Justin Trudeau's 16 word report on electoral reform

Results of the public consultation on electoral reform in the Papineau riding

"most were favourable to the idea of a proportional and mixed-proportional voting system"

Discussion of electoral reform in Canada suffered from an almost total four month legacy media blackout on the more than 40 Electoral Reform Committee meetings held in June through October and the over 300 witnesses who testified at them. Ditto the cross-Canada community consultations held by the committee, individual MPs, and Minister Monsef. 

That changed on October 19 when Justin Trudeau told LeDevoir that there was possibly less public appetite for electoral reform now that Harper was gone and consequently we might be getting proportionately Small Change rather than the promised Real Change.

Today from PostMedia : Trudeau quietly held town hall where most were in favour of proportional voting system

The portion at top is from the 3-1/2 page report on that October 6th town hall produced and submitted to ERRE. It was one week after four MSM opinion pieces in early October suggested Trudeau dump electoral reform altogether (or at least kick it up to the 2019 election promises), but one week before his remarks to LeDevoir. 

Make of that what you will.


Democratic Institutions Minister Maryam Monsef also came under fire last week in Victoria BC for echoing his remarks on a diminishing public will for electoral reform and the difficult political realities of proceeding without public consensus for a specific system of change. 
Here's Monsef's opening remarks to the Waterloo public consult on September 14th. Watching her here, I think she means what she says; what we don't yet know is whether the Trudeau government means what she says.



h/t Laurel Russwurm for Monsef vid. Laurel replaced an unusable bit of vid in the middle with stills but keep going - the vid comes back.
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