Truthiness about MMP and "fringe" parties

Another favorite canard of the defenders of the electoral status quo is that proportional representation, like MMP, will hand our government over to "fringe parties" and extremists who will bring in government policies that most voters abhor.

As the Toronto Star wrote in an editorial that will hopefully become infamous:

Routinely, whoever heads the leading party is forced to cater to the demands of small, sometimes radical special-interest parties that enjoy no wide support, just to stay in power. That in itself is a distortion of the voters' will.

Except well, there's NO evidence to show that situation has happened anywhere in the world under a PR system. In fact, I've been all over the internet for months now asking people who make those kind of statements to back them up with concrete examples. But for some reason, they never provide them?

But the media elites and opponents of fair elections won't let silly little things like reality getting in the way of their campaign to defeat MMP.

Under proportional systems, even when smaller parties enter into government they never get to enact their unpopular policies. Why? It’s simple when you think about it. All parties in a coalition government will be held to account for their policies, so why would larger parties risk losing support by bringing in “extreme” and unpopular positions?

They wouldn’t and, if people looked at the evidence, they don’t.

Don't take my word for it. Here's what Campaign Life Coalition - "a Canadian national pro-life organization" and "one of the first pro-life organizations to emphasize the international dimension of attacks on life and family" - has to say about MMP, in a piece entitled "We Oppose Proportional Representation":

"We understand that there is great disillusionment with the current political situation and frustration with the lack of progress on moral issues in the political arena. CLC appreciates that many people are looking to electoral reform as an answer to these issues ...

Some pro-lifers believe that proportional representation will result in the appointment of Family Coalition Party members at the provincial level and Christian Heritage Party candidates at the federal level ...

There are very few examples of social conservative legislation being passed in countries with PR. This summer The Interim newspaper had a team of three people examine the records of other countries to track the progress of prolife and pro-family legislation in countries with PR. They found just one significant example. In the Netherlands, the Christian Union Party, as part of the coalition government there, has effected some positive change in closing down brothels, reducing the number of marijuana shops and introducing guidelines requiring cooling off wait times for abortions.

But, for the most part, the researchers at The Interim found the reverse to be true: many countries with PR have experienced an advance of anti-life and anti-family agendas in recent years"

In fact, evidence shows that citizens in PR countries, like MMP, are more satisfied with government and feel better represented.

The cross-national comparisons show that citizens in countries using PR are significantly more satisfied than those in countries using systems like ours.

In another measure of voter satisfaction, it has been demonstrated that in PR countries the difference in voter satisfaction between winners of the election (those who voted for parties in government) and losers (those who voted for parties not in government) is significantly SMALLER in countries with PR systems.

Finally, two different studies, using data from the late 70s to mid 80s, shows that governments in PR countries are more like be closer to the median voter, as measured on a left-right scale.

Does that sound like what you'd find from countries where "the voters' will is distorted" and are ruled by "fringe" or "extremist" elements? Didn't think so, looks like we've found more truthiness about MMP!

Truthiness about MMP and diversity

I did a panel debate at UTM yesterday and after hearing some pretty weak arguments from the defender of the status quo concerning how MMP might affect diversity in the legislature, I knew I had to do a piece about the truthiness of his assertions.

One of the big arguments the forces for democracy have been making is that MMP would increase the representation of women and minority communities at Queen's Park.

Here’s what they say about this question on their website.

QUESTION

Will MMP allow for more women and minorities to be elected?

ANSWER

That is entirely up to the political parties. If political parties do not want to field more women or minority candidates, they are not compelled to do so. There is no guarantee that political parties will put more women or minority candidates on their party lists.

As it stands now, the Liberal Party of Ontario have promised to have women make up 1/3 of their candidate slate, and the Ontario NDP have managed to have women make up 50% of their candidate list for the upcoming election. MMP will not make political parties step up their efforts in this area.

Now, the above quote is technically correct. There is nothing in the proposed MMP system that compels political parties to nominate more women. But is it a reasonable assertion that MMP would not affect female or visible minority representation at Queen’s Park?

Not in the least.

But first, let’s look at how MMP has actually affected minority representation in MMP countries.

It is clear that proportional representation systems, like MMP, elect more women. Of the twenty democracies with the most women elected, they all have proportional voting system. The main western democracies using MMP – Germany, New Zealand, Scotland and Wales – all have at least 50 per cent more women in their parliaments.

Also, the MMP experience in New Zealand provides strong support for arguments that MMP would improve legislative representation for other minority groups. Here's a graphic showing the representation of minorities in the New Zealand House of Representatives, pre- and post-MMP (note that 1996 was the first MMP election in NZ):



As we can clearly see, after adopting MMP, New Zealand saw a dramatic increase in the representation of women, aboriginals and other minority groups. In fact, the number of Maori elected is now greater than their share of the population!

How did this occur? Because parties in New Zealand democratically selected candidate lists that were more reflective of the population than they had when they only selected single candidates in single districts.

Recent polling has shown that between 80 and 90 per cent of Ontario voters would like to see more women elected. Would any party risk alienating this large majority of voters by failing to nominate plenty of female list candidates? Not if they wanted to win the election.

The same goes for candidates from other under-represented groups, like visible minorities, youth and the disabled. The list of at-large candidates will be carefully parsed by the media and interest groups. While parties might be able hide their continued under-representation of their groups in the halls of power under the current system, it is highly likely they would continue to do so under the current system.

This is why it is certain that MMP, or any other proportional voting system that uses multi-member districts, will increase women’s – and other under-represented groups’ – representation at Queen’s Park.

This is why women groups like Equal Voice, the national movement to improve women’s representation in elected office, and several multi-cultural groups have endorsed MMP.

Finally, in the quote above, the enemies of democracy, assert that the increased nomination of women by the Liberals and NDP will increased the number of women elected. Sadly, the logic of the current voting system does not allow this – and I expect those writing that know that full well.

Under first-past-the-post, over half the seats in the province are “safe” – that is, barring massive vote swings, they will be won by one party. Indeed, there are parts of the province that have only been represented by one party for generations. So for women’s representation, what matters less is the number of female candidates, but rather where they are located in the province.

For example, the provincial Liberals have nominated women in more than half of the ridings where incumbents are not running. This is a positive sign, but as the Liberals are unlikely to gain many seats, their proportion of female MPPs is not likely to rise appreciably. The same goes for federal Liberal leader Stephane Dion’s commitment to running 1/3 women candidates. Again, a good principle, but will likely not lead to more women elected if they run mostly in Alberta, the Prairies and Quebec, places where the party is unlikely to make gains.

