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During next May's provincial election, BC voters will be asked, for the second time, whether or not they support the introduction of the Single Transferable Vote (STV). At the moment, we simply cast a vote for our favoured candidate and the candidate collecting the most votes wins. Under the STV, we'll be asked to rank candidates in descending order of preference and the winner would be selected by a complicated counting formula.

One precedent for a preferential system is the City of Vancouver. In 1920 civic voters approved a change to the city's electoral system and in the next election, early in 1921, voters marked their choices for mayor and aldermen in order of preference, 1, 2, 3, and so on. When ballots were counted, the candidate receiving the fewest votes was eliminated and his or her second preferences were distributed among the remaining candidates. This went on until one candidate received at least 50 percent of the vote and was declared the winner.

The new system was not a success. In the days before computers, electoral officials hated having to count and recount ballots. More importantly, the preferential ballot did not have any impact on the outcome. In the overwhelming majority of cases, the candidate who led on the first count ended up winning in the end.

After three elections the city decided there was no point continuing with the more complicated system and reverted to the single-choice ballot

Of course, the preferential ballot was a far cry from the proposed province-wide STV. Still, it is a cautionary tale. Watch out for unintended consequences. Or, in the case of Vancouver in the 1920s, no consequences at all.

Labels: POLITICS

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Anonymous user said:

Dan Grice said...

As for Gordon Campbell, his first election he received 3% more of the vote than the NDP but less seats. Winning more votes but losing the election is a hard thing to swallow and a lesson one does not easily forget.

However, the rest of his caucus is not nearly as supportive, or why would they set the bar at 60% instead of 50%?

Mar 11, 2011 at 5:30pm

Anonymous user said:

Dan Grice said...

The single transferable vote spread across a lot of cities in the 1920s, but was rejected because it began to elect minorities and the status quo feared it. In cambridge, where it has been used since the 1950s, it has consistently given visible minorities the representation they vote for.

In Ireland and Australia where it is used, it brings new voices into government and voters are much more satisfied with its results.

The British Parliamentary system has hardly evolved. It was brought in to give the rich merchant class a seat to counter the power of the king. The only reforms have been to allow women and the poor to vote.

The current system creates an artificial class struggle between two major voting blocks. You can read Thomas Hare's on representation (its on google books) to see how little has changed. We have artificial divisions constantly created between government and opposition, as the oppositions tries to defeat the government and the government, holding the purse, tries to buy itself into power.

Mar 11, 2011 at 5:30pm

Anonymous user said:

barnacle said...

I can understand why splinter parties are keen about preferential voting--what I can't figure is why Gordon Campbell is so enthusiastic. Perhaps the thinking is that it would further fragment the left. What many people don't seem to appreciate is that the present parliamentary system, for all its apparent crudeness, is the result of a long evolutionary process. It has won out because it offers an effective balance between choice and stability. It works. It takes my breath away that so many people--apparently including Mr. Campbell--appear willing to take a flyer on a system as experimental as the proposed STV. Whatever else you may say about it, it has the flaw, fatal in public affairs, of lacking transparency. Any system where you have to wait upon the deliberations of a computer before you know who you voted for is seriously flawed in my mind. Nobody can explain it in a simple lucid sentence and even less can they say how it would change the political picture in BC. Sadly, it may be adopted simply because so many are so disenchanted with the whole political process they will support anything that promises a good thumping shakeup. Oh well, one thing we can learn by looking at Vancouver's brush with preferential voting--as with BC's in 1950--is that it can be abandoned as easily as it is adopted, presumably with a ren ewed appreciation for the virtues of the British Parliamentary System.

Mar 11, 2011 at 5:30pm

Anonymous user said:

wbrucek said...

In Vancouver at least Cope and the Greens could have run a candidate (even if the same person won in the end). I'd certainly like more choice and more views in the debate.

Mar 11, 2011 at 5:29pm