The Canadian election is over and the Conservative Party of Canada has won, but produced a minority government. I have been thinking throughout this election of just how many people would vote. It always seemed like no one voted. So I've added up the numbers of how many votes the parties received and compared it to Stats Canada figures.
10,562,956 people voted in this election. The conservative government received 5,204,468 votes that resulted in a win of 143 seats out of a possible 308 seats. This means it took 49.27% of the people who voted to provide us with a minority government (for non-Canadians, there were three other parties who won seats in the house of commons and a plethora of smaller parties who did not win any seats but still campaigned and received votes).
The population of Canada was 33,311,400 as of July 1st, 2008. That provides an average of 31.7% of Canadians actually turning out to the polls. But wait, that is the total population that includes people who are not old enough to vote. The breakdowns I could find from Stats Canada were not too specific, but according to their charts for 2001, there were roughly 8 million people under the age required to vote. If you pop that number into the equation than the percentage of people voting jumps to 71.6%. That is a lot by any standard!
I'm not a statistician, but these numbers are likely very close. What is important here is that I was wrong in my earlier opinions that people don't vote in Canada. They do. The Conservative Party won, and people voted for them. My problem -which is not discussed here- is that Canada is voting locally for a federal leader. The Bloc Party SHOULD NOT be allowed to run in a federal election. How is it just that Quebecers vote for a provincial party that has no input in the matters of other provinces and yet their same votes affect the outcome of a federal election that all other provinces vote in! If the Bloc did not run in these federal elections the Conservative Party would still have won. I am fine with that because the majority of Canadians voted for them. I believe in the democratic system. BUT I do not agree with groups that CANNOT run federally still compete against federal parties in provincial ridings.
5 comments:
But excluding parties like the bloc would also mean you're excluding fringe parties that are made up of only a few candidates or independents. They deserve a voice don't they? I kind of like the idea that if one day I got so pissed off with the government that I decided to run as an independent I would have the right to do so :)
However, I am speaking about running federally as a party. I have no qualms about individuals running as independents, however parties that have representation in only one province should run for office provincially. Federally, a party should have representation in all provinces and territories. What it boils down to is, is that I don't like how our current system only allows you to vote for your local leader, and that same vote counts for the party federally. I would like to see it separated, so that you can vote for the local person /party, and separately vote for that leader /party, federally.
I believe the New Conservatives (of which Stephen Harper is the leader) is actually an amalgamation of the (original) Conservative Party and the Reform Party of Canada(which was largely a fringe party for western Canadian). With these parties separated, the Liberals had a majority. With their collaboration, the conservatives run the country.
D
So now the liberals need to join forces with the NDP, which will spawn the unholiest of holy wars with Biezelbub, which in turn will make gumdrops fall from the sky as I shit my pants from exposing to the world my fraudulent ideas on Canadian politics. But there you have it, from my fiery ass to the speedy like a snail Ethernet that is likely slowly giving us all brain cancer, but at least we all have a social health care plan. Oh wait, Harper got voted in right? ......shit.
There are issues though that a provincial party cannot represent its people on thanks to our division in the Constitution.
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