The special committee on electoral reform has spent the last several months gathering expert testimony and hearing opinions from voters across the country, but all that will come to an end this Monday. A dozen members of Parliament are set to attend the meeting in Iqaluit, Nunavut, where voter turnout in the last Federal election spiked sharply but still fell far short of the national average. “We’re very interested in how to ensure a higher voter turnout rate,” said Liberal MP Francis Scarpaleggia, who chairs the committee. In particular, Scarpaleggia says he wants to hear what voters in Nunavut would think of a proportional representation system, where every vote would “count.”
“Would that entice them or encourage them to come out and go out and vote at election time?”
Scarpaleggia says from the committee’s research, it appears as if the voter turnout would go up slightly with a new system, but it would not be “a panacea to the problem.”
He adds that it’s possible Canada should be looking at going “a more consensus-type system” common among Indigenous communities.
Full Article: Electoral reform committee wraps up cross-Canada tour in Iqaluit Monday – North – CBC News.