Monday, 12 October 2015

Canadian Federal Election 42: Misconceptions and Truths about Canada's system of government and how elections work

Hello voters and soon to be voters! It's one week until election day, and to help everyone make an informed decision I will be writing a series of blog posts about the candidates and parties and other things related to Election 42! To start off, here are some common (and just invented) misconceptions about how our system of government works. A lot of people seem to be in the dark when it comes to how we govern ourselves in Canada. I think the reason for this is not enough focus on civic education in school and our bombardment by American media. It's possible that many Canadians know more about how the American government works than they do our own!

Misconception #1: We vote for the Prime Minister of Canada in this election.

I think this misconception has roots in two places: The first is the importance political parties place on who their leaders are and what their leaders are doing. The party leaders say they are running to be the Prime Minister of Canada, and while they are technically correct, they don't get to be Prime Minister based purely on the results of the election. Secondly, I think a lot of people confuse American presidential campaigns with our elections. In the United States, they elect their political executive/head-of-state, while in Canada, we do not.

The Truth: You are actually voting for a local candidate, and the person who gets the most votes will be sent to Ottawa to sit in the House of Commons of Canada as a Member of Parliament (MP). As an example of this Purple Party, led by Ms. Grape, has chosen a candidate to run in your riding. You can vote for Mr. Jelly of the Purple Party in the hopes they will become your Member of Parliament, but you cannot vote for Ms. Grape. The exception to this rule is if you live in Ms. Grape's riding. Party leaders are also seeking a seat in the House of Commons, just like every other candidate for their party.

Then how is the Prime Minister of Canada chosen? Generally, the political party that manages to get the most Members of Parliament elected to the House of Commons gets to form government, but not always. More on that later. That means the party leader gets to become the Prime Minister and gets to choose more MPs to become cabinet ministers. The Prime Minister of Canada and their chosen cabinet ministers then run the country and they make up the government.

Misconception #2: Coalitions are a coup d'état. They are wrong and represent the losers overthrowing the rightful winner of an election.

This misconception can be traced to 2008 when the Liberals and NDP tried to form a coalition government with the support of the Bloc Québécois that would have unseated the Conservative minority government that was in power at the time. The Conservative Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, and the Conservative cabinet ministers, said that such a move was illegitimate, wrong, a coup d'état, and a "coalition of losers." Many people believed them and continue to believe that coalitions are not right in our system of government.

The Truth: Remember how I said that the political party that gets the most seats in the House of Commons gets to form government? This is actually a simplistic way of breaking things down. In reality, because we have something called "Responsible Government," the party leader who can maintain what we call the "confidence of the House," is the person who gets to be the Prime Minister. When we have a "majority government," or a political party getting more then 50% of the seats in the House of Commons, this is pretty straightforward. When we have a "minority government," or no political party getting over 50% of the seats in the House of Commons, but one party getting more seats than the rest of the parties, then things get a little more up in the air. A minority government must rely on another political party to help them stay in power. This can be either through getting the other party to vote for bills they try to pass, forming a formal coalition where both parties share the duties of government, or getting another party to agree to vote for their bills.

Stephen Harper and the Conservative Party wanted people to believe that because they had the most seats out of any party, they had the right to be the government and no other party had that right at all. But this was wrong. As long as a party leader can be sure that more than 50% of the Members of Parliament in the House of Commons will vote to pass his government's bills, then he gets to be the Prime Minister.

For example, if Mr. Mustard of the Yellow Party has 135 MPs in the House of Commons, Ms. Grape of the Purple Party has 115 MPs, and Mr. Hummus of the Brown Party has 88 MPs, any of these party leaders can form the government and become Prime Minister if they can convince another party to support them. Mr. Mustard insists he gets to be the Prime Minister because he has the most seats out of any other party at 135. But, if the Purple Party and the Brown Party won't vote for his bills, he cannot keep the "confidence" of the House of Commons and he must either resign as Prime Minister or a new election must be held. Because the last election was only one month ago and nobody wants another election right away, Ms. Grape convinces Mr. Hummus and the Brown Party to vote for her bills, and she gets to be the Prime Minister. The combined Purple Party and Brown Party MPs in the House of Commons is 203 MPs. Since only 170 MPs are needed to have over 50% of the seats in the House of Commons, they get to pass all the bills they want. Mr. Mustard could try to claim that the Purple/Brown coalition is invalid, or that it is a coup d'état, but our system of government wants to be as stable as possible, and a Purple/Brown coalition is far more stable than the Yellow Party trying to rule the country with the support of less than 50% of the MPs in the House of Commons.