The evidence is clear, if we’re concerned about having legislatures that better reflect our diversity – and I think we should be – than we need proportional representation. And clearly the best way to get PR is to vote for MMP tomorrow.

No wonder the opponents of democratic improvement feel the need to misinform voters on this.

Truthiness about the Citizens’ Assembly

I haven't been able to put as much time as I've wanted to on my series about the "truthiness" of the defenders of the electoral status quo. But I've started a few and I promise to squeeze out a few more between now and referendum day. First is a piece about the truthiness being spread about the heroes of the Ontario Citizens' Assembly on Electoral Reform.

There are many things that are frustrating about the campaign to preserve the electoral status quo, but one of the most frustrating is how they have ignored, suppressed and distorted how the Assembly brought us to this historic referendum.

Its ultimate success remains to be seen, but it is clear that the Ontario Citizens’ Assembly can be seen as an innovative experiment in making the ideas of deliberative democracy a reality.

The Citizens’ Assembly – promised by the McGuinty government in the 2003 election – was based on a similar experiment in British Columbia and built on that experience. It is premised on the idea that average citizens can come together to make good decisions on various policy issues. In particular, it is seen as a particularly good method for studying electoral reform as politicians face a fundamental conflict of interest when it comes to evaluating the system that elects them.

Jonathan Rose, Queen’s political scientist and academic director of the Assembly, told the Kingston Whig Standard why he wanted to be a part of the process:

Rose became involved in the process because, he said, political scientists always talk about the capacity of citizens to reason, but no one has ever had this opportunity in the province.

The assembly "really put it to the test," he said. "Are citizens able to learn about complex political issues? And they can."

The members of the Assembly spent months learning about electoral systems, consulting with Ontarians and deliberating on the question of which electoral system who best meet Ontario's democratic aspirations for the next century. I wouldn't go so far as to say voters should reflexively support their recommendation, but I think we owe it to them to inform ourselves about how and why they chose MMP. Thankfully, their original website is still up and has an overwhelming amount of publicly accessible material. All in all, the Assembly is a model of open and transparent public policy making.

Throughout the process, the Assembly contracted the respected Institute on Governance think tank to evaluate their work. Here's what they had to say about the Assembly in their evaluation report, which is available online here in PDF:

The whole Assembly process was undertaken in an open and transparent manner and is well documented for the benefit of future exercises of a similar nature. It serves as a model of how to engage and empower citizens to deliberate and decide on selected public policy questions

Most disturbingly, the opponents of MMP are trying to mislead Ontarians on the topic of the Citizens’ Assembly, likely because they (logically) think that the more voters know about the Assembly and its work, the more likely they are to support its recommendation.

Either the opponents of MMP are completely ignorant of their work (which is kind of disturbing to see from people arguing against their recommendation) or they are choosing not to fairly present it to voters. Here are some of the falsehoods they're spreading about the Citizens' Assembly.


TRUTHINESS - the Citizens assembly was "appointed"

Here are some distortions from an email the opponents of democracy are sending out across the province:

“The government spent millions of our dollars on a Citizens Assembly on Electoral Reform. Purportedly, the members of the Citizens Assembly were chosen randomly but no one can establish which database or what information was used to determine such random participation, or history making participants.”

Actually, we do know how the Assembly was chosen and that information could be easily found out by anyone with decent research skills. As the Assembly process was marked by transparency, all their learning material and the results of their consultation phase are still available online here.

TRUTHINESS - ”The people of Ontario did not ask for this referendum.”

Actually, the Citizens’ Assembly was promised by the Liberal government in the last election. Are MMP opponents encouraging governments to break their promises – or just the ones they disagree with? That doesn’t seem like democracy to me.

Rose describes how the group was selected very well in this quote from a recent speech he gave in Kingston:

Formed in spring 2006, the Citizens' Assembly on Electoral Reform was made up of 103 citizens, one from each riding in the province, plus a chair - Kingston's own George Thomson, who is a retired judge and former deputy minister. Half of the assembly was men and half women, and it had at least one aboriginal. Most importantly, the Citizens' Assembly was independent of government. It was given the task of assessing our electoral system and others in use around the world. After a thorough analysis, it had to recommend whether Ontario should keep its current system or adopt another one. If it did recommend change, it had to provide design details about what that system should look like.

Members were randomly selected last spring in a process run by Elections Ontario, which sent out 124,000 letters asking voters if they wanted to be part of the assembly. From the 10,000 who replied, 1,000 voters were invited to attend selection meetings across the province where 103 assembly members were randomly selected by drawing a name out of a box. At these meetings, the feeling of excitement at being picked was palpable. More than one member who was chosen was heard to say that it felt like winning a lottery. But why? This was for the chance to devote two weekends a month from September to May to discussing a subject that many had not thought about; to work on a project that would have no immediate benefit to them except the opportunity to talk to and learn from their fellow citizens. So rare in a democracy is this form of policy-making. In fact, other than in British Columbia, there has never been a citizens' assembly. It says a lot that the opportunities are rare for citizens to be part of a meaningful public conversation on an important matter.
The assembly was diverse in terms of age, occupation, education, country of origin and political beliefs. Members spoke a total of 28 languages, while 66 were born in Ontario, 27 were born outside of Canada and 11 were from other provinces. This great diversity meant that there were many perspectives and experiences from which the group could draw. It was remarkable that people who had nothing in common could work so effectively together in developing a proposal. Author James Surowieki describes this as the "wisdom of crowds."

It is the first citizens' assembly for Ontario and the second time in Canada that this innovative model of policy-making has been attempted. The rationale for letting citizens make this decision was simple: politicians are elected to make policy decisions but have a conflict of interest when it comes to choosing what system should be used to elect them. To paraphrase a British MP, "Asking politicians to vote for an electoral system is a little like asking turkeys to vote for Thanksgiving." An electoral system - how votes are translated into seats - is so fundamental to democracy that it should reflect the preferences of citizens, not those whose interests it could benefit.

TRUTHINESS - the mandate of the Citizens’ Assembly pointed them in a particular direction

Other status quo lovers are baselessly charging that the Assembly was tricked or mandated into “strengthening political parties” by the terms of their mandate. Even smart and politically saavy folks like sponsorship scandal whistleblower Allan Cutler, who wrongly comments on Rick Anderson’s blog that “the Citizens Assembly did an admirable job given that they were given a mandate that was to increase the power of the party system.”

