STV and Proportional Plus are systems that will never be
accepted by British Columbians.
STV and Proportional Plus proponents say understanding the method
of counting ballots does not matter. They say that people do not
care how votes are counted. They say that computers can do this
work, that computers do it now, so why be concerned. Proponents say
that we must simply trust the system and trust those that govern us
to administer our electoral process. One STV proponent even
compares such trust to the trust we must have when we buy butter in
the supermarket. Indeed! Such a statement can only stem from truly
misunderstanding the public will.
This admission of the fact that STV vote counting cannot be
understood by the common person should be its Waterloo. This
admission that STV vote counting involves people in back rooms with
calculators and formulas should be an iron curtain that stops this
system from spreading. And it has been and will be and you can
never sell such a system no matter how many times you say made in
BC.
Counting votes must be simple and transparent, no more no less.
Implying that computers can handle STV computations is little
comfort to those who have seen elections stolen by fraud and
manipulation in as solid a democracy as the United States in it's
presidential election of 2000. Tell the citizens of Florida to
trust such a system of vote counting as that which STV and
Preferential Plus offer. Tell your collegues on the Citizens
Assembly who don't even use computers to put their faith in this
system where winners are calculated by formulas however simple. You
cannot sell this system to an informed and intelligent electorate
that already has a well deserved distrust of government. This is a
fatal flaw of STV and Preferential Plus and no amount of lofty
prose will change this fact.
Please do not be seduced by STV and Preferential Plus. They are
systems that are doomed to failure.
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