Voting In Canada

Canada’s elections involve high participation of people due to which people get information about various political issues and remain up to date of political events. Due to this, people become educated regarding their political leaders electoral system, laws and policies. This promotes more number of people to cast their vote that enable voters to know that their one vote can make the difference in choosing their representative. In the recent Canadian Elections, Justin Trudeau focused on voter turnout so that all citizens can use their vote especially young generation. Funds offered to political parties during elections are quite surprising in Canada. For Campaign cost, funds are needed. Campaigning is the day prior to election to convince
the voters. In campaign, there are small TV ads, messages on social media in which leaders try to catch the voter’s attention. In the past 2015 Canadas elections, Justin Trudeau use twitter to try to connect with voters as people are more connected to internet. Canada is far away from negative campaigning due to its constitution- The POGG( Peace, Order and Good Governance). To avoid, corruption and unfair elections, there are some laws on campaign cost and funding’s that are offered by unions and corporations. During campaign period, a political party must not spend more than $4.4 million and individual donations must exceed $1500 in British Columbia (Brock and Jansen 60). All these laws are made to promote free and fair elections. So that if a political party when than it can’t make decisions in favour of that corporation and try to create injustice between masses. The good thing about Canadian democracy is that it promotes the interests of all the people. In the history, there are some cases when people demand for something and the government also acted upon them. For instance, the desire of Quebec people is to separate from Canada. Quebec is a French speaking province and the Quebec people want its province to be legitimate. Due to this, Canadian Government allows people to participate in direct representation. It was a kind of referendum in which every citizen of Quebec gave vote so that Canadian Government decide what people want- legitimate Quebec or Quebec to be a part of Canada. Results show that more people want Quebec to be part of Canada.
It is certain that no country is perfectly democratic. The Canadian democracy has also some drawbacks. As the electoral system can make a huge difference in winning the election and same is for Canada electoral system-First-past-the-post that states Single Plurality where plurality refers to the majority. If a party A gets 50% votes and all other parties B, C, and D 50% votes and the party A becomes the ruling party. It can be ensuring that 50% votes that were given to B, C and D were of no use and a wasted. We can say that there were only 50% of voters who want party A as a ruling party and the rest 50% of voters may be against the ideologies or the political actors of party A. Under First-past-the-post System, candidate with larger number of votes in riding wins a seat in the House of Commons (Wells 10). In Canada, we have 338 Constituencies from where Member of Parliament is nominated according to geographical region, population within one square meter of area etc. In this system the electoral ballot contain a list of political leaders under the name of their political parties. Single Transferable Vote means one vote for one person. Even though, it equalises all the people have equal power in political elections. It is the easiest method as voters can cast vote for the individuals. However, it allows only big parties to coming power. In this system many new emerging parties and smaller parties can’t get opportunities to come in power. Due to this some women and Aboriginal people are unable to get seat in the House of Commons. The party wins the elections instead of that here is huge population that is against them. This is the major drawback of Canada’s electoral system. Moreover, the decision making process is also quite lengthy and complex. It take much time to pass policies and bills as these are passed from Executive to Legislative and sometimes these policies are criticized so it goes to the judiciary. For instance, the LGBT marriage, it took many years to pass the laws and finally the judiciary make LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender) rights in Canada. The law was implemented in July 2005 to equalize all the people. It took a long time but in monarchy, there is single ruler who can ensure quick implementation of decision.
Some people also argue about the unelected officials.
Senate, Governor General and even Prime Minister are unelected by common people. We elect our Prime Minister through indirect representational system. As we choose our representatives at provincial or local level and leader of the political party who get majority of seats in the House of Commons becomes the Prime Minister. This can become problematic as one person can become that the Prime Minister whom people don’t like. The Governor General is appointed by the Prime Minister who advises Prime Minister in decisions. Senators are appointed by Governor General on the counsel of Prime Minister as per Geographical divisions. They should have property in the area in which they are appointed. Even though Canada promotes equality among citizens but still there are some cases that appear on news that people are discriminated due to their race ethnicity or color. For instance, in Canada, black men involve 1.25% of the population, yet in ranges as divergent as little city Kingston and Toronto, they are three and half times more probable then whites to be ceased and documented by the police (Warde 462). This questions the Canadian Democracy that equality rights are given to all citizens? Or maybe not?
To conclude, the merits of Canadian Democracy overweight the demerits of democracy. The major drawback of Canadian democracy is the First-past-the-post which the federal government may be changed for the welfare of people. Although democracy have some disadvantages but then to some high extent democracy involves because in Canada people can do whatever they want but under the laws. If we want to see how democratic Canada is, we can compare it with other countries such as Saudi Arabia, North Korea etc. I believe that Canada is very democratic as I have full of freedom for my choices and interests in
Canada.