MIXED MEMBER PROPORTIONAL ELECTORAL SYSTEM FOR BRITISH COLUMBIA
VIA THREE COMPENSATION SEATS IN EACH OF FIVE MAJOR REGIONS WITH NO
PARTY LIST
Harold Daykin
(Special features are in bold)
A GOALS
(1) To help bring about greater fairness in the
translation of votes into seats;
(2) While so doing, not to encourage a large number
of parties with seats in the House;
(3) To reduce the chances of One Person Rule;
(4) To increase the chances of having voices
in caucus — both of major Government Parties
and of Opposition Parties — from each major region of
the province;
(5) To reduce our current tendency towards political
and class polarization.
B REQUIRED
FRAMEWORK
This paper recognizes the requirement that any proposal not push
our total number of seats in the House any higher than
the normal Census-determined decade-by-decade
increase.
C PROPOSALS
(1) That we move, at least for the most
populous regions of the province, to a Mixed Member
Proportional System;
(2) That about one fifth of our MLAs be elected by
proportional representation; for l996, about fifteen
members;
(3) That (2) be accomplished via the creation of
Regional Compensation Seats;
(4) That such Regions comprise the 1996 equivalent
of a little over 400,000 registered voters
(in that year, the whole of Vancouver Island wou1d
have comprised one Region); for all BC, five Regions,
with 3 PR members each.
(5) There be two ballots, the second one being a
Party Ballot;
(6) The method of determining which party
has won a Regional Compensation Seat be via use of
Modified Sainte-Laguë Divisors (votes divided by 1.4, 3,
5, 7, etc.)
(7) That the awarded party’s
candidate for a PR seat be in declining order of his/her
percentage of the vote in the riding where her or she ran, but lost
(Kent Weaver’s alternative suggestion from the federal
scene); for simplicity, that party’s Top
Loser in the Region’s constituency races (no
party list).
D RATIONALE
The combination of five large Regions, with three PR members
from each,together with use of Sainte-Laguë Divisors
seems apt for producing, within limits:
• Much greater fairness for a major party
seats-deprived in the riding contests (see an analysis of the 1996
election, to be presented at hearings)
• Substantial improvement in the matter
of voices in caucus within each region
• Modest improvement of
small—party representation (see choice of
Sainte— Laguë)
• From the Top-Loser proposal (No. 7
above), avoidance of the party list (a list would seem to raise
rather than lower chances of a One-Person Rule.
[Entered online from a scanned document]
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