STV died. Democracy died a little bit, too.

Vox populi, vox dei? Well, it depends. Sticking to the world of secular politics, without venturing into murky waters of religious debates, the Latin phrase usually freely translates as “the voters have spoken”. Riding along this particular interpretation, the decision of British Columbia’s voters to reject electoral reform has to be respected and supporters of the current first-past-the-post system will trump it up all the way down to Ottawa.

There are many reasons why BC voters rejected electoral reform that would replace ancient first-past-the-post system with the proportional representation. Campaigning of the anti-proportional camp is one thing and it was hard for the pro-side to fight the propaganda that could simply hitch a ride on the “tradition” of the first-past-the-post system. Even the name of the particular proportional system, Single Transferable Vote, acronymed as STV, had very little chance to become another ATM.

The outcome of the Tuesday’s BC referendum reaffirms the rejection of the proportional election system from 2005 and that means the reform on national level is very unlikely. The nation has spoken.

On the other hand, the will of the same nation, its decisions, are being ignored during every single election on any level. Seven million votes were not counted in the last year’s federal election. Voters did vote, but thanks to the magic of the first-past-the-post system, their votes did not count. Earning 49.9 percent votes doesn’t guarantee a single seat in the parliament (1987 New Brunswick election). On the other hand, a majority government can be formed by a party that comes second in popular vote and, in effect, lost the election. 1,379,991 voters elected 49 MPs for the Bloc Quebecois, 2,515,561 votes were enough only for 37 NDP parliamentarians. Bloc earned only 2 percents of the popular vote more than the Green Party which ended up without an MP. Nearly million Green Party voters were disenfranchised.

Canada will continue to function according to a medieval voting principles and will exercise its democratic deficit as a reminder of the colonial legacy. Yes, the nation has spoken and rejected the proportional representation. Chances are that at the next election the nation will speak again and those who advocate it’s right to speak and be heard now will deny the same right to the same nation. Again.

Conquering West or conquering rural Canada?

While some people were busy falling in love over the Valentine weekend, Canadian Liberals revealed their crush on the West. Or at least that was the idea. Michael Ignatieff went to Saskatchewan, for the first time as the leader of the Liberal Party, with the clear message. The party must embrace the West, it cannot afford to succumb to temptation to run against it, against what it represents. Which means, cowboy values aside, the energy sector, oil, drilling and perceived capitalism.

Ignatieff has very good reasons for the love-thy-enemy approach. Poor showing in the last federal elections cost the Liberals 26 seats in the House. They lost Ontario, which certainly hurt, but west of the Canada’s largest province they managed to get exactly 7 seats – one in Manitoba, one in Saskatchewan and five in British Columbia. And zero seats in Alberta. Of course, the seat math distorts the real vote distribution due to the natural democratic deficit of Canadian first-past-the-post election system. Proportional vote would have resulted in a very different House of Commons.

Still, the Liberals would have lost. The Green Shift, or carbon tax plan, which was the lead of the Liberal’s campaign didn’t go down well in oil-rich provinces, for a start, not many people really knew what it was all about and second, it came from the Liberal party, therefore it is probably a socialist idea trying to undermine western capitalism. There’s no love lost and, occasionally, there are talks about Western Canada splitting from the rest of the country. Many dismiss the idea as too marginal, others say that it’s not meant for real anyway, and point out to the Quebec’s secessionist movement instead. With the Bloc Québécois, it is rather simple. Everybody agrees it’s a one province party. They don’t campaign outside Quebec so while other parties’ leaders and candidates are busy flying across 4 and half timezones, Bloc’s folks are enjoying bus trips within the province.

The Bloc Québécois is the only province-based party but they’re certainly not the only regional one. The Conservatives dominate in the West and while they’re not a single-region party, the West is certainly a single-party region. Unlike Quebec with surprisingly inspirational popular vote distribution (Bloc – 38.1%, Liberals – 23.7%, Conservatives – 21.7%, NDP – 12.1%). Compare that to Saskatchewan (Conservatives – 53.7%) and Alberta (Conservatives 64.6%)…

The Liberals were pushed, with the great help from themselves, out of the West. But they also lost touch with the most of Canada. With few exceptions, their main sources of votes were city centres. Urban jungle seems to be the winning battleground but there’s still Canada beyond the downtown quarters.