Here’s the actual principle from the mandate given to the Assembly from the legislative committee that directed their work.

Effective Parties - the system supports strong parties that can offer different perspectives.

Clearly, this says NOTHING about “strengthening” political parties. It calls for effective political parties, which is very different – and very reasonable – consideration in designing an electoral system. Even the most cynical observer of politics has to recognize that no jurisdiction as large or as populous as Ontario functions without political parties. All the Assembly was asked to do was to consider how their decision would affect political parties.

And if the political parties are given so much more power under MMP, how come they aren’t openly campaigning for it? Or are they more concerned about it because MMP makes parties more accountable to voters by giving them a vote that counts?

TRUTHINESS - the Citizens’ Assembly was a “biased” body

Another outright fabrication from the naysayers:

As for the assembly, you have a selection bias problem with the Citizen's Assembly, which is overwhelmingly stocked with zombies from Fairvote, whose preformed opinions have been reinforced with more conversations with other such zombies. The Citizen's Assembly is a lobby group.

As noted above, Assembly members were randomly selected by Elections Ontario. None of them were Fair Vote members. Although I'm sure some of them are more interested in getting involved with the multi-partisan movement for electoral reform now that they've seen how the media and entrenched interests have distorted and misrepresented their hard work.

Also, I've heard it charged that the Assembly's learning phase pointed them towards reform or MMP specifically. If that was the case, it wasn't evident to the Assembly members themselves. As part of the independent evaluation of the Assembly, the members rated the neutrality of the secretariat and the facilitators 4.6 out of 5.


Conclusion

As noted above, the Citizens’ Assembly was randomly selected. But this created a decision-making body far more representative of Ontario than the current legislative assembly.

Here are some statistics from the Assembly's extensive background report - of course, available online here - and summarized here.

Gender

52 women and 52 men (including the chair who was a man).

Currently, there are only 26 female MPPs at Queen's Park.

Age

18 to 24: 11 25 to 39: 23 40 to 54: 32 55 to 70: 26 70+: 12

Currently, there is only ONE MPP under the age of 40.

Place of birth

Ontario: 66 Other provinces: 11 Outside Canada: 27 (Citizens' Assembly members were born in Bangladesh, Brazil, China, Croatia, Egypt, Germany, Ghana, Greece, Hong Kong, Iraq, Korea, Malta, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines, Serbia, Sri Lanka, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, and the United States).

There are currently only 18 immigrant MPPs and 8 visible minority MPPs.

Language

The Assembly members spoke a combined total of 28 languages: English, French, Arabic, Aramaic, Bengali, Cantonese, Dutch, Fanti, German, Greek, Hindi, Hungarian, Ibo, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Maltese, Mandarin, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Serbian, Spanish, Tagalog, Tamil, Ukrainian, and Urdu.

I'd bet that with only 18 immigrant MPPs and 8 visible minority MPPs, our provincial legislators are less multi-lingual than the mosaic of the Citizens' Assembly.

As you can see, the Assembly is clearly more representative of Ontario's diversity than Queen's Park. I think this gives their deliberations an added legitimacy.

When Ontarians head to the polls and get their referendum ballots, they face a crucial choice about the future of our democracy.

They can believe the backrooms and the party bosses that MMP is bad for Ontario. That will mean either choosing to remain ignorant about the positive record of MMP in countries that use it or pretending that record doesn’t make a difference.

Or voters can trust the the group of average people like us who got an amazing education on the topic of voting systems and came up with a moderate and sensible recommendation for modernizing the way we elect our representatives.

Maybe that's why the defenders of the status are so set on misrepresenting the Citizens' Assembly's work.

Rainbow coalition calls for Ontarians to Vote for MMP

Outside Queen's Park this morning, a "rainbow coalition" of prominent Ontarians, from all political parties, came together to call on Ontario voters to vote for MMP in the October 10 referendum (press release here). Noting that most Ontarians do not feel informed about the question, they also called on the media to step up to plate in the last week of the campaign and let voters know why the Citizens' Assembly recommended MMP - by reprinting the Assembly excellent brochure "One Ballot, Two Votes".

First, Catherine Baquero and Patrick Heenan from the Citizens' Assembly spoke about their work and why they recommended MMP. They scolded the media and Elections Ontario for failing to let Ontario voters know WHY the Assembly recommended MMP and implored the media (which were actually present!) to get their message out in the coming week.

After the Assembly members were done, then the great lineup of speakers went to the mic:
Rick Anderson, Campaign Chair, Vote for MMP
Judy Rebick, CAW-Sam Gindin Chair for Social Justice and Democracy, Ryerson
Bob Rae, former Premier of Ontario
Kate Holloway, Liberal candidate, Trinity-Spadina
Rosemary Speirs, Co-founder, Equal Voice
Jim Harris, former leader, Green Party of Canada
Ed Broadbent, former NDP leader
Senator Hugh Segal

I won't go into detail about their remarks, but they were all passionate advocates for MMP. They agreed that despite many disagreements on public policy issues, Ontario democracy would be significantly improved if voters choose MMP. No matter what your political views, you will be well served by voting for MMP.

It was an inspiring start to the campaign day and hopefully the eloquent words of these respected Ontarians were broadcast throughout the media over the course of the day.

UPDATE: Just saw a great CP story about the press conference. Here's a great quote from Catherine Baquero, a young and articulate member of the Assembly:

"I'm very disappointed there's been a lack of meaningful debate," said Catherine Baquero, a member of the citizens assembly that recommended changing the system.

"I'm disappointed that Elections Ontario's education campaign has been so toothless. What I expected was a more detailed discussion of the pros and cons of each system."

Respected public servant Tom Kent calls for Ontarians to Vote for MMP

One of the great people I've had the pleasure of meeting through my electoral reform activism is Tom Kent, former principal secretary to Pearson, academic, and respected public servant. At a conference at Queen's last year, I got the chance to chat briefly with him about electoral reform, the Liberal leadership race and to thank him for a piece he'd written for the PEI MMP campaign.

He's got a stellar piece in the Globe and Mail this morning. Here are some highlights:

The referendum choice is between realism and romanticism. People who want to stick close to what is familiar are usually seen as the realists. This case is different. It is pure romanticism to believe that we can go back to the good old days when politics was the normal business of two grand old parties. And since we can't, the current electoral system is indefensible.

