Categories: Andrew Coyne

Canadian politics just cracked

Open, I mean. A little. First the Bloc, then the NDP, and at last…

by Andrew Coyne on Wednesday, September 10, 2008 5:05pm - 37 Comments

Open, I mean. A little. First the Bloc, then the NDP, and at last the Conservatives have buckled, and now the Greens are in the debate(s). It’s not much, but it’s a start: the sight of the Green Party leader in the debates is going to give them instant legitimacy, of a kind they have never had before. A whole lot of people who had previously never considered voting Green are going to give them a thought. I don’t mean that everyone’s going to see Elizabeth May and be blown away by her: I agree with those pundits who say she might turn off as many people as she turns on. But just by standing on the stage with the other leaders, she and her party ascend to a whole new level. We are no longer in a three- or four-party system. We are now, and for the foreseeable future, in a five-party system.

As it was, more than 660,000 people trudged to the polls to vote Green at the last election. I say trudged, because every one of them went through the exercise of casting their vote in the certain knowledge that they would not elect a single MP — such is the ludicrous unfairness of our first-past-the-post electoral system. (A refresher course: Tories 5.37 million votes/124 seats=43,000 votes per seat; Bloc 1.55-million votes/51 seats=30K votes per seat; NDP 2.59-million votes/29 seats=89K votes per seat; Greens 664-thousand votes/0 seats=Infinity…) With the lift they will get out of the debates, and given where they are in the polls already, it is possible, even probable, that the Greens will pull more than a million votes this time out. Indeed, they may even outpoll the Bloc.

Which raises a couple of interesting scenarios. 1. Suppose the Greens manage to win a few seats. And suppose they have the balance of power in a tight parliament. The Greens are on record as supporting proportional representation. (So are some other parties, but the Greens appear to mean it.) Could this be the price of Green support?

Or 2. Suppose the Greens, despite outpolling the Bloc, win no seats, while the Bloc comes home with — worst-case scenario — 30 or more. Could this absurd situation be maintained for long? A system that shuts out a party with more than a million votes — and particularly strong representation among younger voters — while handing a bushel of seats to a party dedicated to the country’s destruction?

It’s not quite a Green Revolution, but this may go down as a historic day in Canadian politics.

Tags: democracy, Election Watch, Elizabeth May, Green Party

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http://economics.about.com Mike Moffatt

“664000/0 = infinity should be 664000/0 is undefined because 1/0 = infinity and 2/0 = infinity means 1 = infinity x 0 and 2 = infinity x 0 and 664000 = infinity x 0. Infinity is not a number…”

Norm, was it really necessary for Andrew to write?

lim x -> 0+ (664068/1) = infinity

I’m sure what we’re all dying to see on this blog is calculus.
Maureen

The more wack jobs on the left is fine with me – should make for more Conservative MPs.
http://economics.about.com Mike Moffatt

Charlie: “Coyne, people always muse that the Greens might win seats, but they can never point to a solid example of a winnable seat.”

There are a few that the Greens have an outside chance of winning. Central Nova (obviously), Guelph, Vancouver Centre. They did well in the provincial election in Bruce-Grey-Owen Sound but that was largely on the popularity of the candidate there, who is not running in this election. They could also potentially come up the middle in a riding where all 3 other parties are roughly equally popular, such as London Fanshawe. But other than Central Nova, it’d be hard to argue that any of these are more likely than not.

The Greens, probably moreso than any other party in Canadian history have dispersed geographic support – nearly equally popular in rural and urban that kills their chances of winning a bunch of seats.

Some numbers to consider.. suppose the Greens take 15% of the vote of the NDP and Liberals, and 10% of the vote from the Bloc and Conservatives, and they do this in equal proportion in each riding (and given their popularity in each riding, this is plausible). [And assume no other popularity shifts]

Here’s how the election would turn out:

Conservatives: 32.6% vote / 131 seats
Liberal: 25.7% vote / 97 seats
Greens: 16.4% vote / *0* seats
NDP: 14.9% vote / 28 seats
Bloc: 9.4% vote / 51 seats
IND/OTR: 1.0% vote / 1 seat
http://economics.about.com Mike Moffatt

Note the above numbers are not meant to be a prediction. Secondly, if the Greens really did get over 15% of the vote, they’d likely win 3 or 4 seats – the numbers above just illustrate a) how dysfunctional our electoral system is and b) the magnitude of the problem faced by the Greens.
http://www.abandonedstuff.com/ saskboy

“It’s not quite a Green Revolution, but this may go down as a historic day in Canadian politics.”

I think you’re going to be right Andrew.
John D

So people think Elizabeth May is a Liberal because she is closer to Dion’s environmental plan (Does that make Gilles a Conservative because the Conservatives say QC is a nation?) and because she said she’d rather Dion were Prime Minister than Harper? Seems to me she just honestly answered a question. Who would Layton rather have as PM – Harper or Dion? I think we know he’d never answer the question.
Derek

Why do people always assume that the Greens can’t take conservative votes? I’m a conservative and I don’t vote PC/CPC anymore, I vote Green. They are not “left.” They support the environment (real conservatives conserve) and believe in sound fiscal policy and shifting taxes from good things to bad things. And they had the idea way before the Green Shift.
http://deleted Marthe

Two wrongs don’t make a right.

It’s so convoluted! Typical of how many Canadians think.

We’ve invited Gilles Duceppe to debate, made an exception, so now we can open up the debates to Elizabeth May, with all the rules to fair play broken.

Just like the game Red Rover, Red Rover, let Elizabeth May come over. Who’s next?
Sunny12

Derek is absolutely right, and maybe May being in the debate will help people to see that the Greens are not left wing but much more right wing in their stances. And the reason May is equated with the Libs is because of May’s real quest to defeat the Conservatives by any means possible and to that effect she has basically endorsed the Libs as the way to go. Which begs the question as to whether she really is a leader of a party, or just another Liberal candidate.
Sunny12

many people will be interested to see how May and Dion debate against each other.
http://www.abandonedstuff.com/ saskboy

I’m interested in seeing that too Sunny12. I think May will destroy Dion on issues where the Liberals and Greens differ. I expect she will have to in order to dispel the myth NDP and Conservatives are spreading that they are in the same party.
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