It’s not about being a “gotcha” - it’s about demonstrating a pathway to better democratic representation.
You’re right that EU membership would only require PR for European Parliament representatives initially. However, this would create several significant opportunities:
Practical demonstration: Canadians would experience firsthand how an electoral system that ensures every vote counts actually works, rather than just hearing theoretical arguments.
Institutional precedent: Once PR is successfully implemented for one electoral body, the argument that it’s “too complex” or “un-Canadian” becomes much harder to maintain.
Democratic legitimacy gap: Having representatives to the EU Parliament elected through PR while our own MPs are chosen through FPTP would create an obvious legitimacy contrast that would be difficult to justify.
The Liberal leadership vote using preferential voting actually supports this point. Internal party processes already recognize the limitations of FPTP - they just don’t extend those same democratic principles to the general electorate. In fact, all parties, even the Conservatives, use superior electoral systems to FPTP.
The reality is that 76% of Canadians support electoral reform according to recent polling, but our major parties benefit from maintaining a system that systematically discards votes. Exposure to functioning PR would make the democratic deficit in our current system increasingly apparent.
I get what you are saying, but the UK joined the EU with FPTP voting and left the EU because of FPTP. So while I agree that exposure might change things I do doubt it.
From all I’ve having lived in a couple of countries in the EU (including the UK), exposure to Proportional Vote in the EU Parliament Election seems to have zero impact on people wanting it for other election, maybe because EU MPs are too far away from most people and don’t really get all that much news coverage, unlike the national politics of a country.
Mind you, personally exposure to Proportional Vote when I was living in The Netherlands has definitely made my mind in favour of it, especially after I moved to Britain and was exposed to their shit-show FPTP voting system (worse than my own country of Portugal which as multi-representant electoral circles, so way less Democratic than PR but nowhere as bad as FPTP).
It’s not about being a “gotcha” - it’s about demonstrating a pathway to better democratic representation.
You’re right that EU membership would only require PR for European Parliament representatives initially. However, this would create several significant opportunities:
Practical demonstration: Canadians would experience firsthand how an electoral system that ensures every vote counts actually works, rather than just hearing theoretical arguments.
Institutional precedent: Once PR is successfully implemented for one electoral body, the argument that it’s “too complex” or “un-Canadian” becomes much harder to maintain.
Democratic legitimacy gap: Having representatives to the EU Parliament elected through PR while our own MPs are chosen through FPTP would create an obvious legitimacy contrast that would be difficult to justify.
The Liberal leadership vote using preferential voting actually supports this point. Internal party processes already recognize the limitations of FPTP - they just don’t extend those same democratic principles to the general electorate. In fact, all parties, even the Conservatives, use superior electoral systems to FPTP.
The reality is that 76% of Canadians support electoral reform according to recent polling, but our major parties benefit from maintaining a system that systematically discards votes. Exposure to functioning PR would make the democratic deficit in our current system increasingly apparent.
I get what you are saying, but the UK joined the EU with FPTP voting and left the EU because of FPTP. So while I agree that exposure might change things I do doubt it.
From all I’ve having lived in a couple of countries in the EU (including the UK), exposure to Proportional Vote in the EU Parliament Election seems to have zero impact on people wanting it for other election, maybe because EU MPs are too far away from most people and don’t really get all that much news coverage, unlike the national politics of a country.
Mind you, personally exposure to Proportional Vote when I was living in The Netherlands has definitely made my mind in favour of it, especially after I moved to Britain and was exposed to their shit-show FPTP voting system (worse than my own country of Portugal which as multi-representant electoral circles, so way less Democratic than PR but nowhere as bad as FPTP).