It worked well enough in the past. But a world war followed the economic breakdown of the 1930s and began the rapid transformation of technology and society. For 60 years, our way of empowering governments has been out of joint with the times. That is the underlying cause of the great public disillusion with politics. Realists recognize the fact

Kent notes just how ancient our current voting system is:

Our current way of choosing governments goes back to the time when leaders of local interests tamed the power of English kings. The resulting parliament gradually moved to democracy, notably when the franchise was extended to women ...

As long as government had a relatively small part in our lives, political opinions could be easily concentrated between just two parties. As public affairs have become more complex, opinions about them have inevitably become more divided. And with more than two parties, the old electoral system cannot work either efficiently or fairly.

I particularly like Kent's conclusion:

Some people worry that members nominated provincially, not by party associations in the constituencies, would strengthen the self-seeking "party boss" element in politics. If that were so, the big party organizations would be backing MMP. They are not, because electoral reform would force politicians to improve their ways.

Now only one party at a time, with a majority in the legislature, though not in public opinion, has an interest in the practical business of government. Political controversy is concentrated on negatives, not on what should be done. With electoral reform, politicians will have less incentive to make special promises to special interests, and more incentive to campaign on what is good for the province as a whole. They will need to co-operate with other parties to get things done. The mood of politics will shift significantly from mindless, spin-doctoring combat toward more constructive competition.

This is not to predict instantaneous conversion. The atmosphere of public cynicism surrounding politics is too heavy for quick dispersion.

But electoral reform is a matter not only of fairness, of every citizen's right to have his/her vote count equally with others. It is necessary for rebuilding public confidence and participation in public affairs. On Oct. 10, the people of Ontario can take a decisive step that way. By endorsing a two-vote electoral system, we can move toward a future of constructive democratic government.

But after that great opinion piece, we then find the Globe making this unconscionable factual error in this piece - "The parties would be allowed to appoint a number of members from their lists based on their share of this vote".

If you're as shocked as me with this now debunked error, maybe you'll take a second to ask the Globe to print a correction in tomorrow's paper.

The big lie about MMP

From a recent Vote for MMP email that we've been sending around:

The defenders of the status quo have been repeating a statement about MMP that is fundamentally wrong: that the new at-large seats would be filled by “appointment” rather than by election.

Set aside for a moment the obvious question: why would a Citizens’ Assembly of Ontario voters propose something so stupid? Because they didn’t.

Every legislator under MMP would be elected – put in office by attracting votes and removed from office by losing votes. All of the party leaders have already said their parties would use a democratic process to nominate their at-large candidates (standard practice in all MMP countries). Those candidates are then elected according to how successful they and their parties are at attracting votes.

Electing candidates to fill at-large seats, as well as riding seats, gives voters stronger and better representation than we have now – which is why the Citizens’ Assembly recommends MMP.

Here's a great release from the campaign on this issue. Hopefully the media will give it similar prominence as the defenders of the status quo's hysterical - and now clearly unfounded - claims about appointed candidates.

All candidates will be democratically selected - even Tory admits it

Good news for Ontario democracy this morning. Because John Tory has now basically admitted that should MMP come into effect, his party will democratically select their province wide members.

In a recent interview with the National Post, Tory admitted the PCs will likely find a democratic way to develop its list of candidates." Quoting him directly:

“The history of our party is that the party insists on choosing its candidates democratically. Even the notion that the leader would appoint candidates is something that has been not well received when it’s come up.”

Also, in the news today, the Green Party of Ontario outlined its plans for selecting its provincial candidates. Quoting Frank DeJong:

"Under MMP, voters will expect each party to select its list candidates in an open and democratic fashion. We are committed to using a transparent and equitable process to produce a slate of qualified Green candidates who accurately reflect Ontario's diverse population."

Since Howard Hampton has already committed the NDP to a democratic candidate selection process, that just leaves Premier McGuinty to clarify how he thinsk his party should select its province-wide candidates.

McGuinty deserves credit for starting the Citizens' Assembly process, but I must admit I find myself agreeing with Tory when he says:

“He started this process. I would have thought that by starting it, he obviously was recognizing some need for change — why else did he start it?” Mr. Tory asked, adding that Mr. McGuinty want to “have it all ways.”

“For him to start the process and then express no opinion at all is another abdication of leadership….He’d like to have everybody think he’s on their side, because that’s politics as usual for Dalton McGuinty.”

We don't even need to hear your opinion on MMP itself Dalton, just do like the other leaders and commit to democratic candidate selection - that would take a big (and false) weapon out of the arsenal of the opponents of democracy.

The conservative case for MMP

I'm very pleased that one of my favorite Canadians political columnists is voting for MMP - National Post columnist Andrew Coyne.

In a great piece, he sets out a strong case for why conservatives should be voting for MMP. Here are some highlights:

In the broad strokes, the government of Ontario would look much the same under Mr. Tory as under Dalton McGuinty. It would do much the same things, at much the same cost, with much the same results ... Whoever wins, the forecast is for McGuintory governments, as far as the eye can see.

I’m not blaming either man. Both are simply responding to the incentives in our political system -- notably the method of voting. Sometimes known as “first past the post,” sometimes called “plurality” voting, it should really be called the “winner take all” system, since that captures its most essential dynamic.

He continues to describe how the current system often gives voters less salient choices come election time:

In such a system, as we have seen, victory or defeat can turn on the swing of one or two percentage points.

Living on a knife-edge does strange things to people. On the one hand, it leaves the parties in a perpetual fever of anticipation, convinced they have only to gain a few points in the polls to destroy their opponents. That is one reason the two federal conservative parties, Progressive Conservative and Reform, were so reluctant to merge. It is also the reason why minority governments tend, under our system, to be so unstable.

On the other hand, the consequences of losing a few points makes them excessively, almost neurotically cautious, unwilling to take the slightest risk or advocate the mildest change, but each hugging as close as it can to the median voter, the status quo and each other. Hence the dominance of the two brokerage parties, indistinguishable in philosophy -- alike, that is, in the lack of it.

Put the two together, and you have much of Canadian politics -- viciously partisan, yet unspeakably trivial; much ado about nothing much. McGuintoryism, in short.

Then, the kicker, he argues (cogently, IMHO) that despite progressives' enthusiasm for MMP, it is actually rock-ribbed conservatives who are most hurt by how the current system shapes our politics:

So the case for electoral reform, it seems to me, is one that conservatives, if not Conservatives, should find appealing. It is a cause that has tended, historically, to be identified with the left, not least in the current referendum debate; many conservatives have accordingly rejected it. Yet it is not the left that has suffered most under the current system. It’s the right ...

The spectrum of acceptable ideas for debate would noticeably broaden.