That Canada is very different. It may not have the western energy mentality, but it’s certainly less academic about everyday life. Embracing the West is good, but embracing Canada would be even better, for the Liberals and for the country. Michael Ignatieff, the impersonation of intellectual powers and academia, must find the way how to embrace the whole country without becoming Stephen Harper in the process.

Canada’s democratic deficit

Not counting in seven million votes cast legally by eligible voters would send any election monitoring body, be it the OSCE, Council of Europe or Transparency International, spinning with anger and sending protest notes and demarches to the guilty government. Still, it’s an election reality in all first-past-the-post systems such as United Kingdom or Canada, and it goes unanswered.

According to Fair Vote Canada, more than seven million votes simply did not count in October 14 election. The grim fact is that only votes for the winning candidates matter. Even grimmer fact is that with more than two candidates in a riding, it’s often more than half of the votes that do not count. Which is exactly what happened – 13.7 million Canadians voted, more than half of them didn’t have to bother. With historic low turnout of 59.1% that means that only about one third of Canadians had their say in deciding their country’s future. In Gatineau, 71% of voters were “orphaned”.

Under proportional representation, the 40^th Canadian parliament would have 117 Conservative MPs (not 143), 81 Liberals (not 76), 57 New Democrats (instead of 37), 28 Bloc Quebecois deputies (not 50) and Green Party would have 23 MPs – it has none despite attracting more than 940 thousand votes or 6.8% of popular vote.

Sure, one can object that this is just a play with numbers, a specific point of view, perhaps distorted to the same measure as the first-past-the-post system election results, and finally, that the rules are the same for everybody. Yes, they are. 1.7 million conservative voters lost their vote as did 2.1 million liberal voters. Green Party lost badly and their leader Elisabeth May, who featured prominently at the Tuesday Fair Vote Canada press conference, even organized a virtual Green Party caucus meeting in front of the House of Commons featuring 23 people posing as Green MPs who were not elected due to the first-past-the-post system.

But any party can found themselves on the receiving end of current rules, the Conservatives had, at one point, only two (that’s 2) MPs. The problem is that Canada and Canadians are always on the receiving end of the system which has little to no sense in a multiple-party political environment. Even in a bi-party scenario, it’s possible that a single party would gain 100% of parliament chairs by winning by a single vote in each riding/constituency. And it wouldn’t be the public who would speak, since the actual difference in votes would be 308 – which is the number of ridings. That is not democratic by any standard.

The only answer to the Canadian democratic deficit is introduction of proportional voting system. Whether this will be done through a reform of the Senate or a complete overhaul of the election law in Canada is subject to discussion. As both Larry Gordon, the executive director of Fair Vote Canada, and Elisabeth May told me, there’s no single proportionate system they’re now looking for as an example that may be implemented in Canada. The idea allows for wide degree of maneuvering and adjusting for the specifics of the country. For example, it would make political parties more nationwide and decrease secessionist tendencies whether from Quebec or western provinces.

As for the level of support, it’s kind of given that the Green Party, New Democrats and Liberals would support the idea, especially after the latest election results. But the situation can reverse in four years and even the Conservatives should have no other than purely political reasons to oppose the reform. As Elisabeth May pointed out, Conservative leader Stephen Harper once wrote an article advocating proportionate representation. Probably the most difficult task will be to persuade Canadians who, as is the Fair Vote Canada plan, should make the decision in a referendum. British Columbia will vote on electoral reform in May 2009 – the reform would introduce proportional voting. Results of the referendum (which will be subjected to the “super majority” to become binding) will indicate whether Canada is ready to adopt modern democratic voting system which ensures that all votes do count.

(Written for World Business Press Online)