Wake up and smell the kiwi

Just wanted to link to a great article, with an even greater title, on the Macleans web site today.

The author, Chris Selley gives a good background on how New Zealand came to change its voting system and the voter reaction to the change.

Selley correctly points out that MMP has made the New Zealand House of Representatives more diverse and reflective of the population, as claimed by MMP proponents in Ontario.

Also, he notes that MMP has not been unstable, as stable and working coalitions have become the norm in New Zealand.

Finally, I was most intrigued by a quote from Raymond Miller, chair of the political science department at the University of Auckland, the leading school in that country:

"I've got 300-plus students studying New Zealand politics, and I have to explain to them how the old system worked," he says. "I don't think they have any affection for it, and there's certainly no sense of nostalgia."

You heard that correctly, young Kiwis are very pleased with the decision their elders made over a decade ago. I only hope Ontario voters will be equally cognizant of how young Ontarians want a political system that makes every voices heard and better reflects our great province's diversity.

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

Fancy new Vote for MMP ads for your blog/website

Likely won't be back to blogging regularly until after Labour Day. I'm working on a series of blog pieces for the referendum campaign, so I'm planning to have some good discussion here and on the campaign site.

But in the meantime, I wanted to let people know that we've got some neat Vote for MMP banners up on the site. If you support MMP, we'd love you to put one on your blog or web site!

MPP cares more about his vote than yours

Over the weekend, I read an article that I wanted to come back and blog about from the Owen-Sound Sun Times, on the local candidates’ positions on MMP.

The three challengers all came out strongly in favor of MMP and while PC incumbent Bill Murdoch “spoke critically” (in the words of the reporter) of the Citizens’ Assembly’s recommendation, he wouldn’t come out and say he’s voting against it (hopefully a sign that he detects an undercurrent of support for change in his riding).

But there’s one thing in particular that jumped out at me. Murdoch, like some others opposing MMP, argues that electoral reform might be a good idea, but that we should instead be concentrating on parliamentary reform, specifically loosening the party whip and allowing for more free votes.

“The parties take over and tell the members what to do,” said Murdoch. “I believe if they wanted it to be more democratic in Ontario, they should have changed the system at Queen’s Park first.”

On October 10, we’re not voting on whether we want parliamentary reform. In fact, I can’t even imagine ever having a referendum on that issue. Clearly, the issue of “free votes” is one that can be decided right now within the walls of Queen’s Park. MPPs don’t have to vote any particular way. Sure, if they vote against party leadership they might lose some perks, put themselves out of favour with the leadership, but surely representing their constituents is worth that.

If MPPs from any party wanted to rise up tomorrow and cast off the shackles of the party whip, they could do it, no need for any legislation, any regulations. Are their party leaders going kick them all out of caucus? I don’t think so.

Murdoch says the current system doesn’t let you represent your constituents because of the party whip system, so how could MMP be worse?

Oh yes, the dreaded list MPPs, according to Murdoch, they are “as undemocratic as you could get. You’re supposed to be elected to represent your people, not a party. The way it’s set up right now, those 39 are going to be beholden to the party because how did they get their name on the list?”

But wait I thought MPPs were already beholden to their parties and couldn't propoerly represent "their people" under the current system?

And is Murdoch saying that John Tory would just pick and choose list candidates among his favorite backroom cronies? I think if he were so foolish, he’d surely find himself on the opposition benches.

And would MPPs under MMP be less able to vote against the party line? There’s no reason why they still couldn’t. In particular, I think MPPs elected locally under a hypothetical MMP system would be more able to buck party discipline if the issue was sufficiently important to their local area. After all, if they were to get kicked out of their caucus, they would still be able to run as an independent in their seat. Their supporters could still vote for their local MPP who represents their interest AND for a different party. And to see how independent members can have success under MMP just look at the independent Welsh Assembly Members who were just elected after leaving the Labour Party over its controversial affirmative action policies for female candidates.

Considering Murdoch’s position, it seems to me that the clear conclusion is that he cares much more about his votes than ours. Or he’s just looking for a smelly red herring to distract voters from how MMP will improve our democracy.

All of this isn’t to say that I’m not amenable to parliamentary reform – and in my experience most supporters of electoral reform are – but, in my view, Murdoch’s arguments are no reason to pass up this historic opportunity to modernize our democratic institutions.