Moreover, because the “winner take all” dynamic would have been broken -- parties get roughly the share of the seats their proportion of the vote would suggest, rather than the highly leveraged payoffs observed under FPTP -- all parties would have less fear of taking risks. True, there would also be less upside: progress would only come by sustained advocacy over many years. Conservatives grouse that a Mike Harris revolution would be unlikely, but so would the NDP disaster that preceded it.

So conservatives, genuine conservatives, have a choice. Hold onto the current system, and hope for a Harris-style change of government every fifty years or so. Or take a chance on something new, and start changing minds today.

Another Coyne masterpiece and one that will hopefully increase the number of thinking conservatives like these three bloggers that support MMP.

Finally, I saw another piece today from a prominent Ontario conservative leader, Family Coalition Party leader Giuseppe Gori. It's much longer but is a good - and detailed - discussion of how accountability to voters is different - and, we would both ,improved under MMP

More on MMP and truthiness

Before I start my blog series discussing the problems with the debate over the upcoming referendum, I thought it might be good to give a little background on why I became so interested in the issue of electoral reform.

They say apathy and loss of civic interest characterizes my generation, but I’ve always been interested in politics. I grew up in a political home in Prince Edward Island, the kind of place where issues of the day were (and still are whenever I’m back) invariably discussed at the kitchen table. This led to a life-long interest in political affairs, particularly elections. My parents are both educators – in my view, the noblest profession – and always promoted critical thinking and open discussion.

I had the distinct pleasure of serving as a legislative page in both the PEI Legislative Assembly and the House of Commons, so I’ve observed more than my share of parliamentary debates.

I observed grown men and women two or three times my age behave like children. Sadly, in a 21st Century Canadian legislature, “debate” appears to be far too often characterized by misleading, personal and unwarranted attacks on political opponents rather than a respectful discussion of policy alternatives. At its root, this must be a reflection of the inescapable fact that, due to our outdated first-past-the-post electoral systems, our legislatures reflect neither how we vote nor our diversity. Thanks to our pre-democratic voting system, we are facing the challenges of a new millennium with political institutions that under-represent minority viewpoints, inflame regional tensions and prevent new ideas and perspectives from entering the legislature.

By the end of my year in the House, I knew that we could ask for more from our politicians and our democratic institutions, I just didn’t know exactly how to remedy this problem. In my second year at university, I learned more about the diversity of voting systems used around the world. It was like a bolt of lightning – we could demand more from our politicians and proportional representation was the way to best hold them to account. I sent in my membership form to Fair Vote Canada shortly thereafter and have been involved with the organization for years now.

The summer after second-year university, as a part of co-operative work placement, I worked as a research assistant at the Public Policy Forum, an Ottawa-based think tank. The main project I worked on, and certainly the one I enjoyed most, was on youth voter turnout – which as I’m sure you are aware is steadily in decline. I studied a good portion of the academic literature on this subject and had come to the inescapable conclusion that talking about increasing voter participation without fixing our broken electoral system is ignoring the real reason behind the problem. And when you think about it, does it not make sense that young Canadians of my generation, who are accustomed to unbelievable choice in most areas of their lives – from beauty products to colas to television channels – are being turned off by a political system that reduces the effective choices they can make?

So when my home province was holding a plebiscite on a form of mixed-member proportional in the Fall of 2005, I had to go back to get involved with the campaign. Over the course of three months, I had the great pleasure of working with a great group of supporters and doing my best to educate Islanders about MMP.

At a public forum in PEI moths after the plebiscite was over, I gave a speech that I’ve posted on my blog before, and I think much of what I said is relevant to the ongoing campaign here in Ontario:

I’m still disappointed that I obviously didn’t educate enough Islanders. I think we can all agree most voters felt did not feel sufficiently informed on the issue, many clearly didn’t feel it was worth their time – or would make much difference to them …

Because as much as I wish I could say otherwise, November 28th was NOT a bright day for Island democracy. I believe the plebiscite results reflect:
- lack of knowledge about MMP among many voters
- increased cynicism among voters
- deepening cleavages between urban and rural Islanders, ones stoked by the failures of successive generations of MLAs to take leadership on modernizing our voting system
- low turnout (likely due to lack of polls/voter info cards/lineups). The turnout was much lower than indicated in a survey done before the plebiscite.
- finally, it is difficult to even gauge support for changing our voting system among Islanders, as it seems every second thing the No side was “we support electoral reform, just not this model”

I guess the primary lesson I learned from this Fall was that it’s easier to tear something down than to build something up

It is easier for opponents of fair voting systems to misinform the public than it is for proponents to educate them on the functioning of alternative electoral systems ...

Again as I’ve said to members of the group in private discussion, the No side’s work during the Fall can be fairly described as misleading, incorrect, and designed to play upon Islanders’ misconceptions rather than their hopes for a more democratic future.

My experience in PEI made me very skeptical about the motivations of those opposed to electoral reform. And I see many of the same misleading arguments being used here in Ontario. Although I must note that the movement for electoral reform in Ontario is MUCH broader and deeper than it was on PEI two years ago. We have hundreds of times more supporters and a much more broad-based support network, bringing in people from all political perspectives.

In short, we're much better prepared to win this vote on MMP. But we still need your help and support.

As I will argue in this blog series, those opposed to MMP are either willfully misleading Ontarians about how it will affect our political life or just ignorant of how proportional voting systems work. I’m very proud of how the Vote for MMP campaign is sticking factual and verifiable claims about how electoral change will affect government and democracy in this province.

I would compare the public debate on MMP to two other controversial debates of recent years – the debate leading up to the Iraq War and surrounding climate change. In all three cases, we can see certain political interests and actors willfully distorting the facts to serve political ends.

In my mind, talking about “appointed party hack MPPs” is no different than talking about “weapons of mass destruction”. Pretending that MMP won’t affect women’s representation at Queen’s Park is logically analogous to asserting that CO2 emissions have nothing to do with rising global temperatures. They ignore the best available evidence and research - why? Because the facts don't support those interests' pre-ordained positions - invading Iraq, protecting the oil industry and preserving the electoral status quo.

The Citizens’ Assembly process inaugurated by the current government could have been a shining example of deliberative democracy. But deliberative democracy necessitates informed and reasoned decision-making. We already know that most voters aren't aware of the referendum and even less feel informed. So unless the Ontarians can see through the spin and misinformation about MMP, it will be difficult to say that the October 10 referendum is a triumph for democracy - regardless of the results.

