Apr. 13th Articles

Gauging chance of success for STV referendum
Shane Bigham
NEWS1130
Monday, April 13th, 2009
http://www.news1130.com/news/local/more.jsp?content=20090413_131008_532

Try BC-STV voting online
Skinny Dipper
Blog: The Skinny
Monday, April 13, 2009
http://skinnydips.blogspot.com/2009/04/happy-post-easter-ior-try-bc-stv-voting.html

Test Drive BC-STV
Mark Crowley
Fair Vote UBC
April 13, 2009
http://fairvoteubc.wordpress.com/2009/04/13/test-drive-bc-stv/

Claim that STV is complicated simply not true
Nelson Daily News
Mon 13 Apr 2009
Page: 7
Section: Letters
Byline: Gusti Callis
Source: Nelson Daily News

To the Editor:

Re: Nelson Daily News STV article of March 23, 2009.

Bill Tieleman's claim that Single Transferable Vote (STV) is complicated couldn't be further from the truth. The truth is: STV is simple.

What the voter actually does is rank the candidates on the ballot in order of their preference, with 1 showing their first preference, 2 their second and so on. Any first grader could tell you which things of a list they like most and least, and that's all the voter has to do.

In regard to the vote counting process (which the voter doesn't really even need to understand), any person who can add, subtract, multiply, and divide; and is willing to give 10 - 15 minutes to understanding the process, can become an expert. Don't believe it? Give me a call: 250 825-9282. The Irish have been using STV since the 1920s, ranking their choices, and for years, working out the results with pencil and paper. Are they so much smarter than us; is this beyond our intelligence level? I don't think so.

As determined by the Citizen's Assembly for Electoral Reform (which was set up by the Liberal government in 2003), STV is by far the best choice for a voting system for BC. It meets the needs which BC residents expressed at public meetings which the Assembly held around the province. And be assured that the Citizen's Assembly extensively studied the voting systems used in the world today. I dare say that it won't be too many years before our current First Past the Post voting system (FPTP) is recognized as the archaic, undemocratic system that it is, and is abandoned by the four lonely countries that still use it.

Please don't waste this opportunity to give B.C. a voting system which puts the power of politics into the hands of the voters. Put the voter in the driver's seat on May 12 with proportional results, better local representation, stable governments without policy swings, and more voter choice. Vote for BC-STV, and against FPTP. These are our only two choices.

Gusti Callis

Nelson, B.C.

STV about governance, not politics
The Daily News (Kamloops)
Mon 13 Apr 2009
Page: A6
Section: Opinion
Byline: Nancy Bepple
Source: The Daily News

Re: Group Uses 'Old Politics,' (The Daily News, April 9). The YES BC-STV grassroots Kamloops group is advocating for a new way to do politics.

Actually, the referendum on May 12 on Single Transferable Vote is not about politics. It is about governance.

Whether or not B.C. votes yes to Single Transferable Vote, there will still be politics. Politics is baby kissing, funding announcements just before elections and protests. Politics is about getting your message out and getting what you want.

Governance is about how we make decisions. The strength in STV is that it recognizes that decision making that includes different points of view is better for everyone. STV is proportional representation; it ensures that more views are expressed in government. We live in a very diverse society and all these points of view need to be heard. For me, the most important value in democracy is that everyone has a chance to be represented. STV allows this.

Nancy Bepple

Kamloops

STV: How does it work?
The Daily News (Kamloops)
Mon 13 Apr 2009
Page: A4
Section: News
Byline: Ray Jones, David Schreck
Source: The Daily News

British Columbians will decide in a referendum May 12 if they want to stick with the current First Past the Post system of electing MLAs, or change to the Single Transferable Vote, or STV, method.

On Thursday, April 30, the Kamloops Chamber of Commerce will present an STV debate and forum at Forster's Conference Centre starting at 7 p.m.

Today's column -- written on the topic How The Single Transferable Vote Works -- is by Ray Jones.


Yes, STV is sophisticated: We can do it
by Ray Jones

The Single Transferable Vote, or STV, is used successfully in other countries in the world whose voters are no more sophisticated than we are. It involves some math -- fractions, actually -- something that we start learning about even earlier than Grade 4.

In our current system, a voter is given a choice of one candidate from each political party. The voter then chooses one candidate by marking an "X." There is one winner. Because we have more than two parties, often the winner is elected with less than 40 per cent of the popular vote, meaning that more than 60 per cent of the voters may consider themselves "orphaned," without representation.

BC-STV retains two important features of our current system: there is no increase in the number of seats in Victoria, and the ratio of voters to MLAs stays the same.

BC-STV differs from our current system by having fewer, larger electoral districts. Each district will elect between two and seven MLAs, the most frequent number being six representatives.

Multiple representatives is the hallmark of a proportional-representation voting system, which means the number of MLAs for a party in Victoria will be very close to the percentage of the popular vote received by that party. A 40 per cent popular vote, then, will translate into 40 per cent of the seats, give or take a seat or two.

A ballot will have the names of the candidates listed, in alphabetical order, under a party heading. The voter will indicate preferences by marking "1" for his or her first choice, "2" for a second choice, and so on. The voter may choose as few or as many preferences as he or she wishes.

To win a seat in the legislature, a candidate must receive a minimum number of votes, called the quota. This quota is determined by a formula that is, roughly, the number of votes divided by the number of MLAs to be elected. In the Cariboo-Thompson electoral district, the five MLAs will have to win the support of about 17 per cent of the district's voters.

The first step, after all votes are in, is to count first-preference votes. Any candidate reaching the quota is declared elected. Then the magic happens:

Instead of being ignored, any votes above what the elected candidate needed are transferred to the second preferences on all votes received by that candidate. A second round of vote-counting and transfers then occurs, and a third, until the desired number of candidates have reached the quota.

If, on any round, no candidate reaches the quota, then the candidate with the lowest vote count is eliminated, and his or her votes are transferred, at full value, to the next preference marked.

The result is that, in a six-member district, over 90 per cent of the voters help elect someone.

That's it. It is sophisticated, and it must be in order to give us the proportional results we want.

Best of all, preferential voting promotes inclusion, co-operation and consultation among candidates, since a candidate would find it works against his or her interests to indulge in demeaning other candidates. How? This would lessen his or her chances for being considered for a voter's second or third choices, if he were to demean that voter's first choice.

To see this process simply presented, go to stv.ca or citizensassembly.bc.ca, and click on the flash animation.

Ray Jones is a member of Kamloops for BC-STV. This column was written in conjunction with Dan Carroll and Les Goddard.