Petition e-616 can be found at https://petitions.parl.gc.ca/en/Petition/Details?Petition=e-616 This petition to the Canadian Government website has broken all records and continues to grow. As of writing it is up to: 119,510 signatures You can help make every vote count by signing the petition. And after you’ve signed it (and sent the email confirmation) you can help even more by encouraging…
Petition e-616 can be found at
https://petitions.parl.gc.ca/en/Petition/Details?Petition=e-616
This petition to the Canadian Government website has broken all records and continues to grow. As of writing it is up to:
You can help make every vote count by signing the petition.
And after you’ve signed it (and sent the email confirmation) you can help even more by encouraging your friends and family and co-workers and your kid’s teachers and your dentist and doctor and letter carrier and fellow religionists (including your minister, rabbi, imam or priest) … because *any* Canadian can and should sign this petition too.
If enough Canadians sign e-616, our Government might yet deliver on this oh so important promise.
Because when all Canadians are represented in Parliament, it will make our government much more accountable than it is today because no single party — no single party leader will have the power to impose an agenda against the public good. We know Proportional Representation most often produces stable government capable of long term planning. We also know Proportional Representation leads to co-operation between parties, not polarization like we have now. First Past The Post elected Donald Trump in the USA, and FPTP could just as easily give us a Canadian version too.
Right now the Liberal Government is rallying around Private Member’s Motion 103 because they hope it will makes them look like progressive multicultural heroes. If the Conservative Party chooses an O’Leary or a Leitch as its leader, the Liberal Party hopes to ride a wave of lesser-evilism into a second majority term. (Clever Canadians should recall how well such a plan worked out for Hillary Clinton. Clever Conservatives won’t choose a leader the Liberals can use as a boogeyman.)
But here’s the thing: M-103 wouldn’t even be an issue if every vote counted. If the Liberal Government is truly committed to a healthy multicultural democracy it would be writing the promised electoral reform legislation as we speak. If they are truly worried a referendum would prove too divisive or open to manipulation, the ERRE Committee’s referendum might be deferred to after 3 elections… by which time Canadians will understand Proportional Representation well enough to make an informed choice.
But when a majority of Canadians aren’t represented in Parliament, it isn’t, really.
Canadians need to be able to elect the government we want by electing MPs that can actually represent us. When the Liberal Government was elected with a majority, I hoped the fact the party was divided between Alternative Vote and Proportional Representation we would get a fair process. Even knowing Justin Trudeau was an Alternative Vote supporter as far back as the Liberal Leadership race. And for a while it really looked like we were. Mr. Trudeau and senior Liberals assured us he would let the process go through. My Liberal friends were positive that Proportional Representation couldn’t possibly fail with a fair process, because the evidence of over a century clearly supports Proportional Representation as the fairest way to achieve representative democracy. And 14 Canadian Commissions, Assemblies & Reports recommended PR (with 0 recommending keeping First Past the post or adopting Mr. Trudeau’s favourite Alternative Vote (alias Preferential/Instant Runoff).
But so many people kept asking Prime Minister Justin Trudeau about Proportional Representation he decided to pull the plug on it. So much for a fair process. So much for real change. And nobody is angrier about this unfair outcome than my Liberal friends.
The easiest way to encourage your friends and family is to share on social media.
Note: #CDNpoli is possibly the most important hashtag because it reaches people interested in Canadian Politics whether or not they are informed about electoral reform.
This is the twenty-ninth article in the Whoa!Canada: Proportional Representation Series
• Proportional Representation for Canadaand don’t forget to check out the PR4Canada Resources page!
Last year the Canadian Government passes a motion that condemned the BDS movement. This motion didn’t make it illegal for the United Church of Canada, Quakers, organizations, university students and human rights activists and ordinary people like your Aunt Mabel who boycott and other Israeli companies like SodaStream operating in illegal settlements on what is supposed to be Palestinian land.…
Last year the Canadian Government passes a motion that condemned the BDS movement. This motion didn’t make it illegal for the United Church of Canada, Quakers, organizations, university students and human rights activists and ordinary people like your Aunt Mabel who boycott and other Israeli companies like SodaStream operating in illegal settlements on what is supposed to be Palestinian land. It wasn’t a law, just a motion that said the Government disagrees.
