With the two front runner candidates, Wayne Stetski and David Wilks, currently locked at 37 per cent in the local polls, those voters planning to vote either Green or Liberal need to know that their votes will only serve to help Wilks get re-elected. Only if those of us who want the Harper Conservatives gone, vote together, will we have a chance to rid ourselves of the most undemocratic regime in Canada’s history.
This is the unfortunate reality with our current first-past-the-post election system. Right now voters in Kootenay-Columbia who want to see change in Ottawa number 63 per cent but if we divvy those votes between the three other candidates, the probable outcome is we will not see any change.
When the NDP forms the next government, they have committed to bring in proportional representation for the next federal election. Under this much fairer election system, every party gets a say in Parliament based on the overall percentage of their national vote. We wouldn’t have a repeat of the last four years where the Harper Conservatives, who got only 39 per cent of the overall national vote, have dictated to the majority opposition with 61 per cent of the votes.
For Kootenay-Columbia voters, this is clearly an opportunity to supersize your vote!
Gary Werk
Cranbrook