting percentage with rounding, from party-created lists.

[dolston.livejournal.com]

I could happily support instant run-off by riding.

I am also more than happy to allow for the extra time this would take. Who really cares if the election results are known within 12 hours of the polls being closed when the alternative is waiting and getting a MP that more people are generally happy with.

Re: PS:

[dolston.livejournal.com]

Who is your MP?

[dolston.livejournal.com]

NO!

Dear god no!

Take a look at the size of some of these ridings you are proposing to increase in size. It is not possible.

They are huge expanses of territory. The only possible way for someone to be able to represent these areas is to amalgamate urban centers. All you are doing is ceding more power to the rural areas. There is a certain degree of reality in what area an MPC can physically represent.

[dolston.livejournal.com]

We tried that. It failed. That is why we have parties now.

[sivi-volk.livejournal.com]

They aren't representing the whole geographical area, just the people in it. These people generally are clustered in a few areas, not spread out. So representation of the riding doesn't change much.

Now, more power to the rural areas is a problem. There are definitely things to be changed and improved in this - it is, however, a model that allows pro-rep while still giving regional MPs.

Re: PS:

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Gordon O'Connor.

[aimisdirty.livejournal.com]

Woohoo!

This means that my Charter Rights won't be violated by Liberals, the country won't be destroyed by NDP policies, and my job is secure.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Yeah. Instead, your Charter rights *and* the economy will *both* be fucked, American-style!

It's like the best of both worlds, only in reverse!

(Luckily, "minority government" means nobody gets what they really want.)