Southern Alberta Council on Public Affairs (SACPA)

Presently, federal elections in Canada use the first past the post (FPTP) system where the candidate with the most votes in a riding becomes its Member of Parliament. As a result, many candidates win their seats with less than 50 per cent of votes. During last year’s election campaign, Liberal leader Justin Trudeau said he would, if elected, create a committee to look at alternatives to the FPTP system and promised that next election, likely in 2019, a new system would be in place. Alternatives include proportional representation, ranked ballots, mandatory voting and online voting. Electoral reform often proves to be difficult to accomplish because it combines debates over different and often competing values, political party and politician self-interest, and the need for citizen acceptance, even though many citizens have only a poor understanding of the alternatives available to them. The potential impact of changes to our electoral system are huge and the stakes are high for politicians, political parties