On the other hand, if we want to change our voting system, we may very well only have one chance – voting for MMP. It’s taken centuries for Ontario’s citizens to get the chance to pass judgment on how we vote, so should MMP fail, I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for another chance to make our votes more effective in shaping our parliament.

Vote for Alex Campbell, Defeat Wacky Bennett!

I'm taking a second away from improving democracy to direct your attention to another important democratic matter - Calgary Grit's Canada's Best Premier contest.

The winner of the PEIs best premier contest that I hosted, Alex Campbell is facing off in the quarter-finals versus reactionary BC premier "Wacky Bennett".

While Campbell was a Liberal, he is undoubtedly the Garden Province's most lefty premier. He brought a traditionalist province (at times reluctantly) into the modern world. His accomplishments in changing PEI for the better are unrivalled.

If you've got 10 minutes to spare and want to know more about Campbell, check out this fascinating old CBC piece on the remarkably close election that put him in the Premier's chair.

And I'm sure there must be lots of progressive bloggers out there who don't want to see a premier who was taken to calling the NDP "socialist hordes" who "couldn't run a peanut stand" beat a progressive Premier. So vote here for Alex Campbell.

$10.10 for more democracy on 10/10

Inspired by the increasing chatter in the blogosphere about MMP, I felt I should chime in to remind people that democracy does come for free.

The Vote for MMP campaign is a grassroots, largely volunteer based campaign and is supported by small donations from supporters of democracy - like my readers.

If we are going to win the campaign for better democracy in Ontario, we're going to need the resources to counter the spin and misinformation and reach out to the 70% of Ontarians who don't know about the referendum.

That's why I'm calling on all my readers who are fed up with politics-as-usual to dig into their pockets and make a small donation to the Vote for MMP campaign. Like I just did, you can take a minute and donate online to the campaign right here.

I'd suggest $10.10 in recognition of the October 10 date where we will make history be being the first province in Canada to replace our 13th Century voting system with one that will better allow us to meet the challenges of the 21st Century.

But if you want to give more, I'm cool with that too!

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.

PEIs best Premier winner

After another low turnout, it looks like we've got a winner in the PEIs greatest premier contest.

My personal choice come through victorious - Alex Campbell - the Island's longest serving premier, who is often credited with being the strongest modernizing force in PEI history.

I'm looking forward the rest of the competition and hope the blogosphere in the rest of the country will give Campbell a fair shake.

PEIs best premier - Finals

Finally, we've arrived at the finals for PEIs best premier. It's come down to a battle between the longest serving Conservative premier in Island history versus the longest serving Liberal premier - Pat Binns vs. Alex Campbell.

You can vote to determine PEIs greatest premier by clicking on this link.

I've already cast my vote for Campbell, but I think both of these two would be worthy choices.

Since voting's been slowing to a crawl the last few rounds, I'm not going to go on about the two candidates, but look at previous posts for my take on them. I will leave you with a couple of good media links from the CBC though. First, a CBC-TV story on Binns' first victory in 1996. Second, a great longer TV piece on the oh-so-close, and fascinating, election that put Campbell in the premier's office in 1966.

PEIs best premier - Semi-finals almost finished

It's really late and I've been working all day, plus the number of votes in this is almost non-existant, so I'm not going to go into great depth. I'll just explain my votes in this round.

If you care about who's named PEIs best premier, take the time to vote. Your vote really will count!

Pat Binns (wiki/gov.pe.ca) vs. Angus MacLean (wiki/gov.pe.ca) - vote here

I've been torn on who to pick in this match-up. Binns certainly has a longer record as premier and much more electoral success. However, MacLean also had a very impressive streak of nine electoral wins after close losses in his first two federal elections in 1945 and 1949. Also, MacLean retired of his own accord, rather than going down in flames in the worst PEI election campaign I've ever observed.

Binns certainly deserves credit for growing the Island economy, despite having a federal government and 4 Liberal MPs who seemed to be determined to underfund the Island provincial goverment. However, his embrace of Stephen Harper in the 2005-6 election campaign was, in hindsight, clearly a big strategic mistake (I've got to think that Binns must have been a little disappointed that he couldn't run against Ottawa for a fourth consecutive election).

Binns deserves credit for bringing the issue of electoral reform to the table on PEI, but when the time came for him to take leadership on the issue he chickened out. Also, his overblown rhetoric and inability to control his caucus during the gerrymandering fiasco of Summer 2006 is a stain on his reputation. I was leaning towards casting my vote for Binns, but then I saw this news story today and was reminded of the Binns government's propensity to use the public purse to reward its supporters. As a result I'm going to cast my vote for the only Tory my maternal grandparents ever liked, the man who the Globe and Mail said "has the charm of a potato" - J. Angus MacLean!

