Australia: first prediction

A quick update on Australia where I've dug a bit into the polls and have a projection for the lower house. It is as follows:

LNP - 71
LAB - 71
NXT - 3
IND - 2
GRN - 2
KAP - 1


LAB gains:
Macarthur
Lyons
Hindmarsh
La Trobe
Corangamite
Stirling
Capricornia
Dunkley
Deakin
Petrie
Swan
Soloman
Burt
Hasluck
Cowan

NXT gains:
Mayo
Grey
Sturt

GRN Gains:
Higgins

I am working on an upper house projection, but this is much more difficult. Canadians are spoiled when it comes to political polls, it's very easy to find province by province breakdowns for any federal poll, while I've had a hell of a time finding similar data from just about any country. If I can find a proper Australian poll, I'll produce a prediction for the Senate as well.

Quickie: electoral reform and Conservatives vs conservatives.

In 1974, the PC Party took 35% of the vote.

In 1979, this jumped to 36%

In 1980, this fell to 32%

1984 saw a spike to 50%

After this, we saw the rise of the Reform Party. As such, for the next few elections, I am going to compare the combined vote total.

In 1988 the two parties took 45% of the vote, combined. Down 5% from the 1984 PC numbers.

1993, when the Liberals won government, saw this drop to a combined 35%

1997 saw this rise to 38%

2000 saw this hold at 38%

Meanwhile the two parties merged

2004 saw the number dip to 30%, it's lowest share we've yet looked at.

2006 saw it bump to 36%, more traditional levels, but below the average from 1988-2002

2008 saw this rise to 38%

2011 saw a strong showing of 40%

and finally, in 2015, we saw a dip down to 32%

My point?

If you adopt an electoral system that eliminates splitting the vote, things can be very good for small-c conservative parties. Two parties can, and I argue would, likely form a government. 

Electoral reform is not bad for conservatives.

It's bad for the Conservative Party.

And I don't reforms being bad for any particular party a reason to avoid it. 

The future under electoral reform

History
In 1978, New Zealand went to the polls. Changes were made to the way voters were registered and enrolled. The winning National Party took 51 seats on 39.8% of the vote, while Labour, who only took 40 seats, took 40.4% of the vote. Social Credit, the traditional third party, took 1 seat on 16% of the vote.

In 1981, National won 47 seats on 38.8% of the vote, while Labour won 43 seats on 39.0%. Social Credit managed 2 seats on 20.7% of the vote.

In 1984, a new party, the NZ Party, was formed. They were seen as libertarian and many saw them as splitting the National vote. Labour won that election with 56 seats on 43% of the vote, while National took 37 on 36% and the NZ Party took 12%. Social Credit, kept their 2 seats, but fell to 8% of the vote.

The 1987 election saw Labour win again, 57 seats on 48% of the vote, while National took 40 seats on 44% of the vote. Social Credit, now called the Democratic Party, lost all their seats and took only 6% of the vote.
Labour promised to hold a referendum on electoral reform, but, never did. National attacked the government, saying that it would do real electoral reform if elected.

1990 saw National win big. 67 seats on 48% of the vote, compared to Labour's 29 seats on 35%. The Greens came to the fore, and despite not winning any seats, took 7% of the vote. NewLabour, founded by a renegade Labour MP, took 1 seat, on 5% of the vote.
National carried out it's commitment to electoral reform, and a referendum was held in 1993.

The 1993 election saw National win 50 seats on 35.1% of the vote, while Labour won 45 seats on 34.7% of the vote. The Alliance, a left-wing party founded by NewLabour, took 2 seats, on 18.2% of the vote, while NZ First, founded by a renegade National MP, took 2 seats on 8.4% of the vote. A Labour MP served as Speaker, allowing National to carry a majority.
The 1993 Referendum meanwhile, was a three-stage process. First, in 1992, a vote was held on weather to retain the existing FPTP system, or to change it. 85% of voters decided they wanted to change it. Second, later in 1992, the four other options outlined in my previous post were put to the voters. 8% of voters decided to spoil their ballots in this round, which is interpreted as support for FPTP. 6% chose Parallel, while 7% chose a Ranked Ballot. 17% wanted STV, while the overwhelming majority chose fill-up MMP Proportional Representation system. Due to the high number of spoiled ballots, there was pressure to hold another vote, and alongside the 1993 election, a referendum was held. MMP vs FPTP. The result was much closer, with MMP defeating FPTP by a vote of 54% to 46%. As a result, the next election would be proportional.

