Liberals good idea

[FlamesAddiction]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

Can we use a giant space laser.

As far as spliting seats to reflect demographic, cultural and political necessities, wouldn't that be incredible divisive?

You would literally never get a governmental change as most of those seats would vote along traditional party lines.

Divisive, sure... but more democratic and less alienation if you increase regional powers. Canada is too big to be as centralized as it is both at the federal and provincial levels. As it stands right now, in most areas of the country, we have urban voters making choices for rural people, easterners making decisions for westerners, southerners making decisions for northerners, wealthy for poor (and vice-versa), and so on...

[redforever]

As others have alluded to, seats in the House of Commons are either guaranteed by senatorial clauses (involves changing the Constitution) or various Amalgam Formulae.

1915 – The senatorial clause
In 1915, the first change was made to the original representation formula, by the adoption of the "senatorial clause." Still in effect today, this clause states that a province cannot have fewer seats in the House of Commons than it does in the Senate. In 1915, it had the immediate effect of guaranteeing four seats to the province of Prince Edward Island, instead of the three it would otherwise have had. It has had four seats ever since.

1974 – The "amalgam" formula
In 1974, concern over the continuing loss of seats by some provinces prompted Parliament to adopt the Representation Act, 1974, which, among other things, guaranteed that no province could lose seats.
In February 1974, the Standing Committee on Privileges and Elections established that:

The objective must be adequate and realistic representation of all Canadians bearing in mind the historic undertakings arising out of Confederation and its responsibilities. The allocation of seats (in the House of Commons) is at the very heart of the Confederation compromise.

A "compromise" was therefore proposed to deal with representation in the House of Commons. The new formula, the third in our history, was more complicated than earlier ones. As in the pre-1946 rules, Quebec was used as the basis for calculations, but there were three differences. First, Quebec would henceforth be entitled to 75 seats instead of 65. Second, the number of seats assigned to Quebec was to grow by four at each subsequent readjustment in such a manner as to slow down the growth in the average population of an electoral district. Third, three categories of provinces were created: large provinces, those having a population of more than 2.5 million, intermediate provinces, namely, those with populations between 1.5 million and 2.5 million, and small provinces, with populations under 1.5 million. Only the large provinces were to be allocated seats in strict proportion to Quebec; separate and more favorable rules were to apply to the small and intermediate provinces.

The amalgam formula has been applied once, leading to the establishment of 282 seats in 1976.

THE PRESENT FORMULA
Following the 1981 census, calculations revealed that the amalgam formula would result in a substantial increase in the number of seats in the House of Commons both immediately and after subsequent censuses (369 seats were projected after 2001). Effectively putting a hold on the process already underway to reassign seats, Parliament passed the Representation Act, 1985. It came into effect in March 1986.
The adoption of the Representation Act, 1985 greatly simplified the formula described in the amended section 51 of the Constitution Act, 1867 for calculating representation.

The current formula for representation is applied by carrying out the following four steps:

1 – Allocation to the territories
Starting with the 282 seats that the House of Commons of Canada had in 1985, one seat is allocated to the Northwest Territories, one to the Yukon Territory and one to Nunavut, leaving 279 seats. This number is used to calculate the electoral quotient.

2 – Calculation of the electoral district average
The total population of the ten provinces is divided by 279 to obtain the "electoral quota" or "quotient", which is used to determine the number of seats for each province.

3 – Distribution of seats to each province
The theoretical number of seats to be allocated to each province in the House of Commons is calculated by dividing the total population of each province by the quotient obtained in step 2. If the result leaves a remainder higher than 0.50, the number of seats is rounded up to the next whole number.

4 – Adjustments
After the theoretical number of seats per province is obtained, adjustments are made in a process referred to as applying the "senatorial clause" and "grandfather clause."

As we have seen, since 1915, the senatorial clause has guaranteed that no province has fewer members in the House of Commons than it has in the Senate. The Representation Act, 1985 brought into effect a new grandfather clause that guaranteed each province no fewer seats than it had in 1976 or during the 33rd Parliament.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by Slava

Could you just increase everyone elses seats and thereby reduce the influence of PQ? Is it written in the constitution that they will always have a certain percentage of the seats, or just that we couldn't reduce them?

