Dear Editor,

This is a response to the letters: An open letter to Brennan Day, the newly elected representative for the riding of Courtenay-Comox, and Election again shows we need to change our voting system. 

Both writers have expressed the same deep concern over the dysfunctional electoral system, first past the post, which produces wasted votes, in this case, some 60-plus per cent. That is the percentage of voters who voted for someone other than Brennan Day.

The vast majority of Western democracies use proportional representation, an electoral system that recognizes almost 100 per cent of the votes cast. These democracies chose proportional representation because it truly reflects the citizens' voices. First past the post was laid on us by Queen Victoria as a temporary system.

There have been several commissions looking into electoral reform. Some provinces have had referenda on electoral reform.  Vested interests, politicians who don't want to give citizens a real voice, because they don't want to change the electoral system that got them elected have blocked the change.

One present example of the distortion of the voice of the people is the two seats that the Greens won.  Under a fair and more democratic system, they would have won seven or eight seats instead of just two.

Who wouldn't want to know that their vote was not wasted, as they placed it in the ballot box?

Daryl Sturdy

Vancouver