MMP and truthiness

I've been planning a blog series for the rest of the campaign. I've sketched out a bunch of ideas but was looking for a way to tie them all together.

Then today, on the train to Toronto, as I was taking a break watching an episode of my favorite satirical news program - it dawned on me!

I'll have to do the series exposing the "truthiness" of the arguments against MMP.

As the American Dialect Society definied it when they named it 2005's "Word of the
Year", truthiness:

refers to the quality of preferring concepts or facts one wishes to be true, rather than concepts or facts known to be true.

So I look forward to exposing the truthiness of the arguments against MMP over the next three weeks. It should be educational, as I'll provide references and evidence debunking all the wild accusations made against the Citizens' Assembly's recommendation.

As one of my colleagues notes often, if MMP were a person, they could sue the people organizing for the status quo in the referendum for slander. Their arguments either gloss over, or plainly ignore, the best evidence and research on voting systems and electoral behaviour.

And as one of my favorite bloggers noted last week, I've been proud to be associated with an organization and a campaign that "[more than] any non-academic organization ... argue[s] so much from research findings rather than trying to play on raw emotion". Wish I could say that about our truthy opponents - but then again, if they weren't distorting the facts, they'd have to admit that MMP will work just fine for Ontario.

To paraphrase Colbert, opponents of MMP don't trust books. They're all facts, no heart.

And opponents of MMP won't let facts get in the way of defending the status quo.

Prominent PC delivers passionate case for how MMP will improve Ontario democracy

Prominent Progressive Conservative Senator Hugh Segal delivered a passionate case for voting for MMP in the upcoming referendum before a business audience today at the Economic Club of Toronto. Entitled "Repairing the Infrastructure of Democracy Before It Collapses", Segal went after the critics of MMP head on and made the case for MMP providing more stable, effective and legitimate government for Ontario.

The full text of his speech is available online at the Vote for MMP site and is reported on at the National Post site.

In the address to the business crowd, Segal make the link between good governance and accountability:

This room understands better than most the relationship between corporate profits, efficiency and proper governance. You understand that legitimacy and accountability are not trivial to success and progress in business. Annual general meetings bring shareholders, directors and management together – as they are the owners and operators of any public company – and offer them the opportunity to express their views by casting their votes, votes plural, for the auditor, the board of directors and for any special resolutions requiring their approval. The right of management to manage, to spend, to invest, to innovate and plan is based on this core process of electing directors, one by one, and choosing the framework of corporate oversight and shareholder protection.

My question to you is this - why are taxpayers and voters not accorded the same rights when choosing their government’s board of directors (our parliaments), their leaders (our governments) and their representatives in what is usually the largest corporation, effecting all aspects of our lives and livelihoods? As taxpayers, we are the majority shareholders and stakeholders of the “government” corporation and also the investors - providing the necessary dollars for operational and capital expenditures. And the notion that we are prepared to “invest” our hard-earned dollars – albeit not always voluntarily – and then be hamstrung in voicing displeasure by not having the option of meaningfully changing the board of directors goes against all good common sense. But this is what our ‘first past the post’, old and hoary electoral ‘winner take all’ system actually ensures when a majority of votes are wasted in almost every riding.

Segal added that the proposed MMP system clearly increases voter choice by using one ballot with two votes:

We are consistently asked, as voters, to cast just one ballot with which to express our preference as to who should represent our riding and as to who should form the government. Oftentimes these are not one in the same. Many voters have been faced with the dilemma of wanting to support a local candidate but not his or her party, or wanting to support a party but not its local candidate. Many a superb local candidate has been sunk because of a province-wide trend against their party or their leader.

He added that the wild policy lurch that has characterised Ontario governance over the past few decades has been anything but good for the province's productivity:

Wild swings in government and regulatory policy every four years is simply bad for everyone as individuals and businesses as a collective. Remember the aforementioned Rae majority government of 1990 (elected by a minority of voters) who altered the Labor Standards Act - at great cost to business? Remember the subsequent Harris government, also a majority elected by a minority, who changed it back? If political parties had been forced to work together because there was no artificial majority creating an undeserving "king of the road" (despite voters having voted otherwise), the swings would either not have happened, or been more moderate. Apply this to taxes, regulation, environment, business practices etc… Artificial and illegitimate majorities do not help business or political stability. Business may prefer the taxation or trade policies of one party, may even contribute financially to the party or the candidates. But on Election Day, it is the individual who marks his or her X on a single ballot. The option being presented, the ability to concretely state with both your Xs who should represent you and who should govern you provides a level of balance that is beneficial to the individual and to the collective. It would force bi-partisan cooperation; it would give voice to the campaign platforms of all parties and ensure the accountability of the representative MPP and the promises made by the separate parties.

Segal also launched a broadside against those who would demean Ontario voters by saying MMP is too complicated for them:

And to those entrenched defenders of the inequitable status quo – who argue that two ballots will be confusing to the average voters – let me say politely, how dare you attack the intelligence of Ontario’s voters – we all deserve more credit than that.

Finally, he concluded with a excellent critique of those who mislead Ontarians by charging that list candidates would be unaccountable or appointed. Right noting that MMP will encourage parties to be more democratic internally:

The new proposal for Ontario would include 39 “list members” who would be chosen to proportionally balance the final outcome of election results. The list of members would be open - made freely available by each party and could be scrutinized by the voting public. Electors would be well aware in advance of who might be taking a seat in the Legislature after all the results are tabulated. Any of the parties who do not seek out the best candidates and build their lists on balance, competence and quality, would be crushed like a bug. And I agree with the notion that if these lists are made up by the “back room gang” based on blind party loyalty, it would be a retrograde and unhelpful step. Any party that did not have an open process – transparent and even-handed – in the compilation of this list, so that the full face of Ontario, gender-balanced, rural, multi-faceted, from all walks of life and from all the rich hues and diversity of this province, would pay a serious price with electors. The proposed change and the scrutiny of the voting public would actually force political parties to be more open and accountable than they are today. And the ability to reach out to scientific, business, cultural, artistic and specialist leaders who might not win a nomination in what are often closed and manipulated Riding Associations would be broadly enhanced, as would gender balance – a vital and important concern.

Where would MMP list candidates come from?

I just wrote a long response to a friend on some questions about list candidates in MMP and I thought my readers might be interested in it.

It is tough to get good information on the referendum. You can take what I say for what it's worth, after all I do work for the pro-MMP campaign (if you support what we're doing, consider making a contribution - we could really use it). To be frank, I'm most frustrated by how those opposed to this are so willing to ignore/distort/disregard the evidence on how proportional voting systems work in the real world.

