Comment 59 (1 September 2022) – comments and feedback
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James Cleland
Redistribution of ridings helps to give all Canadians a fairer representation in Parliament. In the 2016 election all of the seats in the 4 Maritime provinces went to the Liberals. It is not a stretch to say that this did not represent the will of the people of the Atlantic region as it shut out any Conservative, NDP, Green or other possible parties. What this means is that Canada is stuck with a defacto 2 party system. With an issue like acting on climate change one party does not recognize that the problem exists, while the other party talks about it and does nothing. As a result, Canada has the worst performance on Climate change of any of the G7 Nations.
Why do we have this situation? In New Brunswick both major parties are captured by Irving interests. Canada wide both major parties are captured by the fossil fuel industry. I believe that if we had a system of proportional representation like many other countries do it would weaken the hold that these interests have on our government. It would put a voice in Parliament of smaller parties that currently have no voice in the Canadian government. I think it would help Indigenous people, minorities and rural people to have a real voice in things that matter to them.
Majority governments obtained by 35% of the popular vote are not good for Canada and only help to sow mistrust in our institutions.