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Originally Posted by Igottago
That would be awesome in theory, but people can't even be bothered to get off their asses and vote in the current federal, provincial, or municipal elections. Will having another decision to make people more willing to participate? And as the initial poster said, is a representative senate going to decrease the effieciency of an already slow moving process?
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Depends. I suspect that most people who dont vote now would not with elected Senators either. For some, probably a small minority, it might encourage them as they might begin to believe their vote may count for something. Especially people in those provinces not named Ontario and Quebec.
However, for those of us who do care, and want the right to determine who represents us in government, it is a good thing.
Quote:
Originally Posted by octothorp
I'd be very curious to see the national response to this. I seem to recall that when Alberta first elected senators in waiting, there was a huge number of spoiled or blank ballots--something like 40% as a protest of the idea of an elected senate. And even during the most recent election, the spoil rate was 20%. And this is in the province where the notion is supposedly universally endorsed. If senates were elected nationally, we might see a spoiled-ballot rate above 50% nationally.
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I very, very, very strongly doubt that 40% of voters deliberately spoiled their ballots as a protest. 40% of ballots may have been spoiled, but I suspect someone is revising history as to why.