Certainly, the list members in Ontario would all have constituency offices, as they do in Germany, New Zealand, Scotland and Wales. They would function just like locally-elected MPPs in that regard. Evidence from those countries indicates that voters make no distinction between local and list members.

Because the list seat to local seat ratio is so low in the proposed Ontario MMP system, there are important incentives built into the system that encourage list MPPs to stay attuned to local concerns where they live. It is likely the first place party will win lots of local seats and therefore get less list seats. This means that a higher proportion of list seats will come from opposition parties. Obviously, all opposition parties hope to be in government someday, but if an opposition party become government, they'll no longer elect so many list candidates. This means that list MPPs can't rely on being on the list to get re-elected. Therefore, politicians being the rational, self-interested beings they are, I think MMP means more attention being paid to local concerns, not less.

There will be some ridings that will have two (possibly even more) MPPs who ran locally in that riding (I anticipate all parties will still run as many local candidates as they can). As my colleague Steve Withers, a Canadian who moved to NZ and loves MMP so much he came back for this campaign, likes to talk about, his riding in NZ (Otaki) has three members. First, the locally elected Labour MP, who won the riding by about 300 votes. Second, a National Party MP, who came second and got elected because he was near the top of the party list. Finally, one of the Green list MPs is from the area and has a office in his city.

So for voters under MMP, they have multiple elected representatives to go to for help. This system might not be to the delight of our current elected representatives, but you're going to have a hard time convincing me it isn't good for voters.

On the practical question of where exactly will list MPPs come from? I think my friends at Liberals for MMP propose a good example of how list candidates would be selected here.

If MMP passes, I think it's clear that the question of "who's on the list" will be a big focus of the media in the lead-up to an MMP election. This provides strong incentives for parties to create lists that are broadly representative of the province. In practice, I think this means that parties are likely to convene regional conventions to make regional lists of candidates which will then be folded into a provincial list - as they do in New Zealand. This will ensure good regional balance - a representative number of candidates from the North, Eastern Ontario, Southwestern Ontario, the GTA, etc. etc. Otherwise, parties risk being roasted in the regional media in areas that are under-represented on their lists.

Let's not forget that the logic of MMP is that every vote, in every part of the province counts towards electing members, so there's no incentive for parties to over-represent any part of the province. Unless they like bad press.

To go back to the example you gave of where would 10 hypothetical Liberal list MPPs come from, they would be the 10 highest ranked candidates on the list who didn't win a local seat. I think it's reasonable to assume that those 10 candidates would be broadly reflective of Ontario, with a slight bias to areas of the province where the Liberals don't do as well in local races and therefore didn't win seats there(such as rural and Eastern Ontario). So there's another wonderful aspect of MMP, it works to ensure more regionally balanced party caucuses!

By the same logic as for regional representation, I think MMP will mean a legislature with more women and visible minorities. The numbers of those groups on party lists will be publicized by the media and parties that fail to adequately represent those groups will risk the wrath of voters that care about those issues. Because if a party doesn't find good lists spots for those groups, you can bet the media will let voters who care about that know.

Cheers (and another jeer) for the Star

Just wanted to note that the Toronto Star's coverage of MMP hasn't been all bad.

The editors certainly deserve kudos for running this piece over the weekend about how MMP will improve environmental policy. Cameron Smith explains:

The first is that a premier would be more inclined to make the environment a top priority.

Secondly, proportional representation will result in more minority governments and coalitions, which means responsibility for government policies would lie with more than one party.

The current system breeds instability. It's a blood sport, where opposition parties focus more on gaining power than on good government, largely because they have little hand in creating policies and have no commitment to them.

As a result, government policies often have a short life span. In the face of global warming, short-term, ever-changing policies are a recipe for disaster.

Of course, I'd be remiss if I didn't link back to a previous post here, where I discussed the evidence that proportional systems like MMP, produce better environmental policies:

In Arend Lijphart's Patterns of Democracy, the respected political scientist and renowned expert in comparative government, looks into the question of the relationship between political systems and environmental policies.

His conclusions on environmental policies? Consensus democracies have lower carbon dioxide emissions, fertilizer consumption, deforestation and higher energy efficiency.

So if you're concerned about the environment, ask your local candidates if they support MMP. If they don't, they likely don't really support concrete action on the environment.

Finally, as my friends at Liberals for MMP note here, the Star has yet to retract their error from yesterday about MMP, but at least they ran some good letters on the topic. Maybe tomorrow?

No MMP wants Ontario voters to be uninformed about the referendum

Let's file this under ridiculous press releases.

Apparently, No MMP, the backroom political operatives for the status quo, are upset that Vote for MMP has been distributing brochures produced by the Ontario Citizens' Assembly on Electoral Reform.

I'm not going to comment at length on this because my friend Matt Guerin, the Chair of Liberals for MMP says it so well in the comments on Cherniak's blog:

The people of Ontario funded the independent and fair process of deliberative democracy with the Citizens' Assembly. The Assembly was made up of ordinary Ontarians selected at random by Elections Ontario.

Their decision has been put to a vote for all Ontarians. To deny Ontario voters access to printed material on the Citizens' Assembly's deliberations and findings is unconscionable.

Furthermore, doing so would look like the government is unethically manipulating the referendum process in favour of the status quo.

Of course this would suit status quo lovers just fine. The more ignorant the populace is about the question, the less likely they'll vote for change.

The government promised an education campaign in advance of the October 10th referendum. Ontario voters have a right to information on the Citizens' Assembly's proposal and its deliberations. Not everyone has access to the internet, so printed material widely available is essential.

However, I will note the irony of the No MMP media contact, Joseph Angolano having once expressed support for the Ontario Citizens' Assembly process, giving it as a reason, in fact, for voting for McGuinty in the last election, as reported by Dr. Dawg, in a blog that for some reason is now offline?

Seems strange to cite the Assembly process as a reason to vote Liberal one year and then try and suppress public knowledge of their work in another. But such is the logically incoherent life of an MMP opponent.

MMP and environmentalism

I came across a blog post that I just had to respond to.

Let's file it under ridiculous claims about MMP.

I'll expand my comment on his site a little bit on mine. Apparently, "both sides of the issue have legitimate points, and this blog is not the place to debate them (please)", so I wouldn't flood him with comments, but if you're as confused about his post as me, I'm sure the Ottawa regional director for the NO MMP campaign is a democrat so that he wouldn't mind a little polite discussion on the relationship between environmentalism and electoral reform. (Also, note in his post the smelly red herring of the Scottish "voter confusion" that's now become a favorite of democracy's opponents).