Context
What is interesting is not what happened in the following election, in 1996, but what happened between 1993 and 1996. MPs jumped ship from the major parties. 9 MPs left National and 4 left Labour, leaving both parties with 41 seats by the time of the 1996 election. 4 of the National MPs and 3 of the Labour MPs joined forces to create the United Party. Two National MPs and a Labour MP joined New Zealand First. Two National MPs created and joined a new Conservative Party, while one of them later quit to become an Independent, and lastly, a National MP founded the Christian Democrats.

As a result, the number of Parties in Parliament rose from 4 to 7.

Voting patterns also changed. In the 1996 election itself, the results were as follows. Note that NZ went from 99 to 120 MPs during the transition.

44 - 33.9% - National
37 - 28.2% - Labour
17 - 13.4% - NZ First
12 - 10.1% - Alliance
8 - 6.1% - ACT
1 - 0.88% - United

Neither the Conservative nor Christian parties won seats, and ACT, a new libertarian-leaning party, managed 8 seats.

Changing the voting system changed the way people consider voting. No longer did you have to vote for one of the two major parties to stop the other, but you could vote for a party you actually wanted. As a result, not only did voters, but MPs themselves changed their political behavior.

This has consequences for Canada depending on what system we choose.


First Past The Post
Sticking with the current system will, of course, see the least impact. Our parties stay right where they are, and nothing much happens.

Ranked Ballots
There is one major change that I see happening quite easily under this system. Australia has been using Ranked Ballots for quite some time, and it's two major parties are, in fact, three. The right-wing Liberal Party of Australia has been in permanent coalition with the smaller and further-right National Party. This coalition is standard in the states of New South Wales and Victoria, and remains even at times of opposition, or when the Liberals win a majority on their own. In Queensland, the two parties merged outright. In Tasmania, the Nationals never had a branch, and in the Northern Territory, the Liberals had always been seen as stepping back to allow the Nationals to be the only power in the area. While South Australia and Western Australia do see cracks in the traditional coalition, the idea of two right-wing parties working together while remaining separate is not seen as insanity.

As a result, with the Conservative Party moving towards are more socially moderate view, I can easily see a move to Ranked Ballots causing a few MPs to break off from the Tories (especially if someone like Michael Chong wins the leadership) and form a new socially conservative right-wing party. It's likely this party could win seats in parts of Canada, and even if they do not, they could still exert pressure on the Conservatives by demanding policy concessions in exchange for endorsing the party as the #2 choice on ballot papers.

I don't see any other parties popping up as a result of this.

Single Transferable Vote
Like above, we could see a new right-wing party spring up. What is more interesting is that depending on riding sizes, we could see more options. With ridings that have about 7 MPs each, a party only needs roughly 15% of the vote to elect a member. This could lead, for example, to both right-wing and left-wing sovereigntist parties in Quebec, as they can share preferences with one another in areas where one is weak. As well we could see the rise of "Big Independents" - Candidates who are strong enough to get elected on their name as non-partisans, who have 'big' personalities; an example from Ireland would be Jackie Healy-Rae, who was later joined (and replaced by) his son, who, in the last election, took enough vote to elect three Healy-Rae members to the Parliament (only two ran). This could also give birth to small parties based around a single person like Nick Xenophon in Australia. I personally predict that if we move to this system, folks like Giorgio Mammoliti would run federally.

In terms of actual parties, we are still unlikely to see much more beyond a socially conservative party pop up. The biggest difference is that such a party would be guaranteed seats in socially conservative areas of Canada.

The biggest change we'd likely see, beyond the new party, is that the vote share for the old major parties will decrease. Voters will be far more likely to experiment with other parties as their first choice, and as a result, we will see parties like the Greens, doubling if not tripling their vote totals.

