Every Vote Should Count: Why Voting Liberal or Conservative in the 2025 Election Perpetuates a Broken Democracy

As Canada heads to the polls in April 2025, we face a critical choice about the future of our democracy. Both Liberals under Mark Carney and Conservatives under Pierre Poilievre continue to block (or is ambiguous on) proportional representation (PR), ensuring millions of perfectly valid ballots will have no effect on election outcomes.

The Liberal Record on Electoral Reform

Liberals have campaigned on proportional representation since 1919 (starting with Mackenzie King)
In 2015, Justin Trudeau promised 1,800+ times that it would be “the last election under first-past-the-post”
After forming government, Trudeau abandoned reform when he couldn’t get his preferred non-proportional system
In 2024, Trudeau admitted that Liberals were “deliberately vague” about electoral reform to appeal to PR advocates
Mark Carney has been noncommittal on PR despite his economic expertise, claiming to be “open” while avoiding firm commitments

The Conservative Position

Conservatives consistently favour maintaining FPTP
Pierre Poilievre shows no interest in changing the system that benefits his party
The current electoral system enables single-party rule with a minority of votes
Both parties benefit from false majorities delivered by our broken system

Why This Matters in 2025

Canada’s democracy faces mounting threats, from foreign interference concerns to polarization. A truly representative system would provide the strongest defence:

In Hastings-Lennox and Addington during the 2025 Ontario election, 51.6% of voters had no representation in Queen’s Park
Meanwhile, Germany’s 2025 election under PR saw voter turnout hit 83%
Research examining 36 democracies from 2000-2019 shows countries using PR have lower polarization than those with winner-take-all systems
Only 6% of the world’s population lives in full democracies, and most use PR systems

When you vote Liberal or Conservative in April, you endorse a system where millions of votes make no difference to election outcomes. You endorse a system where parties that receive minority vote shares regularly wield 100% of the power.

Only the Greens, NDP, and smaller parties like the Revolution Party of Canada consistently support PR. If democracy matters to you, shouldn’t your vote reflect that?