Update: This article describes my initial thoughts on a proportional voting system involving exactly two MPs per riding. I later found out about Dual Member Proportional (DMP) a fully developed system similar in essence to the one described here.

The country of Adanac has recently held its first election using a new voting system called Cooperative Proportional. In this system, every riding elects two MPs who cooperate to serve their constituents’ needs. Since Adanac has 10 ridings, its House of Commons has 20 seats.

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Update: This article describes my initial thoughts on a proportional voting system involving exactly two MPs per riding. I later found out about Dual Member Proportional (DMP) a fully developed system similar in essence to the one described here.

(Download PDF)

If there’s one change Canadians want to see in our electoral system, it’s a little more proportionality. According to a recent Abacus Data survey¹, Canadians would prefer a Mixed Member Proportional (MMP) system to ranked ballots. The survey participants also favoured the goal that “the number of seats held by a party in Parliament closely matches their actual level of support throughout the country” to other electoral changes such as ensuring MPs have majority support in a district, electing more women and people with diverse backgrounds, or electing more independents. If Canada’s voting system were to change, yet fail to move even slightly in the direction of proportional representation, the reform would be regarded as disappointing at best.

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Update: This article describes my initial thoughts on a proportional voting system involving exactly two MPs per riding. I later found out about Dual Member Proportional (DMP) a fully developed system similar in essence to the one described here.

(Download PDF)

As Canada considers its options for electoral reform, I put forward a new voting system called Cooperative Proportional (CP).

The system is cooperative in two regards. First, instead of choosing a single candidate to run in a riding, a party chooses one candidate and one co-candidate who cooperate to win votes. Second, instead of electing a single MP to represent their riding, voters elect one representative and one co-representative who cooperate to serve the constituents. A riding’s representative and co-representative may be from the same party or from different parties, or one or both could be independents. They should have equal standing in the House of Commons, and their riding-level decisions should be made by consensus. Although two MPs are elected in each riding, the ridings would double in size so that the total number of seats remains the same.

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