Parallel Proportional Representation
The key here is what system is used to elect the MPs still in ridings. If it's FPTP, we may not see as much change as we would otherwise, but if we decide that riding MPs will now be elected by Ranked Ballot, this will encourage the birth of a socially conservative party. Also important is just how many Proportional MPs are elected. Will they make up 10% of the new assembly or 50%?

Assuming a fairly restrictive system, say FPTP and a third of MPs, it's still possible we could see the rise of a socially conservative alternative, but in reality, we are probably looking at our current parties remaining, and the biggest change being a doubling of the vote for the Green Party, but only on the proportional ballot.

Proportional Representation
This system opens the floodgates and is almost certain to cause changes to our political parties. Not only is a socially conservative party almost guaranteed, but a libertarian party as well. It's quite possible that existing parties can play that role, as we have a Christian Heritage, and a Libertarian party in this country. Depending on the path the NDP takes, we could even see a new left-wing party rise. The Liberals, right now, are doing a good job at balancing their own politics, but this is unlikely to last forever. Over the long-term we could well see a blue-liberal party pop up, as well as a party trying to position itself between the Liberals and NDP.

PR means much more fluidity in party support. While we have had parties come from nowhere only to vanish quickly, this has been rare. PR means that this will happen more often, and a number of "single-election" parties could come into being and disappear.

Conclusion
Any change to the way we vote has the real potential to change our parties themselves. At the biggest risk is the Conservatives, who are vulnerable to a "de-merger" should a system be created that ensures splitting the vote is no longer an issue. On the flip side, we also open ourselves up to options not considered. Take for example a Bloc Quebecois on the rise again under STV. Vote transfers may not be enough to stop them, and we might see a new Federalist party rise in Quebec, forming a coalition with whomever happens to win English Canada. Take for example a Parallel system where a new party decides not to run in any ridings, and rather, only run for the parallel seats, thus making vote splitting impossible.

The possible changes are quite massive, and we likely won't realize all the different ways that things can play out for at least two decades after we take the leap.

Electoral Reform - the 5 major proposals

There are 5 major proposals for electoral reform in Canada, as I see it, and I will detail them, below.




First Past The Post
The default and status quo option is to keep out current system. For those not in the know, FPTP works as follows:

The country is divided into smaller chunks known as "ridings" that are roughly equal in population. Each riding elects one member. The election method is that every voter gets one ballot, and marks an X beside the candidate they most want to win. When the ballots are counted, whatever candidate has the most votes, wins the riding, and becomes the MP.

This is perhaps the simplest election method, which is why it is so widespread in history. The problem comes when you have more than two candidates running as someone can win with under 50% of the vote. Imagine if you will a riding where 65% of voters want someone named Jean to be their MP. There are three candidates, Jean Smith, Jean Beliveau, and Bob Menendez. Smith gets 32% of the vote, while Beliveau gets 33%. Menendez however gets 35% of the vote. Despite the fact that 65% of the riding want a Jean as MP, they get a Bob instead.

The Tories and to a degree the Bloc support this system. Both pretty much for the same reason, there are far more federalist or progressive parties out there than there are either conservative or sovereigntist parties. FPTP is the best system to maximise CPC and BQ seats.

This system is used in the USA and UK.

Ranked Ballot
Also known as Single-Member STV, the Alternative Vote, Instant Runoff Voting, and the Preferential Ballot. The general thinking is the Liberals want this method.

In this method, you divide the country into ridings like you do in FPTP, but the voting and counting is different. Rather than simply marking an X beside the candidate you want to win, you rank the candidates you want to win 1, 2, 3, and so on. When counting the ballots, you only find a winner when someone has 50%+1 of the vote. To get there, you remove the least popular candidate and redistribute his votes based on additional preferences.

This is usually one of the go-to systems for those looking for something more fair. The problem comes with the fact that you end up with a result where you do not pick a winner based on who everyone wants, but based on who everyone does not want. People will rank candidates lower if they want to stop them from being elected, meaning that moderate candidates who are inoffensive have a higher chance of winning, even if few really want them elected.