Misconception #3: My party only needs 35 more seats to beat that other party and win the election!

This is a misconception being floated by the NDP late in the campaign as an attempt to convince people to vote for them to defeat the Conservatives instead of voting for the Liberals. It's based on outright lies as to how our system of government works plus a misunderstanding of how some aspects of polling work.

The Truth: To start off, the New Democratic Party can't win the election by getting only 35 more seats. If the NDP did that, they'd have only 35 seats total! Why? Because when the election was first called, it is preceded by an event known as the "dissolution of Parliament." This means that there currently is no Parliament in Canada, each party has exactly zero (0) seats in the House of Commons, which is why if the NDP got 35 more seats added to their current seat amount (0) they would have exactly 35 seats. I'm pretty sure nobody in the NDP wants that to happen.

There are a few explanations as to why the NDP strategists think this will work. They may be counting on the dismal civics education in this country and are pinning their hopes on the fact that people don't realize that this is not how Parliament works. They may be trying to take advantage of a misunderstanding of the "incumbency effect," which is a thing pollsters and statistics nerds take into account when figuring out whether a long-serving MP will win an election against a complete newbie (indeed, the CBC Poll Tracker seat count takes incumbency effect into account when figuring out which party is likely to win the most seats in the House of Commons). The third possibility, which I don't believe personally, is that this is how the NDP actually thinks Canada's system of government works, they honestly believe they need only 35 more seats to beat the Conservatives. In the extremely unlikely event the third possibility is true, I wouldn't trust the NDP to run a hot dog cart, let alone the Government of Canada.

However, it would be foolish for the NDP to assume that they'll automatically get to keep all 103 seats they won in the 2011 election, especially since they're currently polling in the low to mid 20% range while the Liberals and Conservatives are polling in the low to mid 30% range. This means that the current poll numbers show they are far more likely to lose 35 seats when compared to their 2011 popular vote share (30.63%) rather than pick up 35 more seats from what they got in 2011.


Misconception #4: When I elect an MP, they have the duty to listen to my wishes and do whatever I say!

This misconception probably comes from how the USA's government works (funny how that seems to happen a lot) as well as changing attitudes towards people we as Canadians consider higher on the social ladder.

The Truth: In Canada we have a system of democratic representation called the "Trustee Model." This means that when we elect an MP, we send them off to Ottawa and trust that they'll make good decisions on our behalves. This is why political parties, party platforms, and party leaders are so important to us. Through those instruments, we know how the MP we trust to make decisions for us will make their decisions, and roughly what decisions they will make. This is also why party discipline is so important in our system of representation. It doesn't matter what the constituents want, you can't ever defy the party leadership. This may seem unrepresentative, but this is actually what the electorate seems to want in Canada. If you voted for Mr. Pear of the Yellow Party, you would be pretty upset if Mr Pear voted against a measure in the Yellow Party platform that you really wanted to see the Yellow Party implement after they got elected. You would probably also be pretty upset if Mr. Pear "crossed the floor" (joined another political party after getting elected) to the Purple Party after you voted for him because you liked the Yellow Party and Mr. Mustard, the Yellow Party leader.

On the other hand, the American system of democratic representation is called the "Delegate Model." When American voters elect a representative and send her to Washington, they expect her to act as a delegate representing their wishes. The party, the party platform and other considerations are still there, but they aren't as strong of a driving force for American voters as they are for Canadian voters. This is why a congressman or congresswoman will vote against their own party if they know their constituents are dead set against what the party wants. They probably won't be punished by the party leadership, or they won't be punished in a way that matters anyway, and they will still be welcomed as a member of their party.  This is why you get a Democratic congresswoman who lives in a state where the citizens don't believe in gun control voting against a Democratic gun control bill even though the entire Democratic Party and the entire Democratic establishment supports the bill and wants it to pass. The congresswoman knows that if she votes for the bill, she'll face the wrath of her electorate in the next election, and she's likely to be voted out of office. While the Democratic congresswoman's electorate agrees with 98% of the things the Democratic Party stands for, gun control is the one issue that is important to the Democrats that they can't abide. The rest of the Democrats in Congress know this too, so they'll give her a pass for voting against this one important Democratic issue knowing she'll support them on most other issues.