As I point out more succinctly on his blog, the evidence is crystal clear that MMP would be GOOD for the environment.

In Arend Lijphart's Patterns of Democracy, the respected political scientist and renowned expert in comparative government, looks into the question of the relationship between political systems and environmental policies.

The book looks at 36 democracies and compares them in multiple ways since the end of World War II. It's really an amazing book - all 310 pages of groundbreaking empirical research. He makes a convincing case that we can break parliamentary government into two broad families that share many characteristics due to the electoral system: majoritarian and consensus democracies.

I think we can all agree that by far the best way to compare outcomes of given political systems is to compare them in broad, extensive cross-national comparisons. Lijphart's book is undoubtedly one of the best and more extensive. The guy didn't get to be President of the American Political Science Association and a professor emeritus for nothing.

His conclusions on environmental policies? Consensus democracies have lower carbon dioxide emissions, fertilizer consumption, deforestation and higher energy efficiency.

Maybe on Mars our outdated voting system is good for the environment, but on Earth if looks like proportional systems like MMP are where it's at.

So if you want environmental policies that deliver results, the choice in the October 10 is clear, you need to vote for MMP.

Seems we can file this claim as another falsehood being propagated by NO MMP.

I look forward to addressing more of them as the campaign unfolds.

Source: Lijphart,Arend Lijphart's Patterns of Democracy, 1-8 and 295-7

Democracy's foes reveal themselves

Came to work at Democracy Central this afternoon to find that the group who will be campaigning against the multi-partisan, independent and representative Citizens' Assembly's recommendation for a mixed-member proportional voting system for Ontario have revealed themselves.

Not surprisingly, it was with a press release cross-posted to Jason Cherniak's blog (who I did get the pleasure to meet briefly this past weekend and seems like a nice guy).

My friend and leading pro-democracy blogger Scott Tribe responded with a blistering and accurate attack on the flimsy logic of the No MMP campaign.

The discussion in the comments on those blogs is interesting and should be reflective of how the campaign will develop should the No MMP forces continue to try and peddle misrepresentations and half-truths as their stock in trade.

I'm sure we'll be pointing out the glaring holes in the case against MMP in the weeks to come but I want to concentrate briefly on one point in the release to refute it.

No MMP warns the proposed voting system "will allow political leaders to stack their caucuses with blind loyalists who have no direct responsibility to the people." Let's consider this scenario of the 2011 election under MMP.

As proposed by the Citizens' Assembly, parties are required to publicly release their candidate lists - and how they were chosen - before the writ is dropped. Obviously, on the day list must be made public, the media will be ALL over that story. They'll talk about the list order, break down the regional and demographic representativeness of the list and let voters know how the list was chosen. Do you think a party would risk all the negative publicity that would come from having to admit that the list was selected by the leader in a smoky backroom? Not if they want to win the election. Because they know that the other parties would be criticizing them like crazy if they did that.

Also, the 3% threshold for winning seats under MMP provides a strong incentive for parties to be fair and transparent with their members when it comes to list selection. After all, if a party were to choose its candidates in an undemocratic way, it would be easy for an enterprising party activist to quickly start their own party, with fair and democratic candidate selection processes, and directly compete with their former party for votes based upon their more democratic nature. Heck, they might even be able to call it the Democratic Liberal/PC/NDP/Green party!

So as you're hopefully starting to see, all this talk about list MPPs is not based in reality but is just an attempt to scare voters away from a new and improved voting system.

And this isn't even starting to criticize the problems with undemocratic candidate selection under our current voting system, as this blogger points out.

PEI Citizens' Assembly on Electoral Reform?

Some news from back home on the Island that should be of interest to those following electoral reform in Canada.

As I've noted the new PEI Liberal government promised to "set up a Citizens' Assembly" in the "Accountability" section of their winning platform. But what's really interesting about this story is that the group promoting this event. Included in that group are both key supporters of the Yes for MMP Coalition from the November 2005 plebiscite, like Ron Kelly who's quoted in the article, and Ivan Macarthur and Gordon Cobb, the masterminds behind the No campaign.

All of the people I've met in that group are really capable leaders, so I'm excited to work with them to show the PEI government how to stage a citizens' assembly that improves upon the processes undertaken in BC and Ontario.

I'll have to prepare a paper for this upcoming conference I think. I look forward to hearing other Island leaders' thoughts on how to best design an electoral reform process that engages and educates Islanders.

Bloggers (of all stripes) 4 MMP

As readers of this blog will know, a favorite topic of mine is electoral and democratic reform, so I wanted to do up a brief post giving a shout out to some bloggers - from all sides of the political spectrum - who have come out to endorse the Ontario Citizens' Assembly on Electoral Reform's recommendation of a mixed-member proportional (MMP) voting system for Ontario.

Erroneously, opponents of fair and advanced democracy often try to pretend proportional representation is about representing smaller parties. But really, it's about fairly distributing political power and ensuring that all citizens can make effective electoral choices. Supporters of all parties are affected by our antiquated voting system, particularly voters who live in "safe seats" like mine, where the election is often over once the dominant party's candidate is nominated.

MMP will provide voters all across Ontario with more choice, fairer results and stronger representation, but we will return to that over the summer.

It's great to see lots of Liberal bloggers starting to talk about how MMP will improve our democracy. Clear Grit has a long, but very good, discussion of why MMP will work in Ontario. ProgBlog leader Scott Tribe has long been a supporter. And mad props to Queer-Liberal who has a series of really super awesome posts on the issue. In particular, I like his latest post about why Liberals in Ontario would be smart to embrace MMP. After all, it was a fulfilled promise by the McGuinty government that brought us to this historic referendum.

There's even a Liberals4MMP blog that has started. I look forward to seeing the list of pro-MMP Liberal bloggers grow over the summer and into the Fall.

On the complete other end of the spectrum, we find prominent social conservative blogger Suzanne from the Big Blue Wave, who has been following the issue religiously. She has devoted numerous posts to the issue.

Hopefully, we'll see even more right-of-centre bloggers speak out for MMP as the campaign develops. We're still waiting for the first Tory MPP or candidate to come out for MMP, but I can't imagine it'll be too long before a Toronto Tory endorses it, after all, it's clearly in their self-interest.

Finally, to illustrate the broad multi-partisan support for MMP, maybe we should start building a list of bloggers that support MMP ... anyone more tech-saavy than I want to help with that?