The Liberals, NDP, and Bloc are finally working together to form a functional coalition government which represents Canadians far more accurately than the Tory minority we currently have, yet people all over are accusing it of being undemocratic. It’s no surprise that the conservatives are whining, they don’t want to loose totalitarian grip over the other 60% of the country. But even some non-conservatives are buying into the fabrication that a coalition is somehow undemocratic, unjust, or otherwise illegitimate.
The only argument that’s being used against this coalition is that Canadians elected a “Tory government”, and that it is disrespectful or dishonest for the other parties to “steal” the government from them. This is such a flawed argument I’d be amused at its ubiquitous adoption if it weren’t so said that so many Canadians are either idiots or too lazy to look up the facts.
Canadians don’t elect the government, we don’t elect who gets to be in government, we don’t elect which party gets to choose who gets to be in government. When you go to vote you’re choosing who gets to fill that seat in Parliament which is dedicated to your riding. Once all the seats have been filled, the Governor General chooses who forms the government, the rest are in opposition. In a majority situation this is very straight forward, the party with greater than half of the seats form a government which is basically unchallengeable by the opposition, ever. In a minority situation, however, every party could form the government, and whoever does it would need the confidence of (at least some of) the opposition, in forming the government at all, and also in continually operating as government. It almost always ends up being the party with the most seats, but there’s nothing dictating that the party with most seats must necessarily be the one to form a government.
Given that we don’t elect the government, the assertion that a Liberal-NDP coalition somehow goes against the electorate’s wishes as expressed by votes is simply ludicrous. Votes are expressed in the amount of seats a party receives, which is the degree of representation the voter gets in parliament. They are totally irrelevant to the issue of government formation. That is left to the parties to work out, the party with most support in parliament from the government.
A coalition government is just a number of parties collaborating to form the government instead of one larger party. Aside from that (and perhaps some more negotiations), it works the same as a normal minority government. This is a form of government commonly found in numerous countries including Germany, Israel, Ireland, Belgium, India, and Finland. It is the most common form of government resulting from proportionally representative electoral systems, where the amount of representation in parliament (or the equivalent thereof) closely approximates the amount of voter support. This is far more democratic than the current Canadian system in which a 3% difference in votes could result in a 16% difference in seats (0 vs. 50).
Our current seat distribution, of course, did not result from a proportionally representative election. However a coalition government in the present situation is still much more democratic than the current Tory government which with 40% of Canadian support rules the country akin to a fascist dictatorship. One does not need to look far to notice the Bush-appeasing, anti-liberty, anti-culture, and draconian legislation that Harper’s government have introduced during his reign, including Bills C-10,42,51,52,60,61, ACTA, SPP, and numerous impositions of minimum sentences to Criminal Code offences, and that’s just what I can recall from recent history without references. A coalition government with the current parliamentary makeup, while not perfect (it still excludes the Greens altogether), would at the very least put 60% of Canadian support in government.
At this point the coalition-hater objects: they’re a bunch of small parties, none of which gained more support from Canadians than the Conservative party. Why should they now “turn” the results over and group together? This is probably accompanied by the suggestion that if they wanted majority vote, they should have all consolidated into a single party like the right-wing did, turning Canada into a two party state.
What a stupid objection to be making, with almost as stupid a suggestion. The champions of anti-coalition sentiment brand themselves as defenders of democracy, and yet, guess who becomes upset when different parties actually work together for once (instead of pointing fingers indefinitely). Our electoral system is far from perfect, given its tendency to place disproportionate amounts of power in parties with minority support. But how would further degrading this system by eliminating voter choice solve the underlying flaws of the system? Patching a broken dam with band-aid doesn’t help, we need to build a new dam, or in this case a new electoral system: a system of proportional representation.
The claim that a coalition is undemocratic becomes even more laughable when you consider the blatant hypocrisy in such statement, Harper himself showing utter disregard for democracy when he manipulated the system for personal gains. The person who called an undue election, tried to strangle every other party to financial death, wiretapped opposition phone calls, and willing to employ any tactic just to stay in power is hardly qualified for any position of authority in democratic governance.
When the Harper government falls, there would be two possible outcomes: either the Liberal-NDP coalition forms government, or we have another election. I personally don’t mind another election, but in light of the recent waste of 300 million dollars, a lot of people would disagree with me. That leaves the Liberal-NDP coalition, which being in complete accordance with our constitution, is the most sensible option to take.
Update: Just came across a Macleans post, Harper himself proposed exactly what he’s now calling undemocratic when he was in opposition.