In the United States, elected representatives are afraid of the people who voted for them. In Canada, our elected representatives are afraid of the leaders of their political party. I think this attitude is starting to change somewhat as I see more and more people complaining of their MP toeing the party line and voting for what the MP's party leadership wants rather than what the MP's constituents want. There is also something happening in Canadian society called "the decline of deference," named after a book of the same name. In a nutshell, Canadians used to be more deferential toward elites and authorities, like the leadership of a political party, for example. However, there is a shift in Canadian culture where we are no longer as deferential toward authority the way we once were. I think this can lead to people questioning why their MP must always toe the line rather than bowing to the wishes of their constituents. At the same time, remember the scenarios above where Mr. Pear votes against his party's platform or crosses the floor to join another party? While people may be less deferential toward authority, they definitely seem to mostly vote based on party, party leader, and party platform before they vote for a local representative.

I hope this post cleared up any misconceptions you may have had. If there are any more, just post them in the comments below and I'll tackle them when I can. Remember, only 7 days until the election on October 19th! Get ready to vote, or go to the last day of advanced polling today and make your voice heard!

Wendel Schwab

Follow me on Twitter: @WendelSchwab

Saturday, 10 October 2015

Prince George ridings hold debates at UNBC

Yesterday both Prince George ridings held debates at the University of Northern British Columbia. Moderated by Tracy Summerville, a political science professor at UNBC (full disclosure, I have taken classes taught by Dr. Summerville), the debates were a good, in-depth discussion with all candidates jumping into the issues of the day and a very involved and vocal crowd. Some of the issues discussed included resource development and sustainability in Northern British Columbia, missing and murdered aboriginal women, Senate reform, electoral reform, and the Trans-Pacific Partnership. I recorded both debates (apologies for the poor quality of the recordings), and they are available below.

General debate observations


First up, some general observations: The historic Canfor Theatre at UNBC was at full capacity with Prince George residents, the media, and students from the university. The crowd was very involved with the debates, and even though no questions from the audience were permitted, they made their displeasure or approval of what the candidates were saying known. The vast majority of people to attend this debate were NDP supporters, which makes sense given that historically the central areas of Prince George tend to vote NDP. There was little love lost for the Conservatives in the crowd. The majority of the crowd was hostile toward Bob Zimmer during the debate, and it seemed that his four years in office as Member of Parliament for Prince George-Peace River-Northern Rockies was a liability. Pollsters talk about the "incumbent effect" - incumbents to an office have a better chance of winning than a brand new candidate - but this seemed to do more harm than good with this audience. It is also possible that the audience was very well aware of Zimmer's past remarks at a previous debate. Conversely, because Todd Doherty was a first time candidate and didn't have the albatross of the past four years of Conservative rule around his neck, the audience seemed much more receptive and good natured toward him. With both Conservative candidates, the incumbency effect seemed to be working the opposite way it is normally supposed to work during this debate.

The moderator of the debate, Tracy Summerville, professor of political science at UNBC, did an excellent job of reigning the candidates in and not letting them go over their allotted time. It was amusing to see a rambling candidate cut off in the middle of a sentence after she had warned them they would be on a strict time limit. The questions for the debate were chosen before hand by the organizers of the debate (UNBC, the Prince George Citizen, CKPG, and the Prince George Chamber of Commerce). The candidates who would answer questions were chosen randomly as the moderator pulled names out of an envelope. Dr. Summerville mentioned/joked that during the break between the two debates that she had people of all partisan stripes complaining that the questions were biased, which means they were probably just right.

Prince George-Peace River-Northern Rockies debate


The first group of candidates to take the field was those running to be the Member of Parliament for Prince George-Peace River-Northern Rockies. The candidates in attendance were Elizabeth Biggar of the Green Party of Canada, Barry Blackman of the Progressive Canadian Party, Kathi Dickie of the New Democratic Party of Canada, Matt Shaw of the Liberal Party of Canada, and Bob Zimmer, current MP for Prince George-Peace River-Northern Rockies, and candidate for the Conservative Party of Canada.