Joe Ghiz (wiki/gov.pe.ca) vs. Alex Campbell (wiki/gov.pe.ca) - vote here

This battle between two legendary Liberal families was also a tough choice for me. Joe Ghiz was certainly a giant in PEI politics. He was the Premier who started the negotiations that led to the Confederation Bridge and played an important role on the national stage during the Meech Lake Accord. Renowned on PEI for his intellect and rhetorical flourish, he never was able to live up to his Opposition promises of reducing patronage once he got into government. Hopefully, his son's legacy as Premier will be to cleanse the PEI government of low politics.

But I've got to go with Alex Campbell. While he did loom as large on the national stage, he dramatically affect Island life, radically reshaping its institutions and nudging (at times dragging) a traditional society into the modern era. Thanks to a brilliant campaign by the younger Ghiz this spring, he will remain PEIs longest serving premier for at least another decade - and I would argue, PEIs best premier!

The voting will continue until Friday afternoon around 6:00 Atlantic time. Then I'll set up another poll for the finals, which will go until Sunday evening.

PEIs best premier - Semi-final matchups

I'm a little disappointed with the number of votes in the last round, but we'll plow ahead with the contest nonetheless.

The semi-finals are just what I expected with Alex Campbell and Angus MacLean moving on. That sets up another round of matchups between a pair of Liberal and a pair of Tory premiers in the semi-finals. All four legendary figures in Island politics and the latter match-up being a particularly interesting one between mentor and protege.

Pat Binns (wiki/gov.pe.ca) vs. Angus MacLean (wiki/gov.pe.ca) - vote here

Joe Ghiz (wiki/gov.pe.ca) vs. Alex Campbell (wiki/gov.pe.ca) - vote here

The voting will continue until Friday afternoon around 6:00 Atlantic time. Will be back tomorrow sometime with a break-down of these match-ups.

PEIs best premier - Quarter-finals end tomorrow

I’m disappointed with the low numbers of votes in this round so far. We had just over 40 votes in the preliminary round, but only 11 so far – between the two match-ups!

The voting in this round will close late tomorrow evening, so get your votes in!

Alex Campbell v. Walter Jones – vote here

Alex B. Campbell (wiki/gov.pe.ca)

As I’ve said, the younger Campbell would be my personal choice for the Island’s greatest premier – and not just because he’s the only remain native of my home town Summerside. Although his premiership ended before I was born, Campbell had a sterling reputation in my Liberal family. Generally acknowledged as a forward-thinking visionary, Campbell had a bigger vision for the Island than anyone who’s come before or after him. He left a permanent mark on Island politics through the establishment of restrictions of absentee ownership of land, the development of consolidated schools in rural PEI and the establishment of UPEI by combining the two denominational post-secondary institutions that were in Charlottetown.

J. Walter Jones (wiki/gov.pe.ca)

“Farmer Jones” would not be my choice for best premier, but he clearly was a passionate promoter of Island agriculture. Credited with starting the seed potato industry on PEI, he also played an important role in the silver fox farming industry. He first ran for elected office as a Farmer-Progressive candidate in the 1921 federal election, but would become a Liberal in the 1935 sweep, taking the Premier’s chair eight years later after Alex’s father Thane took a seat on the bench. While not a friend of organized labour, Jones does get some credit in my books for being the Premier to finally bring an end to prohibition in the Garden Province (which was of course the last in Canada to do so).

Angus MacLean v. James Stewart – vote here

Angus MacLean (wiki/gov.pe.ca)

MacLean had a variety of jobs in his long life – fighter pilot, MP, Minsiter of Fisheries, Postmaster General, Premier and blueberry farmer. Also, he served as a mentor to a future Premier, and one of the leaders in this contest so far, Pat Binns. A distant relative of mine (and no, not everyone on PEI is related, MacLean is fondly remembered by many Islanders for his devotion to the traditional Island way of life, despite only being Premier for just over two years. He fought suburban sprawl (something later Premiers should have emulated), even bringing in a moratorium on shopping malls.

James Stewart (wiki/gov.pe.ca)

I’m away from a library or my books on Island history, so I can’t do much further research on Stewart, so I’ll just repeat what I wrote last week. I gotta give the guy credit for being the first Island premier to serve two separate terms and having the cojones to fight the prohibitionists.

