Quebec was to have a referendum on a proposed new mixed-member electoral system concurrent with the next provincial election in 2022. However, that plan is now “on hold” as the bill will not be passed in time.
Quebec was to have a referendum on a proposed new mixed-member electoral system concurrent with the next provincial election in 2022. However, that plan is now “on hold” as the bill will not be passed in time.
Fruits and Votes 
To be fair, it would be hard to predict that a provincial election would take place in 2022.
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Getting cold feet on electoral reform?
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Westminster governments like Quebec control the allocation of parliamentary time in excruciating detail. There’s no time to pass the bill actually means We haven’t allocated enough time to pass the bill because we don’t want it to pass.
The government of Quebec is to be congratulated. Until today I thought Canadian politicians had exhausted the supply of excuses for the Great Electoral Filibuster that has been running since the beginning of this century. Those excuses have included no parliamentary consensus (Trudeau), no supermajority (BC), not enough turnout (PEI).
The Quebec government has taken excuse-making to a whole new level and no doubt the people of Quebec are anxiously guarding their homework from the dog that will arrive at any minute.
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I think we should be surprised that electoral reform got as far as it did. In addition to the usual reasons we wouldn’t expect a party governing under FPTP to change the electoral system, urban Anglophone Montreal is to the Quebec Liberals as Alberta and Saskatchawan is to the federal Conservatives: that is to say, the Liberals run up huge wasteful margins in those seats, making it systematically more likely that the main non-Liberal party will win an unjustified majority. Interestingly, the Liberals were the only party to oppose electoral reform, or at least they were during the last election.
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“I think we should be surprised that electoral reform got as far as it did.” I have said exactly that about quite a few federal and provincial reform processes in Canada.
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Final Coda: The CAQ government has formally given up on electoral reform. Given where Quebec politics is right now, it means electoral reform in Quebec is probably dead for at least a decade.
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Some time in 2221 Canada will hold its umpteenth electoral reform referendum. By that time the required majority for reform will be 99.9% and governments will be free to ignore the result anyway. Naturally all parties will promise electoral reform as a major priority.
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Personally I’m astonished that a large party that can expect to benefit from FPTP for the foreseeable future has decided to keep FPTP.
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My reaction, too, especially when I saw a poll showing they are likely headed to a large majority of seats in the upcoming election.
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Makes the whole endeavor a bit depressing. There’s a constitutional challenge going on with a lot of academic involvement but I don’t have much hope there.
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