tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6615716556540686703.post2919029197889784242..comments2023-09-01T00:35:22.182-04:00Comments on Wilf Day's Blog: What would a proportional Alberta Legislature look like?Wilf Dayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05546880754492040363noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6615716556540686703.post-55710955148977126252008-12-17T21:31:00.000-05:002008-12-17T21:31:00.000-05:00By "elected personally" I mean just that. On the r...By "elected personally" I mean just that. On the regional ballot, you vote for the person. The regional candidate with the most votes from the regional ballot wins the party's first regional seat (unless that person already won a local seat, in which case the party's regional candidate with the second highest votes is elected to that regional seat.)<BR/><BR/>This is the "open list" MMP model used in the German province of Bavaria. It is also the MMP model designed by the British Columbia Citizens' Assembly, which designed two models, and then made a final choice for the Irish STV system instead of open-list MMP.<BR/><BR/>There are other MMP models. Scotland uses a regional closed list model. So do a couple of German provinces. New Zealand uses a national closed list model. So do the majority of German provinces. That means that the party's provincial convention nominates the list of provincial candidates for the provincial "top-up" seats, and the voters do not choose between them. In that model, the voters choose the local MPP from the candidates nominated locally, and their second vote is simply for the party they want to see in government.<BR/><BR/>The Ontario Citizens' Assembly chose province-wide lists rather than regional lists. This is because they were trying to give priority to keeping local ridings as small as possible, not make the legislature too large. <BR/><BR/>The ideal model, from the point of view of getting proportional results, would have been to keep the present 107 ridings and add another 71 "top-up" MPPs, for a legislature of 178 MPPs of which 40% would be "top-up" MPPs, which is a good ratio to get proportional results. But no one was bold enough to propose 178 MPPs. <BR/><BR/>So those 103 Citizens were looking at expanding the House to 129 or 139 MPPs, and cutting the number of local ridings to 97 or 103, so that the percent of "top-up" MPPs would be 25% (or maybe 30%). But 25% is quite often not enough, especially if the province is broken down into seven or eight regions, some of which will have more disproportional results than others. So for that reason they decided on province-wide lists. It would be silly to expect voters to choose between at least 32 candidates, most of whom they had never heard of, on a province-wide ballot, so they chose the closed-list model. <BR/><BR/>But then they finally refined the numbers to 90 local ridings, 39 "top-up" MPPs, 129 total MPPs, 30% "top-up." At that point they should have gone back to review their previous decision: they could have chosen to use seven regions, with only five or so regional MPPs each, and then they could have used the Bavarian open-list model. But they had no time to review their previous choices. Their schedule was too tight, partly because they started a year later than the government's Democratic Renewal Secretariat had wanted.<BR/><BR/>That's why critics complained last fall about the parties "appointing" MPPs, like Senators. Actually that was unfair; they would have been nominated well before the election, and all parties agreed they would do so democratically. But province-wide lists didn't sound very accountable. <BR/><BR/>The main reason MMP lost in the referendum was poor public knowledge. A survey soon afterwards showed that, among voters who understood the proposal, the majority voted for it. Still, the closed province-wide lists were not a great feature, I agree. So I'm not suggesting that model.Wilf Dayhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05546880754492040363noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6615716556540686703.post-75675268212526910042008-12-17T09:12:00.000-05:002008-12-17T09:12:00.000-05:00Great to see another blog to add to my 'following'...Great to see another blog to add to my 'following' list. I love reading them and I'm glad to see another blogger over the age of 20! :-)<BR/><BR/>I am afraid, Wilf, that you're going to have to go back to basics for me! I will happily follow your blog, I love discourse, it helps us move towards <A>truth</A>, but I need clarification.<BR/><BR/>When you say that <A HREF="http://wilfday.blogspot.com/2008/11/readily-available-proportional.html" REL="nofollow"><I>one-third of MPs to be regional "top-up" MPs elected personally</I></A> do you mean that I cannot elect those topped up? They are appointed by the party? <BR/><BR/>I cannot accept that this is democracy if I do not vote directly for the 'top-ups'. We are trying to get away from an appointed Senate, and I cannot see that this is any different. <BR/>Can you help enlighten me?!Jenn Jilkshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05259681360456905055noreply@blogger.com