NOVA SCOTIA ELECTION RESULTS : PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION

Those in favour of proportional representation, say aye. Okay, so not many of you spoke up. For those who do lean towards such a method of choosing representatives for government positions, the pie charts below will invariably support your opinions. Rather than the 31/11/10/0 seat arrangement figured by the election last night, the collective popular vote would give the Green Party one seat. The NDP would not fill a majority of the seats, the Liberals would have more than a quarter of the House and the PCs would be closing in on one-in-four. Instead, you have the following.



With just over 45% of the vote, the NDP receives almost 60% of the seats in the legislative assembly. Despite garnering almost a quarter of the vote, the PCs sit in less than 1/5th of the House. And the Liberals, with 27.22% of Nova Scotians on their side, see barely 1/5th of the seats filled by Grits. Moreover, the Greens received over 1,500 votes in the Valley; over 1,200 votes in Cape Breton; over 4,000 votes in the Halifax region; almost 1,600 votes in the northeastern section of the mainland; and more than 1,000 votes in southern Nova Scotia. Yet those votes amount to nothing in the legislature. I almost feel like converting myself to a supporter of proportional representation.

And before you say that our parliamentary system is proportional, let me point out that it is not only disproportionate based on last night's results, but we don't live in a democracy either. "Shock," you say. "Heresy," another shouts. Listen, if this were a democracy, we'd be having referendums on every issue. We don't choose how our government governs. We choose the choosers.