Frankly reducing the impact is more important anyway, and having a larger parliament isn't the worst thing that we could see happen.

You could increase seats, I don't recall Quebec being guaranteed x percentage of the seats.

Section 51 is fairly complex, and it spun my head a couple of times.

But reducing seats is definately a constitutional issue, Quebec is guaranteed that their seats will always increase.

[Barnet Flame]

It is a good and seemingly sensible idea. However, the angst and the expense involved in amending the Constitution would probably negate the projected savings for some time to come.

[redforever]

Originally Posted by getbak

Personally, I'd like to see the number of seats set at 300 with the distribution revised at set intervals to reflect changes in the distribution of population.



The problem, as you pointed out, is that reducing any province's number of seats would require a change to the Constitution, and we all know how well that goes in this country.

Without a Constitutional change, you can't reduce any province's number of seats in the House; so, the only way to bring the distribution of seats into a more equitable alignment is to add seats for the under-represented provinces.

You can reduce seats as long as you don't reduce them below what is guaranteed by senatorial clauses or the amalgem formulae.

[Hack&Lube]

Constitutional change is a death sentence for a political party in this country if history shows us anything

[redforever]

Further to other formulae used to determine the number of constituencies in Canada is the:

Constitution Act, 2007 (Democratic representation) (clause 1).
Clause 2 replaces section 51(1) of the Constitution Act, 1867. Included are four rules that outline the calculation for readjusting seat assignments to the provinces in the House of Commons. These are as follows:

1 - The total population of the provinces shall be divided by the “electoral divisor” (see below). The quotient obtained shall then be used to divide the population of each province, which in turn produces a quotient equal to the number of seats assigned to a given province (counting numerical remainders in excess of 0.50 as one after the latter division).

2 - Should the assigned number of seats for a given province derived either through rule 1 or by the application of section 51(A) of the Constitution Act, 1867, also known as the “senatorial clause,” be lower than the number of seats assigned to that province on the date of the coming into force of the Constitution Act, 1985 (Representation), a corresponding number of members will be added to bridge the difference produced by a readjustment.

3 -Additional seats will be assigned to any province that has not experienced an increase as a result of the application of both rules 1 and 2, so that its number achieves an electoral quotient as close as possible to that of the most populous province to receive additional seats, provided that the province in question has a lower population than the most populous province to receive additional seats.

4 a) The “electoral divisor” for the first readjustment to the number of seats in the House after the coming into force of the bill is calculated by dividing the total population of the provinces, using the most recent decennial census, by the number of members in the House of Commons assigned to all provinces in the first readjustment that followed the coming into force of the Constitution Act, 1985 (Representation).

4 b) The “electoral divisor” for subsequent seat readjustments will be derived by dividing the total population of the provinces, using the most recent decennial census, by the number of members of the House of Commons thirty years prior to this most recent decennial census.



Clause 3 of the bill prescribes that, for the purposes of interpretation, a reference to the Constitution Acts, 1867 and 1982 is deemed to include a reference to this Act.
Commentary

Issues and Concerns

Bill C-56 is part of a broader package of democratic reforms introduced by the government. The purpose of the bill is to bring the Canadian electoral system closer to its original principle of representation by population. Compared with the formula currently employed for readjusting the number of seated members in the House of Commons, a readjustment using the formula prescribed by Bill C-56 arguably draws nearer to the principle of representation by population. According to the latter formula, the fastest growing provinces of Alberta, British Columbia and Ontario would be scheduled to receive a share of seats in the House of Commons after the 2011 readjustment closer to, and in some cases, virtually identical to their share of the total population of the provinces.

However, it has been pointed out by the Premier of Ontario, Dalton McGuinty, among others, that even under the new readjustment regime provided by Bill C-56, Ontario will remain under-represented in the House.

Further concerns have been raised in the Quebec National Assembly. Although the province will retain its 75 seats, Quebec’s seat percentage in the House will decline under the new readjustment regime. On 16 May 2007, the National Assembly unanimously adopted a motion calling on the government to withdraw its democratic reform package.

