Ontario is reversing direction yet again with the construction of the ‘GTA West Corridor’, a brand new $6-Billion highway cutting directly through the greenbelt and decimating acres of fertile farmland. Saving commuters an estimated 30 seconds worth of travel time, the project was deemed such a colossal waste of money that it was cancelled by the previous Liberal Government. The decision to reverse course has been roundly condemned by opposition parties representing 60% of the province’s voters.
The new highway comes at a time when cities across the province are begging for increased investment in their infrastructure. Hamilton recently had its LRT project cancelled only to be brought back as a scaled-down version subject to Federal funding and northern Ontario communities are crying out for the government to honour its election pledge and reinstate rail service to the north. Not to mention, Toronto has a massive backlog of infrastructure to repair that could threaten to balloon to tens of billions of dollars in the years to come.
All these would objectively be better places to direct funding rather than Doug Ford’s economically and environmentally destructive pet project of a road. So why is he so adamant about building it?
Well, there are several reasons:
Firstly, the conservative base is concentrated in the suburbs and rural areas. These voters tend to be far more dependent on cars; therefore, it is more politically beneficial for the PCs to build a new road to shore up votes in these areas rather than projects located in safe opposition ridings.
Secondly, the road goes through several swing ridings that could be pivotal come election time. Offering these voters a juicy new highway could be the difference between a second Ford term or a defeat landing him back in opposition. This is all thanks to the swinging stark nature of our First Past the Post voting system.
So how would this be different under proportional representation? As seats would be divided proportionally, the electoral benefits of appealing to swing ridings all but disappear. This is because the conservatives would still need to appeal to voters in urban areas, even if they don’t have a plurality of support.
However, this situation is not just isolated to the conservatives but is another in a long list of examples of parties being incentivized to act against the best interests of the people in this province. It’s time to drive First Past the Post out of our politics and deliver Canadians a system built to cater to the needs of the many instead of the demands of the few.
Webinar Tomorrow: February 24, 7 pm EST
From Trudeau’s pledge to end first past the post to referendums in both Ontario and BC, recent electoral reform initiatives in Canada have failed to change our voting systems.
To learn from these initiatives and understand why they failed, join Fair Vote Toronto for a webinar with Laura Stephenson, Professor of Political Science, Western University and David Moscrop, Political Commentator & Host, ‘Open To Debate’.
One of the earliest proposals of proportional representation was by John Adams in his influential pamphlet Thoughts on Government, written in 1776 during the American Revolution:
“It should be in miniature, an exact portrait of the people at large. It should think, feel, reason, and act like them. That it may be the interest of this Assembly to do strict justice at all times, it should be an equal representation, or in other words equal interest among the people should have equal interest in it.”