Stewart became Premier in 1923 when he defeated John Howatt Bell’s Liberals. He would lose his post in 1927 for being – god forbid! – unwilling to bring in complete prohibition. Tenaciously he stuck around for another term as Leader of the Opposition and became Premier for a second time in 1931. He would press Ottawa for a better deal to help the Island deal with the Depression, but the job took a toll on his health and he would die two years later.

PEIs best premier - Quarter-finals

It’s now Monday afternoon and I’m calling the voting for the preliminary round of PEIs best premier closed.

The Premiers moving on to the next round are:

1 (tie). Pat Binns
1 (tie). Joe Ghiz
3. Alex B. Campbell
4. Angus MacLean
5. James D. Stewart
6. J. Walter Jones

So in the quarter-final matchups, it looks like a contest between two Liberals and another between two Tory premiers.

Alex B. Campbell (wiki/gov.pe.ca) vs. J. Walter Jones (wiki/gov.pe.ca) – vote here

J. Angus MacLean (wiki/gov.pe.ca) vs. James D. Stewart (wiki/gov.pe.ca) – vote here

Voting in this round will continue until Wednesday at 6:00 p.m. Atlantic Standard Time.

I’ll be back here tomorrow with some more background on the candidates and my picks to go on to the semi-finals.

Last day to vote for PEIs best premier

After about 41 votes, the final six for the PEIs best premier contest are coming into focus. In this last post before revealing the finalists, I'll just briefly provide some background on the best Island premiers of the past generation, as it looks likely that most of them will be on to the next round. I'll also provide a brief tribute if one doesn't make it through.

J. Angus MacLean - wiki/gov.pe.ca

A distant relative of mine, MacLean was a war hero, MP, Minister of Fisheries (surprise!) and a passionate defender of the Island's rural way of life.

Joe Ghiz - wiki/gov.pe.ca

Canada's first premier of non-European extraction, Ghiz was known around the Island for his intelligence and the rest of the country for his role in the Meech Lake Accord. Arguably, the most important Island premier in national politics since Davies. With almost 25% of first preferences, Ghiz looks like he'll get a spot in the semis.

Catherine Callbeck - wiki/gov.pe.ca

Another first - the first elected female premier in Canada (in a province that has only elected 20 different women to its legislature). Her tenure was short but tumultuous. However, she stayed undefeated, letter her successor Keith Milligan take the electoral loss to Pat Binns in 1996. Now a Senator.

Pat Binns - wiki/gov.pe.ca

Binns, the affable bean farmer, MacLean protege and cabinet minister and one-term MP, would win three big election victories. He led the province through economic growth and some modernization. Binns tested the electorate one too many times and his Tories were soundly defeated on May 28 - to Ghiz's son Robert. Tied with his sucessor's father in first preference votes so far, Binns is another likely semi-finalist.

So if you've yet to vote, get your vote in - polls close tomorrow afternoon.

PEIs best premier - nominees 5 through 8

After a few days of voting for PEIs best premier, the favorites are starting to separate from the pack. Pat Binns and Joe Ghiz are clearly in the lead, both with enough first preference votes to be elected. My personal choice, Alex Campbell, is in third, while Stewart, Jones, MacLean and Callbeck appear to be the most likely candidates to move on to the final 6.

If you haven't voted yet, please take a second to cast a vote for PEIs best premier.

Thane A. Campbell - wiki/gov.pe.ca

Campbell the elder became Island Premier in 1936, after the death of Premier Walter M. Lea, who had led the Liberals to the first ever legislative sweep in the history of Westminster parliaments just the year earlier. In his seven years as Premier, this lawyer and Rhodes Scholar would pass the first law governing the civil service and establish the national park on the beautiful dunes of the north shore. His son Alex would become premier, making the Campbells the first Liberal family dynasty in the Premier’s Office.

J. Walter Jones - wiki/gov.pe.ca

After succeeding Campbell, Jones would serve for nearly a decade as Premier. An agronomist, Jones was an expert in the once important fox farming industry and credited with making the potato the staple of Island agriculture. Elected to the legislature in the sweep of 1935, he would take the Premier’s Chair in 1943 after Campbell took a seat on the provincial Supreme Court.