Audio of the full debate (I started recording a little late, unfortunately) is below:



The part that I forgot to record was the moderator asking the candidates to create a "rubric" for what makes a good MP. As you can hear within the first minute and a half, the moderator was careful to ensure nobody went over their allotted time (to laughs from the audience).

Starting at 25:54 minutes in, the moderator gives Bob Zimmer a chance to clarify his previous comments on murdered and missing aboriginal women, and he didn't do a very good job in my opinion.
Moderator: Over the last few days there has certainly been significant conversation about comments that were made about the tragedy of missing and murdered Aboriginal women. I want to take this opportunity tonight to ask, can you please clarify or tell us your views about whether or not there should be a formal inquiry.

Zimmer: Yeah, my point was, I was making a statement based on a RCMP study that had already been done on missing and murdered Aboriginal women. And one of the risk factors listed there is what I spoke about. Just to be completely clear, I believe everybody is created equal, I honestly do. And I have a daughter, I have a mother, I have a wife, and I look at them all the same. And I can't imagine anything worse than losing a child, and a daughter. So, I say this with all my heart, is that we need to fix this, and that's where I'm at, we need to make sure there's action on the ground that deals with the issue of missing and murdered aboriginal women, straight up.

Moderator: Is that a "yes" or "no" to the inquiry?

Zimmer: With forty-two studies already, I think it's time for action.

Moderator: OK.

Audience applauds.
The question then becomes: If the Conservative government of the past four years knows what's going on, if forty-two studies have been done, then why hasn't any straight up action been taken? Is Zimmer admitting that the Conservative government been lax in dealing with this problem, and he will be urging them to take action? He is silent on this aspect of the issue, saying that action must be taken, but not promising to champion any action with the Conservative caucus and not telling us what that action might be.

Kathi Dickie, the NDP candidate and Aboriginal woman herself (she was sitting next to Zimmer), asked "Why am I seen as an inferior, disposable object? And have been for years!" Zimmer replied:
Zimmer: I can speak for myself, that's not the way I see it. I see, again, everybody is created equal and I deeply care about all women and all people in society, and concerned about all their safety. I have a list of things we have done and what we are doing to make sure that this doesn't keep occurring and anyway I just want to say again from the bottom of my heart that's where we're at and that's where I'm at and we need to get this thing done and fixed.
There we have it: Bob Zimmer, lover of all.

Barry Blackman, the Progressive Canadian candidate, then suggests we hire an army of private investigators to solve the MMIW problem, to which Zimmer replies: "That, in one answer, is the RCMP study."

It was then Matt Shaw, the Liberal candidate's turn to speak:
Shaw: Demonstrating intent and symbolism in leadership is very important, and the fact is, this is a national emergency. And the perception out there is that if it were any other demographic, if this would have been white women around the Greater Toronto Area, it would have been on people's radar, let me tell you.
Elizabeth Biggar then began talking about how "white man's apartheid was based on Canada's Aboriginal policies, like just think about that." A search of Google revealed that this was a little used phrase for apartheid in South Africa, and it seems to come mainly from the book It Happened to Me . . . In Apartheid Times by Myrna Gordon nee' Roach. In response to this factoid, the audience seemed to chuckle a little. I don't think anyone knew what to make of Biggar.

In response to Biggar, Zimmer gets defensive and feels that he needs to clarify that he is indeed not racist:
Zimmer: I'll just say for myself, I've grown up with Aboriginals beside me, I've never even thought of them as Aboriginals, they were just my friends growing up in school. I think most of us in this room have been brought up the same way. I don't see it that way with my own eyes. That's why I see the equality there, and I see the need to help them, and I see the need, and I see the need, and I see the need...

Biggar: Many in Canada don't have clean water. What are we doing?

Audience applauds, Biggar and Zimmer say things I can't make out.
Dickie: Bob, I grew up in Canada, I was subject to societal racism from the time I was born all the way through. I've lived through that, I've been, I've been - the education system has taught me that I'm inferior, I'm a second rate citizen and I'm not as good as... This is Canada I grew up in.
Dickie then mentions the 1,200 murdered and that her community worked with the RCMP on a recent murder and that the RCMP "doesn't have the resources to deal with the job." This got a round of applause from the audience.