Such a system would generally benefit the Liberals, especially early on. After a few elections with this system it's quite possible we would eventually see Tories and New Democrats preferencing one another to stop the Liberals from winning. Regardless, if any party is to see a boost from a changed voting system, this is the system expected to best boost the Liberals.

This system is used for house elections in Australia, and has been used in various provinces at various times (Manitoba from 1927-1953 for example)

Single Transferable Vote
This is the Multi-Member variant of STV, and is traditionally what is meant when people say STV. This system is also known as "BC-STV"

In this method, you divide the country into chunks that we will still call "ridings". Each riding need not be equal in population. When it comes time to vote, every voter still gets one ballot like in the Ranked Ballot, and they rank them 1, 2, 3, and so on, however, when it comes time to count, things are done differently. Each riding elects multiple members. The method to get there is a bit complex so I'll skip it for now, but be aware the results are 'a bit proportional' with some caveats. Generally each riding in a STV system will elect between 3 and 9 members.

These systems tend to balance the desire for local representation - something that many voters in countries moving away from FPTP are afraid of losing - with the desire for proportional representation - since nearly every riding in this system will have MPs from multiple parties. The major problem with this system is that it does neither of these as well as other systems, and the fact that you can secretly gerrymander the system by adjusting the number of MPs elected per riding to best advantage your own party.

From what I can calculate, this is actually the best system for the NDP, because it allows for Liberal and Green votes to transfer. On the math, it's likely that an STV would cause the largest number of NDP MPs to be elected based on any given popular vote share. Despite this, the NDP does not currently back this as their prefered system.

This system is used in Ireland, and for Senate elections in Australia.

Parallel Proportional Representation
This is sort of a "hold over" system I've included to represent various adjustments that can be done to PR to make it more possible to achieve majority governments. This entry is intended to represent all such adjustments, of which, Parallel is just one.

In this method, you do not need any ridings for the proportional seats, though, many countries will use various electoral districts (such as states or provinces) to help keep things at least minimally local. Other places do still create ridings, very large ridings (with 10 or more members) to achieve this purpose. This is a mixed-member system, meaning that you still have single-member ridings electing MPs, but you also add the MPs elected proportionally to that total to help create a more proportional result. The proportional MPs are elected based on the proportion of votes each party gets.

This is the weakest version of real proportional representation that can be adopted and is often looked at by countries where there is a desire to fix the problems with FPTP, but where there is a strong aversion to creating an endless string of minority governments. The major problem with this system is that it is not fully proportional, and as such, is unlikely to be the "first choice" of a voting system by many voters. The main 'benefit' of this system is that it is a compromise, which is also its greatest drawback. It's difficult to look at this system positively for that reason.

No one party stands to gain the most from this system, but all parties do stand to gain in one particular way; no longer will there be swaths of the country without MPs from major parties. If such a system had been in place historically, we'd have seen Quebec NDP MPs for decades, and the Reform Party would have had a small number of MPs from the Atlantic in 1993.

This system is used in Japan and Mexico.

Proportional Representation
When used in the context of current electoral discussions here in Canada, PR generally refers to one system, FUMMPPR, or Fill Up Mixed Multi Member Proportional.

Like the above PR system, you still use ridings, and add proportional members to that. Unlike the above, the proportional MPs are not assigned based on vote totals alone, but based on vote totals minus the number of seats already won in the ridings. While this sounds complex (and can be complex) the simple way to explain it is that if a party takes 40% of the vote, it's final end total will see it win 40% of the seats in Parliament. Everything else in the system is just math to ensure that this will ring true at the end of the day.

The reason to move to such a system is simple, to ensure that parliament looks similar to the vote totals as cast by the voters in the last election. The biggest drawback is that this will almost always mean that no one party can obtain a majority; which has time and time again been shown to be the biggest concern of Canadians when it comes to electoral reform.

The Green Party likely has the most to gain from this system, and the party supports it. Additionally, the NDP is currently pushing for this. Recently, after the Liberals changed the makeup of the committee that will look at electoral reform, there has been some thought among some that the Liberal Party may be willing to look at this system as well.

This system is used in Germany and New Zealand.


