Recently, Fair Vote Canada has been circulating information that presents an unbalanced view of different methods of voting for our representatives in government.
Historic longterm democracies DO NOT use proportional representation.
Great Britain, France, the United States of America, Australia and Canada do not use proportional representation. To try to balance these with countries that have recently adopted a form of democracy is to compare apples and oranges.
The recently established governments in the countries of the former Soviet Bloc are no doubt an improvement over what they had previously, but there should be some hesitancy to accept neo-fascist governments that are all to common as “better” than what we have here in Canada.
Other arguments can apply to the governments of Central and South America, to most African nations and to the countries of the middle east that would cause pause if we were to consider emulating them.
Proportional representation does favour one sector of the country that already has too much power - the elites that finance and run the Party Apparatus would, in effect, appoint their representatives in equal amounts to those that represent the other 36 million Canadians.
This fact alone makes proportional representation as laid out in their propaganda untenable!
These elites power lunch and party with our elected representatives and are constantly trying to pervert their dedication to our interest.
They don’t need a hand up to protect their interests!
Improvements can certainly be made. Perhaps the single transferable vote has advantages—none of us gets our first choice but we all get a choice that represents the compromises that we can live with.
And in the end that is all that matters-a nation built on dogma is built on a weak and shifting foundation.
Blair Backman
Parksville