Another interesting part of this debate was when every single candidate, except Conservative candidate Bob Zimmer spoke out in favour of electoral reform. Every candidate agreed we need to adopt some sort of Proportional Representation, with Zimmer stating the reason he is not in favour of Proportional Representation is because there would no longer be a local candidate to address local concerns. I find this reasoning a bit rich coming from the MP who moved his family to Ottawa as soon as he got elected in 2011. Zimmer no longer lives in the riding he is supposed to represent, so how can he be an effective local candidate?

I also have to wonder if anyone has ever informed Zimmer of Mixed-Member Proportional Representation. In such a system, you have local candidates that represent a riding as well as proportional seats based on the vote share the parties got in the last election. Below is a video on how New Zealand runs their Mixed-Member Proportional Representation:
 

Personally, I am absolutely in favour of electoral reform. I wrote about this in my previous blog post: As someone who lives in a "safe" riding that is always won by a single party, I feel like my vote does not count for anything. If we had a Mixed-Member Proportional Representation system I could vote for whoever I felt was the best party/candidate, and I would know my vote helped someone get elected. The type of Mixed-Member system that I really like is called "Best Near-Winner" and it's used in the German state of Baden-Württemberg. In this system, the candidates who most narrowly lost the election in their riding go on to fill the proportional seats. This means that every MP represents and was elected by a riding, there are no party lists, and there are proportional seats as well as seats assigned by riding.

After the discussion on electoral reform, the Prince George-Peace River-Northern Rockies debate ended, there was a break and the Cariboo-Prince George debate began.

Cariboo-Prince George Debate


The second group of candidates to square off was  those running for Member of Parliament for Cariboo-Prince George. These candidates included Tracy Calogheros for the Liberal Party, Sheldon Clare, an independent candidate, Trent Derrick for the New Democratic Party, Todd Doherty for the Conservative Party, Richard Jaques for the Green Party, Adam de Kroon for the Christian Heritage Party of Canada,

Audio of the full debate is below:



As I already wrote in my general observations section, Todd Doherty had a much easier time at this debate than his counterpart Rob Zimmer did during the last debate. The discussion also seemed more robust and the candidates seemed to be a higher calibre than from the more Northern riding. For example, while the Green Party's Elizabeth Biggar came across as a hippy who lost her way from Southern California, the Green Party's Richard Jaques came across as much more credible and he was eager to burnish his "Northern-man" cred.

One of the most interesting exchanges of this debate had to do with the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which led to the strangest exchange of the night: When Doherty claimed that he had read the text of the TPP:
Derrick: Have you read the TPP, all the fine details?

Doherty: Yes I have.

Derrick: Have you gone through...

Audience reacts

Derrick: You got a copy?

Doherty: We've got copies of it.

Audience and candidates react

Moderator: Everybody wants to hear the answer to this, right?

Doherty: We have a summary of the document.

Audience and candidates react

Clare: You were asked a specific question and you didn't give the right answer.
I'm not sure why Doherty would claim to have seen the details of the TPP yet, when by all accounts the deal is still highly secret with only a summary of selected information released to the public. In the end, Dohertyy had to walk back his claim and admit he saw the same summary as everyone else.

Doherty's claim opened up an opportunity for Calogheros to call him out on his misleading statement:
Calogheros: My problem is with what you just did, Todd. You were asked a direct question about whether or not you read that document, you said that you had read it in detail. No one has seen that document in detail. You've come back and said you've read a summary, you answered a question falsely and then tried to pivot.

Audience applauds

Calogheros: You sat here beside me and told this room you read a document that has never crossed your desk. You've read a summary, that I'll give you, but you didn't read that document in detail and yet you led this room to believe, and would have happily allowed them to leave this room believing, that you had read it in detail if you hadn't been called on it.
During this speech, Doherty physically turned his back on Calogheros after that exchange, so he must have felt appropriately chastised by the Liberal candidate. Doherty also sounded a little rattled when he responded in defence of the TPP. The TPP debate also allowed Adam de Kroon to get in one of the most clever lines of the night when he remarked: "Like everyone else here, I have not read the TPP."

All in all, two good debates, and lots for the Northern British Columbian voter to think about. Hopefully I'll have another update out soon. As for now, I have many papers to write!