Jones became in/famous for his strident defence of Island agriculture. His policies are best summed up by the 1947 Canada Packers strike where he used the legislative power (which was of course overwhelming in the hands of gerrymandered rural districts) to break the strike and ban national and international unions on PEI (of course stronger in urban PEI). Jones justified it as “protecting the farm interest”. He would leave Island politics in 1953 to become a Senator.

Walter R. Shaw - wiki/gov.pe.ca

Another farmer, Shaw first became noted as a livestock breeder. He served as Deputy Minister before getting into politics and launched the PEI Federation of Agriculture. He won the Tory leadership in 1957 and would defeat the Liberal administration of Alex W. Matheson in 1959 at the ripe old age of 71. Shaw would bring some degree of centralization to secondary schools through a system of regional high schools and develop the food processing industry. He would win another election in 1962 before narrowly losing the 1966 election, by far PEIs most hard fought election.

Alex B. Campbell - wiki/gov.pe.ca

As I mentioned above, Campbell the younger is my choice for the Island's best premier. He took office after a dramatic election in 1966. During the campaign, one of the candidates in the First Kings riding on the eastern tip of the Island passed away, prompting the election administrators to postpone the vote in that riding. After the other 30 seats were split between the PCs and the Liberals, the reins of power came down to the subsequent by-election a dozen days later. In the meantime, Shaw named one of the Conservative candidates (the Island has dual-member districts until 1997) as Transportation Minister and proceeded to pave everything in the district. As this great archived piece from the CBC shows (watch it if you've got 10 minutes to kill,it well done), the voters of First Prince said thank you very much for the road work and elected two Liberal MLAs, making the 33 year-old Campbell one of the youngest premiers in Canadian history.

Campbell quickly staked out a position as a social reformer. His government has a particular focus on economic development, working with the federal government to enact the Comprehensive Development Plan, further professionalizing the Island's civil service. The Campbell government was ahead of its time, concerned with issues like renewable energy before they became fashionable, bringing the ultimately ill-fated Institute of Man and Resources to PEI. He further revamped the educational system by bringing in consolidated schools in rural PEI and established restrictions on absentee ownership of land. As Island historian Wayne MacKinnon argues in a book I really should pick up, Campbell "sought to achieve a balance between two conflicting cultures, and in the process, laid the foundations for the modernization of Prince Edward Island".

After a dozen years in office, making him the Island's longest serving first minister, Campbell left office to take a position on the province's Supreme Court.

I should be back tomorrow or early Sunday with the last four nominees for the Island's best premier. Remember, voting will close Monday afternoon, so get your votes in here.

PEIs Best Premier - the early years

The poll for PEIs best premier is now online at Demochoice.org - go here to vote. The balloting will continue until next Monday afternoon, when I get into Toronto, probably around 2:00 EST.

As CG notes, the first round will be a STV ballot to reduce the list of a dozen premiers down to six. Sounds strange for someone who's working to bring in MMP in Ontario, but I'm an electoral reform advocate above all. I'd support MMP, STV or any other crazy electoral system a representative group of average folks select. Anything other than our outdated, undemocratic first-past-the-post system.

Once the top six are selected, we'll go to a CFL style 6-premier showdown, with the top two vote getters getting byes into the semi-finals. Any ties will be broken by me, because I'm the boss here!

I’ve decided to go through the list of Premiers chronologically. I’ll break down the twelve contenders for the title in groups of four. First, the best of the Island’s premiers from the first part of its history:

James Colledge Pope - wiki/gov.pe.ca

Pope gets the nod for being Premier when PEI entered Confederation, although he had served as Premier twice while the Island was still a British colony. A Conservative, Pope gets bonus points for leading the colonial government that started the ill-fated PEI railway that forced the nearly-bankrupt colony to join Confederation.

Ironically, it was the Liberals who negotiated PEIs way into Confederation, but subsequently lost an election to Pope’s Tories just before that fateful day – July 1, 1973. Subsequently, Pope bolted for the House of Commons three months after PEI became Canada’s seventh province. He bounced back and forth between the House and Province House in Charlottetown, serving as Minister of Fisheries in the former for a period of 4 years.

Louis Henry Davies - wiki/gov.pe.ca

PEIs first post-Confederation Liberal premier, Davies defeated Pope’s successor Lemuel Cambridge Owen (best name for an Island premier by far!) in 1876. His three-year administration, a shaky coalition of with some Tories, managed to bring in a public secular school system and reform the civil service (not very successfully we’ll see) before being defeated in the legislature three years later.

