May 25, 2005

Time Running Out for Electoral Reform

The Electoral Boundaries Commission Act requires that a commission must be appointed during the first session of the new Legislature to "make proposals to the Legislative Assembly as to the area, boundaries and names of the electoral districts of British Columbia". That means that by February 2006 the government must appoint three people, one of whom must be a judge or a retired judge of the Supreme Court or the Court of Appeal and one of whom must be the chief electoral officer.

The government has the alternative of amending the Electoral Boundaries Commission Act, but not to appoint a commission would be a bad decision as the Charter of Rights and Freedoms has been found by the Supreme Court of Canada to apply to electoral boundaries so that there is equal "effective representation". The rule of thumb is that constituency boundaries must be drawn so that each constituency is not more or less than 25% different from the average population size. Based on registration for the 2005 election, the average constituency has 35,000 registered voters, so no constituency should have more than 44,000, however several do. Voter registration by constituency is not yet available on the Elections BC website, but we know that 26,500 voted in Vancouver-Burrard while less than 8,800 voted in Peace River North. Both constituencies elect one MLA; many would say that this is not equal effective representation and that redistribution cannot wait. One vote in Peace River North should not equal more than three votes in Vancouver-Burrard!

The last commission chaired by Josiah Wood, a retired judge of the Court of Appeal, produced the current 79 constituencies which came into effect for the 2001 election. A new boundaries commission is required after every other election. If BC-STV had been adopted, the commission would have a much more complex task than its already difficult job.

The requirement to get on with the work of electoral boundary redistribution poses a big problem for dealing with the pressure created by a 57% yes vote for BC-STV which passed in 77 of 79 constituencies. Premier Campbell has said that he may change the fixed election date to the fall. If that is the fall of 2008, say the third Tuesday in October, then there is little time to delay the start of the commission's work. If the issue of electoral reform is going to be resolved so that it can be included in the mandate of the commission, the suggestion from NDP leader Carole James that a further referendum question be put to the voters concurrent with this year's municipal elections may not only make sense, but it may be the only reasonable option. Details such as what the referendum question should be, and what hurdle a yes vote must jump in order to pass must be worked out. There is no time to waste in answering those questions.

It is the Campbell Liberals who will determine the future of electoral reform in British Columbia. The clock is ticking for the appointment of the Electoral Boundaries Commission.