Does the Tail Wag the Dog, the Dog Wag the Tail, or...?

The opponents of proportional representation in British Columbia can't keep their lines straight. The new NDP government has indicated that, as they campaigned on, they will be holding a referendum on PR and actively supporting a YES vote. The media opponents - Vaughan Palmer, Keith Baldrey and Bill Tieleman - are relentlessly trying to make it sound like some kind of offense to democracy that the NDP are: holding a referendum on PR and actively supporting a YES vote. One of their favourite arguments against PR is that "the tail wags the dog." According to this story, small parties in government will have a "disproportionate" amount of power. Look what's happening right now! they cry. The BC Greens are forcing the government's hand! For example: Two parties which promised to support proportional representation are... wait for it... supporting proportional representation. Two parties which support banning corporate and union donations are...wait for it... banning corporate and union donations.

Two parties which support investing more in early intervention, treatment and recovery to address the fentanyl crisis are...wait for it...supporting investing in early intervention, treatment and recovery to address the fentanyl crisis. And investing in schools and health care and housing - ETC. But according to opponents, the fact that every BC NDP promised has not materialized immediately and to the letter is incontrovertible proof that the tail is secretly in charge. For example, both the BC NDP and BC Greens campaigned on more daycare spaces and making daycare more affordable. Both ran with detailed and ambitious programs to deliver this - Greens wanted free daycare to age 3 and free early childhood educated for 3-4 year olds. The NDP wanted $10 a day daycare. And several other nuanced differences to achieve the same end. Now they are - hang on to your seats here - WORKING OUT A CONSENSUS. NDP Minister Katrina Chen: "The Greens have different ideas about how to get there, but we share the same goals. We're already consulting on our implementation plan, getting ready for the February budget. We know we're not going to agree on everything with the Greens, but we have a solid working relationship and our end goal is the same: making life better for people. Our agreement is working well and producing results." BC Green MLA Sonia Furstenau: "I don't think there's going to be any significant disagreement in terms of what we're trying to achieve in terms of details," she said. "Hammering out the details is not, I don't see, going to be an impediment to seeing this legislation come forward." It's REALLY hard to make a "tail wags the dog" hostage-taking crisis story out of things like this, but they're trying damned hard. Now the Dog Wags the Tail? After a good run of "tail wags the dog" lately - more to come, no doubt - this week the opponents switched to the opposite line: Now the dog wags the tail. The electoral reform legislation - on first reading - stipulates that any election held before July 2021 will be held with first-past-the-post.

In other words, if voters choose PR in the 2018 referendum, and if they choose a system with less redistribution required, and if the new system is ready to roll in 2020, and if an election is for some unforeseen reason called before July 2021 - voters get stuck with first-past-the-post.

This could be - as Baldrey claims - a cynical move by the NDP to make sure that the Greens will support the NDP for a full four years no matter what they want to do.

But if the NDP are the ones imposing this clause on the Greens - as Baldrey claims - what happened to that super-power tail wagging the dog?

Did the tail go to sleep? Get squished in a door? Hostage and captor switched spots? Just like when opponents claim PR leads to extremism one day and the "every policy going to the mushy middle" the next - they can't have it both ways at the same time. Unless of course the goal is just fling mud in all directions and see what sticks. Let's get real. There's no formulaic story-line about a dog and a tail that plays out with a proportional voting system: Instead, it's called democracy.

The only thing that's guaranteed with proportional representation is that we get the representation we voted for. Or close to it. Then parties have to compromise. Most western democracies - Sweden, New Zealand, Germany, Ireland, Scotland and most of the OECD - are governed like BC is right now: By more than one party, representing a genuine majority of voters, in a cooperative agreement. These agreements range from formal majority coalitions (where different parties have Ministers in the government) to partnerships like we see in BC with more limited but specific terms - Supply and Confidence Agreements.

There will always be a bigger and a smaller party (or parties) in a multi-party agreement. That doesn't make the smaller party some kind of "kingmaker." It means two or more parties have to negotiate. The influence of a small party in the government is more likely to reflect how many people supported that party's policy ideas. Very small parties in a coalition have very small influence. In countries with PR, voters vote for their preferred party - large and small - not in the expectation that their party will "win" and wield all the power, but to give their party's best people and best ideas more influence. How much power does the BC Green Party really have - and how much power is fair? About 1/5 of BC voters chose the Greens, and 2/5 of BC voters chose the NDP. The BC Greens got 17% of the popular vote. That's not peanuts. It's more than the federal NDP attained in many elections. It's more than the federal NDP had when - working with a Liberal minority government - they helped bring in universal health care. Were people yelling about tails wagging dogs then? Without an aggressive strategic voting campaign in BC - as a result of first-past-the-post - even more voters might have voted Green. With the support of 1/5 of BC voters, the Greens are in a limited partnership with the NDP, which means, in general: They get some say in helping to develop policy on the shared objectives which are clearly outlined in the confidence and supply agreement. For a party which earned the support of 17% of voters, that sounds fair to me. Put another way, the NDP does not get to unilaterally ram through it's entire platform after having received 40% of the popular vote. The NDP must compromise with one party or the other until parties representing a majority agree with a policy. NDP and Greens can show voters how PR works As the smaller party, the Greens must show their recent and potential voters that their active participation in the policy making process ADDED VALUE to the legislation that comes out of the government. As the bigger party, the NDP must show voters that they did not give in to any wild and wacky policy demands from the Greens (do you see any in the confidence and supply agreement? I don't...) and that they were still able to implement the most of the important ideas in their platform. Both parties must show they can work together without too much drama and produce a lot of good policy that makes a difference in people's lives. Around the world, governments in countries with proportional representation do this every day. These governments have no more frequent elections and are outperforming countries with majoritarian systems on almost every measurable outcome - from better voter turnout to lower income inequality to greater success in reducing carbon emissions. How the BC government performs is the best sales pitch to voters for proportional representation there could be: Actual lived experience. Opponents will have their work cut out for them to compete with that.