Dear Editor,
I wish to thank you for bringing continued awareness to a subject that I am very passionate about and have referenced several times in the last few years in letters to this paper. Last week’s editorial concerning the needed electoral reform in Canada was argued quite well (Fate of the nation, THE EQUITY, Feb. 12, 2025).
Since Confederation 158 years ago, there have been 16 minority federal governments, with a remarkable five of them being just in the last 20 years. Clearly, there appears to be an increased trend in Canadians falling into this style of governance that is arguably ineffective and confrontational, thereby lacking in meaningful results.
The 2001 federal Law Commission of Canada concluded that our present, outdated ‘first past the post’ electoral system, having it roots from 19th century Britain, was no longer suited to be functional within the Canadian political landscape. The Commission concluded that the ‘democratic malaise’ in Canada, with its declining voter turnout, stemmed from citizens feeling disempowered by the current system, as voters do not believe their vote has any real impact in selecting a representative government.
As a result of these strong findings, both Stephen Harper and Justin Trudeau promised that, if elected, they would enact a process towards proportional representation, as advocated by the Commission. Unfortunately for Canadians, neither of these two prime ministers lived up to their promise.
How seats are allocated in parliament clearly does not correspond with voters’ wishes, and THE EQUITY editorial does a very good job in illustrating this. That the Green Party can have two seats in the Commons with just over 300,000 votes nationwide, while the People’s Party, with well over 800,000 votes nationwide, is awarded no seats at all defies common sense.
One can only imagine what the political landscape would look like if our leaders would have kept their promise – the last 15 years of Canadian history could well have looked very differently. For sure, we would not have had a prime minister who ridiculed and diminished segments of this nation’s citizenry on matters of personal conscience, and who put his ego ahead of the goals and aspirations of this country.
Todd Hoffman, PPC Candidate, Campbell’s Bay
