- Member of Parliament
- Member of the Joint Interparliamentary Council
Whip of the New Democratic Party
Member of the panel of chairs for the legislative committees
- NDP
- Edmonton Strathcona
- Alberta
- Voting Attendance: 67%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $141,604.97
- Government Page
- Feb/5/24 11:30:00 a.m.
- Watch
Mr. Speaker, I am so happy to stand today and speak in support of Motion No. 86. My colleague from Nanaimo—Ladysmith and the member for Elmwood—Transcona before her have done vitally important work to ensure that electoral reform is a discussion we are having in the House.
We all know why we are in this place right now talking about this. It is because of the failure of the current government to live up to the promises it made to Canadians before being elected.
I read somewhere that the current Prime Minister had mentioned over 1,600 times during the election campaign that he was going to fix our electoral system. Of course, he did not do that. As soon as he had that taste of power, he chose a different route. I think that is why electoral reform is so important. It is to prevent this constant back and forth where we see Liberal, Conservative, Liberal, Conservative, without having to have a majority of votes.
I am hearing a few heckles from the Conservatives. I actually want to touch on that, because, of course, I have been listening to my colleagues from the Conservatives talk about electoral reform, how it works and whatnot. I know that some of the members speaking are being a little disingenuous.
For example, if one were to look at how Conservatives elect their own leaders, one would find that they do not believe that first past the post is the best way to do that. They use a form of electoral reform to elect their own leaders within their party. That is their party politics.
One will often hear them talking in this place about how there is a “coalition” between the New Democrats and the Liberals. Of course, they know very well that there is no coalition, that this is not what is happening. More importantly, we should recognize that coalitions are meant to be part of our electoral system and our parliamentary system.
I know that this is not the culture in Canada to date, but that is the system within which we are working. If anyone ever says that coalitions are illegal, they do not reflect the will of the people or any of that, this is actually incorrect. While we do not have a coalition, I would say that coalitions are part of our electoral system. Moreover, in fact, we have seen many times that the Liberals and the Conservatives work very well together.
My main thinking on this, in terms of why we need electoral reform, is that I feel our politics are becoming so much more divisive, so much more pushed to the sides. The problem is that the vast majority of Canadians do not live on the outside edges. Most Canadians are centrists. They want to see common sense. They want to see their politicians work together. They want to see us working on the things that matter to them. However, because of our political system, things are moved to the side. Things are moved to the edges. It is very dangerous. We are seeing this across the country.
I would be remiss if I did not raise the issue of what is happening in my province of Alberta. This weekend, I was at a rally to protect trans kids, because Premier Smith, and perhaps we should call her “Marlaina” Smith, has decided to make an attack on trans kids.
I have to say that the reason she is doing this is fully political. It is because, in Alberta, the centre, the vast majority of Albertans, are not controlling what our political parties do.
Right now, in Alberta, the far right is controlling what our premier does. We saw this with Jason Kenney. He was not brought down by Albertans; he was brought down by the far right, extreme views of some Albertans, which do not represent the majority of people who cast a ballot in Alberta.
Danielle Smith does not have to protect herself from the centrists. She needs to protect her job by actually going as far right as she can. Who cares about the most vulnerable minority groups in our provinces, who require real leadership from their premier? Who cares about kids who could lose their lives? As long as one keeps one's job, as long as one is able to do that, then one is in good shape.
When I hear the Conservatives in here trying to heckle me and saying that first past the post is the most effective, I think we can see in our country that this is not what is happening. We even see it within the Conservative Party. Erin O'Toole was not brought down by the centrists within the party. He was brought down by the far right. The Leader of the Opposition has to keep the people on the far right happy or lose his job. This is a problem with our electoral system.
I spend a lot of time talking in schools. I used to be a teacher before I was elected. I love meeting with students and talking about our electoral processes. I always talk to them about this idea that we need representation. Our Parliament needs to look like our country. We need to have the same makeup and diversity that makes Canada so wonderful and so strong. It needs to be represented in our Parliament.
The problem is that the current system makes it much harder to ensure that what happens in this House reflects what happens in our beautiful country of Canada. We do not see enough women or minority groups represented in politics. We do not see that diversity of age, ethnicity and language. All those pieces are missing when we have a first-past-the-post system.
When I speak to young people, I always think that they should all be thinking about politics as a potential career, every one of them. We need more people who want to get engaged. We need more women and more diversity within our House of Commons. However, in the back of my mind, I always think it is really hard for women to engage. It is really divisive and hateful. We make it difficult for minority groups to participate, raise their concerns and raise their voices.
I always use child care as a perfect example of that. I mean no offence to my colleagues who are older white men, but if we filled this place with old white men, would they care as much about child care as a young woman with small children would? Do we not think that there is some recognition that a 16-year-old who is going to be living on this planet a lot longer than me, or any other member, would care more about climate justice and climate change than somebody who is wrapping up their career?
Some hon. members: Oh, oh!
Ms. Heather McPherson: I am not naming names.
Mr. Speaker, I think it is very important. I want to end by quoting something we heard from the Edmonton chapter of Fair Vote Canada, which is “really worried about how toxic and divisive our political discourse is becoming. Many people we talk to don't even want to get involved because of it. There is more that holds us together than divides us, but our winner-takes-all voting system is holding us back from solving problems together. A non-partisan citizens' assembly is a way to bring Canadians into the conversation about making our democracy stronger. A Citizens' Assembly can engage Canadians across the country in a conversation about improving our democracy.”
Canadians want this; as representatives of Canadians, we should be making sure that we are moving forward on it. I thank the member for Nanaimo—Ladysmith for all her important work on this.
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- Dec/5/23 6:25:11 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the NDP agrees to apply the vote, and we will be voting yes.
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- Dec/5/23 6:23:34 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the NDP agrees to apply the vote, and we will be voting yes.
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- Dec/5/23 6:22:11 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the New Democratic Party has agreed to apply the vote, and we will be voting no.
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- May/8/23 10:38:28 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I am not one hundred per cent sure what coming votes the member is talking about, but obviously, we would determine how we were voting on something based on which vote it was. That is generally how that works.
I think what she might be referring to is the supply and confidence agreement, where we were able to get the government to move forward on certain things because they are very important values that we hold. We will continue to push the government to do things such as make sure that there is affordable housing, dental care for Canadians and all of those things.
When the government is doing things that we disagree with, I think we are a very effective opposition at being able to hold it to account to make sure that it recognizes it has to take those actions. The fact that we have a diplomat that has been expelled is because all parties in the House were able to do that.
Today, in fact, a vote on the motion was brought forward that we were able to vote on, along with my colleague from the Bloc and, in fact, with the Conservatives, which I guarantee is not a normal state of affairs. We were able to vote as, I guess we can call it, a coalition of the three other parties.
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