Addressing the electoral under-representation of British
Columbia and many of its ridings
British Columbia is chronically under-represented in the House
of Commons, where it currently has only 34 seats even though its
population entitles it to 36. British Columbia should ask the
Canadian government to address this problem, and it will be in a
stronger position to make that request if it first eliminates
under-representation in its own electoral system. It would then
have demonstrated a viable solution, shown its own commitment to
resolving the problem, and raised public awareness of the issue.
This submission proposes a solution to the problem of
under-representation that can be applied both within British
Columbia and at the federal level.
The Supreme Court has indicated that relative parity of voting
power is a prime condition of our Charter right to effective
representation. Nevertheless, under-representation persists. It
arises from three causes. First, high growth areas are
under-represented because of a delay of up to about 17 years before
growth is reflected in representation. For example, British
Columbia's 34 House of Commons seats reflect its 1991 population.
This submission proposes a method of eliminating the impact of this
delay on the voting power of British Columbia and of high growth
ridings within the province.
Second, urban ridings are often under-represented because they
have larger populations than rural and remote ridings. The Supreme
Court has endorsed some degree of inequality of riding sizes, in
spite of noting the negative impact on the Charter right to
effective representation. The Court indicated that the right to
effective representation also requires that factors other than
voter parity, such as geography and community interests be taken
into account in setting riding boundaries. Taking these other
factors into account necessarily results in somewhat unequal riding
sizes. The proposal presented in this submission would ensure
equality of voting power, without limiting the consideration of
these other factors in setting riding boundaries.
Finally, some provinces are guaranteed more seats than their
populations warrant. This results in under-representation of the
other provinces, including British Columbia. This submission does
not address this last cause of under-representation.
The proposal is that Members of the Legislative Assembly,
instead of casting a single vote in the legislature, would cast one
vote for each voter they represent. For example, one MLA might
represent a riding with 30,000 voters, and so would cast 30,000
votes in the legislature, while another MLA might cast only 28,000
votes. The number of votes for each MLA would be adjusted
frequently, based on a permanent voters list. This proposal would
ensure equal voting power in the legislature for all voters,
regardless of riding sizes and growth rates.
For recorded votes in the legislature, the results would be
accumulated by computer as the votes were cast and recorded.
Non-recorded votes would be streamlined by having MLA's cast a
single vote each, as they do now.
In practice, the results of the recorded votes could be reported
on a scaled basis, by dividing the results by the average number of
voters per riding. For example, if the average riding size were
30,000, then a result of 1,503,000 to 867,000 could be reported as
50.1 to 28.9, or rounded as 50 to 29.
Application at the federal level
The application of this proposal to the federal level would be
the same as at the provincial level, with the addition of
calculations to implement the minimum representation guarantees
enjoyed by some provinces. (As noted above, this submission does
not propose any changes to those guarantees.) The calculations
would be as follows.
The first step would be to translate the guaranteed number of
seats for each province into a guaranteed number of votes in the
House of Commons, using the formula:
Guaranteed votes = Guaranteed seats X number of Canadian voters
/ 279.
(The number 279 is the number of seats in the House of Commons,
before adding additional guaranteed seats, under the existing
formula for seat allocation.)
The second step would be to determine the number of additional
votes needed for each province to achieve the guaranteed number,
and then to allocate those additional votes proportionately to the
province's Members of Parliament.
These calculations, like the regular adjustments to the number
of votes for each MP, would be made frequently, based on a
permanent voters list.
Redrawing riding boundaries
The proposed frequent adjustments to the number of votes for
each MLA or MP would not eliminate the need to redraw the riding
boundaries from time to time. Although the proposed adjustments
would ensure equality of voting power, it would still be necessary
to prevent high-growth ridings from becoming too large, and to
ensure that riding boundaries continue to reflect factors such as
community interests.
This submission does not propose any changes to the process of
redrawing the riding boundaries. However, it would indirectly help
achieve better riding boundaries because, with equality of voting
power assured regardless of riding sizes, there would be more
flexibility to vary riding sizes to better reflect factors such as
community interests.
Conclusion
Adoption of this proposal would make British Columbia's
electoral system fairer and more compliant with the Charter right
to effective representation, by ensuring equality of voting power.
It would also strengthen British Columbia's case for similar
changes at the federal level to address its chronic
under-representation in the House of Commons.
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