Conclusion
Our next election will all but certainly be held using one of these systems. Parallel systems, as noted, are adopted to allow for majorities, and, in fact, Japan has had a healthy string of majorities since it's adoption of a parallel system in the 90's. There are other 'variants' that one can add to PR to make it more friendly to majorities. Italy for example simply gives the winning party 55% of the seats, even if that party does not take 50%+1 of the nation-wide vote. Greece awards number of free seats to the winning party, meaning that about 40% of the vote will result in a majority. It's quite possible that such a variant may be looked at here as well.

In my next post I will look at what may happen if we move to the systems outlined above.

Quickie: Would Trump be a disaster?

No.

That's the simple answer. No.

Trump would be like Rob Ford. Trump would be able to do some things, but would be reigned in from doing the more crazy things. Trump would have some support in Congress (and if he wins the election, it's likely the GOP will have control over both houses) but that support will not stick with him if he tries to do some of the more radical proposals on his agenda.

Most importantly, however, and what differentiates Trump from Rob Ford, is that Trump says whatever the heck he feels like. I have no doubt that Trump's "Muslim Ban" will end up looking a lot more like "A ban of muslims from entering the country if they've spent X amount of time in any of Y countries" and that his "Wall" with mexico will amount to "An upgrade to the existing fencing along the Mexican border"

Put simply; you can't base what a Trump presidency will be based on what he says he will do. You can only base it on what he's actually done, and been willing to do, and based on that, he will not stand out as 'the only crazy' in the list of Presidents should be win.

Quickie: Risks to the major parties

Reading this article has spurred a thought in my mind that I wish to share.

Each major party has a risk right now that could hurt that party's chance of future success.


NDP
The NDP's biggest risk is being irrelevant and useless. What good, after all, is a "progressive party" when we already have one of those? What is the use of a party that can win in Winnipeg, Calgary, and Vancouver, when a party that can do the same already forms government?

The NDP needs some fresh ideas, and by that, I mean controversial ideas. Look at the backlash against the current healthcare system when the NDP introduced it in Saskatchewan. Consider as well the role the NDP had in securing pension indexing, a costly but currently popular program.

If the NDP is unwilling to say something unpopular the party may well vanish into the mists of time, being replaced as the left-wing protest party by the Greens.


CPC
The Tories risk is being seen as out of date and out of touch. The old PC Party suffered from this from time to time and it always hurt the party electorally.

Fortunately, unlike the NDP, the party has already taken real concrete steps towards ensuring this does not happen, voting, at convention, to support same sex marriage, and even decriminalizing small amounts of marijuana.

Failing to continue in this direction can easily lead to a long stint on the opposition benches.


LIB
The Liberals problem is that of leadership. Last long-lasting Liberal governments have tended to fall apart over the same issue, poor leadership. Consider Paul Martin, John Turner, or the Pipeline Debate of the St. Laurent era. Trudeau risks heading in this direction if he can not rein things in.

2011 showed us that the polls can be wrong because people are unaware of their own subconscious. Consider all the polls showing the NDP did 'okay' in the french debate, and all the polls, in the days after, showing the NDP rising, fast, to first place in Quebec. A switch had been hit in the heads of Canadians and they were not even aware of it.

While polls show 'Elbowgate' has not impacted Canadians, there is a massive risk. Trudeau, after all, is the one who yelled "shit" in the house, is the one who beat up a Senator in a charity boxing match. As a "young man" who is "fit" he could easily play into the stereotype of someone "violent". At the same time, by giving concessions, he can come across as unable to make a quality decision. Trudeau can't continue to backtrack on issues, and if he wants to change things, needs to ensure that the first step is the right step.

Quickie: Electoral Reform - is it dead?

News came today that the Liberals have decided to bias their own electoral reform committee in favour of a system that does not yet exist, by distributing seats as though Canada has a Proportional Representation system.

What this means is we will have a committee where 4 members want FPTP, 3 want PR, and 5 want a ranked ballot. As such it becomes quite likely that the committee will deadlock itself and we will have another election in 2019 under the current system because we could not agree on what to change it to.

Regardless, I am still working on a new video that examines all the possible systems in one go.