Liberal back bencher Iqra Khalid’s Motion 103 has raised a ruckus.
Once again it becomes clear Canadians need to improve our civic literacy. Our politicians have entirely too easy a time manipulating us.
A motion is not a law. A government motion that condemns X simply says the government thinks X is bad. It is not a law, but an attempt to lead by example.
Ms. Khalid’s Motion 103 will not make it illegal to criticise Islam. It does not herald the coming of Sharia law to Canada. Nor does it make racism illegal. Canadians will still be able to be racists if they wish to be. A motion is not a law: only a law can make something illegal.
As a writer, I am a firm believer in free speech. If you are concerned about Canadian law interfering with our free speech, there is plenty to talk about with our hate speech laws and the law Canadians know as C-51. But this motion does not do anything to inhibit free speech. Even if it wanted to it couldn’t. A motion is not a law.
Motion 103 just says the Government of Canada doesn’t approve of Islamophobia, systemic racism and religious discrimination, and tasks the government with studying it in hopes of finding a soluition. But you don’t have to take my word for it. If you’re still worried, you can read it (like every motion or legislation considered by the Canadian Government) online. But to make it even easier, I’ve reproduced it for you here:
Iqra Khalid – Private Members’ Motion
Motion 103
Systemic racism and religious discrimination
Text of the Motion
That, in the opinion of the House, the government should:
(a) recognize the need to quell the increasing public climate of hate and fear;
(b) condemn Islamophobia and all forms of systemic racism and religious discrimination and take note of House of Commons’ petition e-411 and the issues raised by it; and
(c) request that the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage undertake a study on how the government could
(i) develop a whole-of-government approach to reducing or eliminating systemic racism and religious discrimination including Islamophobia, in Canada, while ensuring a community-centered focus with a holistic response through evidence-based policy-making,
(ii) collect data to contextualize hate crime reports and to conduct needs assessments for impacted communities, and that the Committee should present its findings and recommendations to the House no later than 240 calendar days from the adoption of this motion, provided that in its report, the Committee should make recommendations that the government may use to better reflect the enshrined rights and freedoms in the Constitution Acts, including the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
This motion does not single out Islam for special consideration, it “condemns Islamophobia and all forms of systemic racism and religious discrimination.”
After a young man murdered half a dozen Muslim men at prayer in their Quebec City mosque, is it not reasonable to condemn discrimination and hatred toward the Muslim community? Especially when such flames of extremism have been fanned by politicians?
All citizens are supposed to be protected by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Of course, in a democracy that relies on an electoral system that fails to represent its citizens proportionally, citizens can only hope we will get governments that will uphold our Charter protections.
Fair enough: I’ve changed it from “majoritan” to to “majoritan/plurality.”
I’ve edited:
More formally known as “majoritan,” electoral systems that only allow for a single winner are “winner-take-all.”
to
More formally known as “majoritan/plurality,” electoral systems that only allow for a single winner are “winner-take-all.”
Even so, while each MP is elected with a plurality, our “majority” governments consist of an actual majority of seats in Parliament (albeit plurality seats).
Just so you know, I am not an expert, just a frustrated citizen who has learned a great deal about this and is still learning. This article was written a bit more than a year ago, and I wouldn’t make this mistake today. I have unvested a great deal of time and energy to this and I strive for accuracy. If you catch any further errors, please let me know.
Just one problem: our system is NOT Majoritarian. In a majoritarian system, a candidate has to win more than 50% to win a seat. Examples are Alternative Vote and instant run-off. In our system, a candidate can win with less than 50%, which makes our system a Plurality system.
This is one of the most common mistakes about electoral systems. I see it repeated in newspaper articles on a regular basis. Another popular misconception is that “ranked ballot” is a system, when in fact it’s a type of ballot that can be used in either a Majoritarian or a Proportional system.
Unfortunately, these mistakes are not harmless. The first leads to people thinking our system is better than it is. Polls find that many people wrongly believe that a candidate needs to get 50% or more of the vote to win in our system. The second leads people to assume that Ireland’s system is not proportional, and therefore to undercount the number of countries that have PR.
If we are ever going to get a decent electoral system in this country, we’ll need to stop the spread of misinformation about PR and start getting the facts out.
Don’t be broken hearted if Mr. Trudeau lets us down.
Plenty of other fish in the sea…