As always, follow me on Twitter: @WendelSchwab

Thursday, 8 October 2015

MP Bob Zimmer: One of the major drivers of missing and murdered Aboriginal women is lack of a job

Hello politics watchers! I live in Prince George, British Columbia, which is a pretty awesome city that I love living in, but has one major drawback: Every election the two Prince George ridings, Cariboo-Prince George and Prince George-Peace River-Northern Rockies, elect Conservative Party of Canada candidates, or past candidates from their predecessor conservative parties (Reform Party, Canadian Alliance, Progressive Conservative). Prince George-Peace River once elected a Liberal Party of Canada candidate in 1968 and Prince George-Bulkley Valley once elected an New Democratic Party candidate in 1988, but other than that, these ridings have gone straight blue since forever.

For a politics nerd like me, this is pretty frustrating. I feel like it doesn't matter who I vote for, my vote simply doesn't count. Come hell or high water my riding will vote Conservative anyway. However, there are other ways I can get involved in the democratic process: Writing this blog is one thing I can do, and holding my local MPs accountable is another thing I can do.

Why not kill two birds with one stone? Let's get started, shall we?

Recently during a debate, one of the local candidates, Bob Zimmer, who has served as MP for Prince George-Peace River-Northern Rockies since 2011, in response to a question on an inquiry for missing and murdered Aboriginal women, was alleged to have said:
One of the major drivers of missing and murdered Aboriginal women is lack of economic activity or simply put lack of a job.
Our perspective, and we have tried to do things where we bring economic activity or jobs to reserve and different other legislation to see that through. Ultimately, when people have a job they’re not in despair and they can stay on reserve and that’s where we want them to be.
I know a lot of them don’t want to move off reserve, they want to stay there and I support them there, we just want them to be able to live there happily and healthily.
Mr. Zimmer paused and people began to boo after Mr. Zimmer said "that's where we want them to be." Mr. Zimmer almost seemed to be implying that the Conservatives want Aboriginal women to stay on reserves.

A more complete transcript is available in the tweet below:
There are two possibilities with Mr. Zimmer's statements: The first is that he perhaps does not seem to be very sensitive First Nations issues. Had Mr. Zimmer shown more awareness he would have pointed at things like the cultural genocide from the Indian Residential School System, systemic poverty in First Nations communities, a legacy of racist government policies and attempts at forced assimilation of Canada's Aboriginal peoples, the forced relocation of Aboriginal people such as the Lheidli'Tenneh from prime land to remote reserves, the third world conditions of many Aboriginal reserves in Canada, or the chronic underfunding of Aboriginal services relative to the rest of the population of Canada all as the causes of the violence Aboriginal communities, and Aboriginal women, are exposed to and live with. I think if Mr. Zimmer had been more aware of Aboriginal issues in his riding, he would have suggested removing the 2% per year cap on increasing Aboriginal funding that has been in place since the 90s, implementing some of the recommendations from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission report, and yes, even conducting an inquiry into missing and murdered aboriginal women in Canada.

The second possibility is that Mr. Zimmer is well aware of the issues I outlined above, perhaps he himself is taking issue with the lack of funding for Aboriginal communities and the Conservative government's lack of movement in the areas of addressing Aboriginal issues. I would like this second possibility because it assumes good faith in our MP, that he will do something about missing and murdered Aboriginal women when he goes back to Ottawa, and that he is pushing back at the political inaction within the Conservative Party in regards to Aboriginal issues.

From the standpoint of political calculation, it would seem to be a huge mistake for Mr. Zimmer to be entirely unaware of the issues facing First Nations people in his riding. Prince George-Peace River-Northern Rockies has a Aboriginal population of around 13%, which is a substantive demographic. The First Nations vote is also more mobilized and ready to go than any other federal election in perhaps ever. As the Member of Parliament for Prince George-Peace River-Northern Rockies, Bob Zimmer is supposed to represent 100% of his riding, not just 87%. I definitely expect that the MP for any riding would be far more aware and knowledgeable about the issues of the people in his riding than I would expect of the average person.

I made attempts to contact Mr. Zimmer to get his take on this story while writing this blog post, but he did not respond to my inquiries. If I hear from Mr. Zimmer, I will update this blog post accordingly as I feel he deserves the chance to explain, repudiate or clarify his comments.