Davies left for Ottawa in 1882 and served as Minister of Fisheries for Laurier (another pattern), until he left for the Supreme Court in 1901 – the first and only Islander to serve on that body. The only Rt. Hon. Among the bunch he became Chief Justice in 1916, holding the position until his death eight years later.

Aubin-Edmond Arsenault - wiki/gov.pe.ca

The only Acadian to occupy the Premier’s office and the first to lead a Cabinet in Canadian history, Arsenault succeeded John A. Mathieson as Conservative leader and Premier in 1917, after nine years in the Legislative Assembly. Defeated by the Liberals two years later, he did make on legal reform that would dramatically impact Island culture for years to come – repealing legislation that limited Islanders’ car driving to certain days and roads.

James David Stewart - wiki/gov.pe.ca

Stewart became Premier in 1923 when he defeated John Howatt Bell’s Liberals. He would lose his post in 1927 for being – god forbid! – unwilling to bring in complete prohibition. Tenaciously he stuck around for another term as Leader of the Opposition and became Premier for a second time in 1931. He would press Ottawa for a better deal to help the Island deal with the Depression, but the job took a toll on his health and he would die two years later.

So in the first group, we’ve got two historical firsts, the Island’s only Supreme Court Justice and two-term premier who was killed by the job. Don’t let anyone tell you that being Premier of the Garden in the Gulf is easy!

I think I’m leaning towards the accomplished Davies and Stewart as my favorites in this bunch. If you’ve got an idea on your preferences, go vote here.

Vote for MMP - and PEIs best premier!

First off, just wanted to plug my work's new website. I think it looks pretty sweet. I think the blog search function is pretty cool. So bookmark Vote for MMP for all your electoral reform needs! Send the link to your friends! And Ontarians, vote for more choice, fairer results and better representation on October 10.

But even more excitingly, I've decided to take part in the inimitable Calgary Grit's Search for Canada's Best Premier. I'll be hosting the "Search for PEIs greatest premier right here on this blog over the next couple of weeks.

I've decided I'll start off the competition by putting a selected group of a dozen premiers (6 Liberals and 6 Tories, for balance's sake) in an STV poll. I'll post that link tomorrow once I figure how to set that up, but without further adieu, here's my list of nominees for PEI's best premier:

James Colledge Pope - wiki/gov.pe.ca
Louis Henry Davies - wiki/gov.pe.ca
Aubin-Edmond Arsenault - wiki/gov.pe.ca
James David Stewart - wiki/gov.pe.ca
Thane A. Campbell - wiki/gov.pe.ca
J. Walter Jones - wiki/gov.pe.ca
Walter R. Shaw - wiki/gov.pe.ca
Alex B. Campbell - wiki/gov.pe.ca
J. Angus MacLean - wiki/gov.pe.ca
Joe Ghiz - wiki/gov.pe.ca
Catherine Callbeck - wiki/gov.pe.ca
Pat Binns - wiki/gov.pe.ca

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?

I'm a bad blogger

As usual, I haven't been the best blogger. But I have been a pretty busy guy the past month. I've been doing much more travelling than normal.

First, it was a trip to the Fair Vote Canada AGM at Ryerson University at the start of June. It was great to be inn a room with such a diverse group of people concerned about the health of Canadian democracy. I've been at the last four FVC AGMs and this one was by far the best. A good sign for the upcoming Ontario referendum this Fall. In particular, it was great to see a much younger crowd than normal. I think Ontario university and college students can expect to hear about MMP and how it can improve our democracy this Fall.

Then, it was back home for a quick visit to PEI to pop into Fanningbank, the lieutenant governor's beautiful old mansion in Charlottetown and see my Dad get sworn in to the new provincial government, as Minister of Education and Attorney General. Needless to say, I was very proud of my Dad that day. For my entire life, Dad has provided a positive example as someone who uses their talents to contribute to the community. He's got a bit more power and responsibility now, but I know he'll bring the same intelligence, hard work and integrity he's brought to other projects in his life to his new job.

I won't comment on PEI politics too much (being a good son) but maybe I'll find the time this week to discuss the Ghiz government's first smart strategic move.

Then I spent about a week in the greatest city in the world (well at least of the few I've been to before). Well technically, we never left Manhattan, but did get to see the sights, some wicked art and a hilarious Broadway show.

I wish I could have been back for the recent legislature opening in PEI, but have been commuting to Toronto the last couple of weeks for my job. But I'll be back with much more about that over the next three months.