Vaughn Palmer column

Electoral reform may mean reform, Liberals discover

By VAUGHN PALMER

The Vancouver Sun

VICTORIA - Some B.C. Liberals complain that the Citizens' Assembly on Electoral Reform has already decided in favour of proportional representation before hearing from the public.

The assembly begins a series of public hearings next month, asking whether people want to stick with the current electoral system or adopt a new one.

Officially it is an open question. "The assembly has not come to any conclusion about whether the present system needs to be reformed," said a preliminary statement published last month.

But the statement included several other comments that left little doubt about which way the 160-member assembly is leaning.

Proportional representation was praised as a route to "a more consensual style of politics."

It was promoted as a tonic for "more genuinely representative politics at a time when voter turnout is falling and apathy is rising among young British Columbians."

It was characterized as a way to banish "the dominance of one-party majority governments" and "to move away from the highly charged adversarial politics that have characterized the province in recent decades."

And in the closing paragraph, the assembly said it wants to hear "if British Columbians agree with it that a more proportional system would better reflect the basic values of our province's population."

The Liberals seized on those comments during a recent session of the legislature committee that was established to monitor the work of the assembly.

Kevin Krueger, deputy chair of the committee and the whip for the B.C. Liberal caucus, put his reading directly to assembly chair Jack Blaney.

"I was surprised, Dr. Blaney, that the preliminary statement so clearly demonstrated that the assembly had made up its mind to lean in a particular direction -- being proportional representation," Krueger said.

"This document goes beyond saying that it wants to hear what people think," he continued. "It says it wants to hear if they -- meaning the people of B.C. -- agree with it that a more proportional system would better reflect the basic values of our province's population."

Liberal MLA Rob Nijjar shared Krueger's concern. "I came up with the same feeling," he told Blaney. "It's pretty clear what they've decided, pretty clear what they're thinking -- it is proportional representation.

"Now they are deciding what type of proportional," Nijjar said. "The nuances are being worked out and they're presenting that to the public."

Which was not the way the assembly was supposed to proceed, according to Krueger. The Liberals envisioned that the members would first listen to the people before deciding to stick with the current system or go with a new one.

"It wasn't expected that the members of the citizens assembly would steer the outcome," Krueger explained. "They were to listen to the public, then make a recommendation. ... We wanted to hear what the people of B.C. had to say."

But Blaney defended the preliminary statement. "There was no intention there to make a recommendation at all," he assured the committee. "They indeed have their minds open."

The assembly, as he noted, had also listed some advantages of the current system, such as the way it preserves local representation. The object, in both instances, was to encourage the public to a full expression of views.

Once the public hearings are completed, the assembly will take a summer break, then resume its deliberations in the fall. Only then will it decide whether B.C. needs a new electoral system.

Even at that, the public would have another say. Any recommendation from the assembly would be translated into a referendum at the next provincial election, giving voters the final verdict on any switch.

Having said that, the assembly may well, as its preliminary statement suggests, end up supporting proportional representation. The public, disenchanted with the current system, may well agree.

But it is a little late for any members of the government to be waking up to that probability. As Blaney reminded the Liberals in his opening remarks to the committee, they established the assembly to be fully independent and gave it a free hand to do what it is now doing.

"The members of the assembly know they have some power," Blaney advised the committee. "They are not just being consulted. ... They didn't quite believe it at the beginning that this was going to be totally independent; they believe it now."

Perhaps Krueger and Nijjar and their colleagues are also beginning to realize the full implications of what their government set in motion with this assembly.

vpalmer@direct.ca

© The Vancouver Sun 2004. Reproduced here by permission of The Vancouver Sun.