BC referendum on changing electoral system

[Hatman 🍁]

It should pass, as it will be a standalone mail-in ballot, so only people who care will vote, and most people who care support reform. Look at PEI.

The BC government was very smart to not attach this to the municipal elections, when only old fuddy duddies vote (and they would vote status quo), thus killing the chances of reform.

[Hatman 🍁]

The 2005 referendum was done after a lengthy citizen's assembly delegated on the matter, plus it followed two provincial elections which resulted in results being wildly off of the popular vote.

In 1996, the NDP won a majority with fewer votes than the Liberals and in 2001 the Liberals won 97% of the seats with 58% of the vote.

I suspect the odd result of last year's election will also help reform win.

[Hatman 🍁]

While I like the idea of provincial Senates, I am probably the only one, and it ain't happening.

But, since you brought it up, my plan would be to have a PR elected Senate and a IRV/ATV elected lower house federally and provincially.

[Hatman 🍁]

If you have a MMP system, with enough proportional seats to ensure that the overall result is proportional to the provincial list votes, it would be unnecessary to worry about using ranked choice voting in the single member ridings or to be concerned about the exact riding boundaries. Even if the single member seats produce a grossly disproportional result, this would be corrected by the list seats.

This is a good point. Maybe under MMP they would bring back the Atlin riding?

[Hatman 🍁]

"Weighted votes" is probably unconstitutional in a Westminster system.