It may also be worth noting that Bill C-56 employs an upward moving divisor to calculate seat readjustments in the House of Commons. As such, the increases in the number of members sitting in the House will be larger than those achieved through a formula based on a fixed electoral divisor.

Further, 30 years after the coming into force of the bill, the effect of these additional seat increases will compound itself by employing a seat total as readjusted by an upward moving electoral divisor, as opposed to a seat total readjusted with a fixed electoral divisor. This may potentially lead to a situation similar to the unacceptably large seat readjustments produced by the “amalgam” formula.

http://www.parl.gc.ca/About/Parliament/LegislativeSummaries/Bills_ls.asp?ls=c56&Parl=39&Ses=1

[cal_guy]

The Representation Act, 1985 (which cover the Grandfather rule where no province can have less seats than in 1985) was enacted under the Section 44 amendment rules which only required House of Commons and Senate support. The Liberal proposal does not attempt to remove the requirement that each province have at least the same amount of MPs as Senators which would have required provincial support.

[Bownesian]

Originally Posted by cal_guy

The Representation Act, 1985 (which cover the Grandfather rule where no province can have less seats than in 1985) was enacted under the Section 44 amendment rules which only required House of Commons and Senate support. The Liberal proposal does not attempt to remove the requirement that each province have at least the same amount of MPs as Senators which would have required provincial support.

Which means that the proposed redistribution would continue the over-representation of the four atlantic provinces because all 4 are either one seat over their Senate minimum (NS, NL) or are at it (NB, PEI).

In an ideal world, I'd prefer a constitutional amendment to either option - something along the lines of a minimum of 1 per territory or province plus 1 MP/150,000 people or so to keep the number of MPs at around 250. Unfortunately, the Canadian Constitution is almost unamendable because of the requirement to have 2/3 of the provinces and 50% of the population agree.

[Bownesian]

For those interested, I saw a good chart (in link below). I'd be OK with this version, assuming it's just a legislative change and doesn't require a constitutional amendment.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/...ats-house.html

[getbak]

Originally Posted by redforever

You can reduce seats as long as you don't reduce them below what is guaranteed by senatorial clauses or the amalgem formulae.

Yes, but the only provinces that currently have more seats than they are guaranteed are Alberta, BC, and Ontario, and they're the provinces that are underrepresented.

Originally Posted by Bownesian

For those interested, I saw a good chart (in link below). I'd be OK with this version, assuming it's just a legislative change and doesn't require a constitutional amendment.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/...ats-house.html

Unfortunately, it does require changing the Constitution.

The numbers proposed by the Liberals would drop Quebec, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Nova Scotia, and Newfoundland & Labrador below their 1985 levels, which are guaranteed in the Constitution.

In order to make the amendment, it would have to be passed by both the House and the Senate, plus 2/3 of Provincial Legislatures. Since it would negatively impact half the provinces, all it would take is 4 provinces to vote against it, and that would be that.

[SebC]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

If you want to see a strong resurgance by the Bloc, try reducing Quebec's seats. Besides it currently being unconstitutional, it would give Quebec strong election time ammunition for a federalist seperatist party.

78/338 = 0.231
72/308 = 0.234

Quebec comes out better under the Liberal proposal than under the Conservative one.

[cal_guy]

Originally Posted by getbak

Unfortunately, it does require changing the Constitution.

The numbers proposed by the Liberals would drop Quebec, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Nova Scotia, and Newfoundland & Labrador below their 1985 levels, which are guaranteed in the Constitution.

In order to make the amendment, it would have to be passed by both the House and the Senate, plus 2/3 of Provincial Legislatures. Since it would negatively impact half the provinces, all it would take is 4 provinces to vote against it, and that would be that.

That clause falls under section 44 of the Constitution, as such it does not have to be approve by the provinces.

[getbak]

Originally Posted by cal_guy

That clause falls under section 44 of the Constitution, as such it does not have to be approve by the provinces.

If you say so...Honestly, reading all the clauses and conditions makes my head hurt: http://laws.justice.gc.ca/eng/Const/...sc:7-bo-ga:l_V