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Proportional Representation is about Competition and Choice

Imagine only two breweries were allowed to sell beer in British Columbia, one selling only a lager, and the other selling only an IPA. If the government was considering allowing new breweries to enter the market with new products, what would the existing breweries say to try to prevent that?

They would tell people that no one really needs a stout or a pilsner and that witbiers taste bad. They would tell people that somewhere in Europe, someone got sick from drinking the wrong beer once. They would say that some people might choose the wrong beer and that no one really needs a second kind of lager.

Consumer choice - or in this case political choice - isn’t a bad thing though just because some people might choose wrong. It may threaten existing, entrenched political interests, but not the voters themselves that support existing parties. Competition is tough, but it benefits all consumers.

Some existing interests feel threatened by this increased competition - the array of backroom lobbyists and former politicians that make-up the no side in the referendum attest to that - but some see it as an opportunity for improvement and a challenge to be met. Christy Clark and John Horgan are two such politicians - apparently each either viewing their own parties as up for the challenge, or viewing the increased competition from Greens and Conservatives as inevitable, or simply putting the public interests ahead of partisanship.

Outcomes in countries that use proportional representation show that the benefits of greater competition aren’t just hypothetical, but real and measurable too. Countries using proportional representation have lower taxes on investment, lower tariffs, and better economic growth by about 1% per year. They even outperform us on social measures like income inequality, education and the environment, all while spending no more or less on their government and running up 39% less debt.

That’s not to say that British Columbia hasn’t done well - only that we could be doing better, and that improvement is something we should strive for.