OrilliaMatters welcomes letters to the editor. The following letter is in response to a letter published Jan. 13 from Fred Larsen.
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As Fred Larsen writes in his response to my letter, I am also happy to see people discuss and debate the merits of various electoral systems, however I still refrain from calling people I disagree with nonsensical.
While we may have disagreements, I still consider and give a fair hearing to the people who have ideas different than myself.
I would, however, like to address his arguments and ideas. It is absolutely true that many countries around the world use proportional representation (PR) and get along just fine; in fact I wish these countries and the people who live in them well.
At the same time, there is only one Canada, and we are not the same as any of the countries around the world that use these PR systems. I don’t just say this cockily (although I do think Canada is pretty great), but because these differences necessarily matter to which electoral system we use.
To use an example he cited in his letter, the Netherlands, he actually helps distinguish why PR would not work well for us. The Netherlands is rather tiny (it could easily fit inside Ontario multiple times) and does not have sparsely populated and sprawling provinces like we do far removed from our country’s centre.
For the Netherlands, PR may make sense seeing as they don’t have, say, a Western province such as Alberta which has a different economy and priorities than provinces like Quebec or Ontario.
Further still, Quebec or Ontario have vastly different priorities than Newfoundland or Manitoba. Our electoral system rewards the candidate who can concentrate support within a geographic riding, thus it reflects the concerns of our highly regional country which is indispensable.
This system works. Just check out the results of 2019 federal election. The Liberals were shut out in Alberta and Saskatchewan, showing that people in this part of the country were not happy with the status quo.
In British Columbia, the Liberals lost seats, perhaps owing to their position on the Trans Mountain Pipeline, reflecting the regional concerns of voters there.
The result was that the Liberals lost their majority because regional issues cost them. In order to win a majority in our system, a party must win ridings all across Canada representing many different types of voters, whereas under PR they could simply cater to the concentrated populations of Southern Ontario and Quebec to get a majority.
Finally, what strikes me the most is Mr. Larsen’s suggestion that Canadians only rejected PR in all of our referenda because they didn’t understand it. I would strongly disagree; I have faith in my fellow Canadians to be able to take seriously and understand such a straight-forward concept that they have rejected over the span of decades.
Maybe he should take seriously the idea that most people disagree with him (and that they’re not nonsensical for doing so).
Wesley Nicol
Orillia
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