VOTING SYSTEMS.

Temuka Leader, Issue 7595, 23 July 1914, Page 4

VOTING SYSTEMS.

M R LAS HUE AT REEL FOREST

Mr (’. Lashlio addressed a ' meeting of Peel Forest residents in the dining room at the store, when about. 'JO people uere present, and Hip ehnir weK taken by Mr W. Honey.

Mr J.ashlie stiid the subject of his address had been advertised in (ho township as '“Voting Systems.’’ He was glad of this, as it gave him an opportunity to go over a fairly comprohensivn field and speak of other phases of the question of voting besides proportional representation. Ho would start! out on the democratic basis of government of the people for the people by the people. He dealt incidentally with the evils of Party Government, saying that it was really not the party in power that governed the country, but ■ simply the major! ty of the party in power. He believed that a good deal of the evils of Party Government, would be abolished by (1) the abolition of the Upper House, (2). by an doctiye Executive, (3) by proportional representation. In speaking of the Upper House, he advocated its entire abolition. The idea that it was a check on hasty legislation was an exploded fallacy. As a chock on hasty legislation it could bo provided that no enactment, shall become law till it has passed two sessions of Parliament. What was the object of representation, and did the present system of election in New (Zealand secure that object ? Obviously everybody could not sit, in Parliament; therefore the object,-of representation should be that every voice should be heard in Parliament. Practically the only way in which this could be accomplished was by an extension of the Referendum principle. While believing in the Referendum as a political principle, il had to be admitted that there were some questions that could not and should not be decided by the people. As a born democrat he favoured the principle of one man one vote, and one vote one value. There were those who thought there ought; to be somie deferential voting, giving more voting power to the man who owned property than to the man who owned nothing. Ho had no sympathy with that idea whatever. There was no reason why a woman with five children should not have as ■ largo a voting power in the community as the man with 5,000 acres of the best land in the country. It was remarked that people .who advocated deferential voting of that kind were usually those who maintained that the barmaid vote on the liquor question should bo worth lA votes and the vote of the mother of a family was only worthy of one vote. His reason for not making a difference in the value, of votes between the rich man and the poor man was that national legislation dealt very largely with social and moral questions, in which case the vote of the poor man was just as valuable as that of the rich. When it, came to more definite questions involving property, the man who had property in different towns had a vote m each place on local elections. Therefore his property was protected to that extent. By means of a blackboard kindly provided by the residents, Mr Lashlio explained various voting systems. .Speaking of the Second Ballot, he said suppose there were five candidates and 3,000 votes were polled. The top man secured 1,01(1 and the other four received 3,1)90 among them. Under the present system, tho man who received only 1,010 would be elected, although there were 3,990 votes polled by people who did not want him. Therefore he had only polled 20 per cent of votes, and had 80 per cent, against him. It was to avoid that kind of thing that the Second Ballot system was tried. Th« drawbacks to this system wore that it was costly, clumsy, and cumbersome, and did not ensure a majority representation. It also lent itself To bribery and corruption between the different factions. It was costly because it cost, .06,000 tho first year iU was in operation, and only returned eight out of 20 candidates. It was also unfair to the last man on the list, in that he- had no further cho.nce of competing against the two top candidates even though only divided from the second candidate by two or three votes. Dealing with the various systems of preference voting, Mr Lashtte took first the Bordas system. By a demonstration on Hie blackboard ho showed that a- man.getting seven votes out of ten could he eventually defeated by the other preference votes. Speaking of Mr McXab’s Bill, he also contended there was the same injustice in this ns was seen in the Second Ballot. In this system the last man’s voles were utilised i for the remaining candidates. There was a similar system which dropped all candidates except the top two. Suppose the voting for four candidates was ns follows Massey MOO, Socialists 1300, Liberal A 120(1, Liberal B 1100. The ultimate fight would be between Massey and (ho Socialist, although this two Liberal candidates held 2,300 votes between them. Thus the electors were forced to choose between one of t'mv.two extremes. Dealing with Mr -I. McCombs’ system, Mr Lashlio said it was one which followed, out Parliamentary practice of placing only two issues before the people at one time, in the same way as waa done at an ordinarily conducted meeting. Mr Lashlio explained this, and showed how two candidates could bo pitted against each other, and the vote calculated as though there wore only two candidates in the field. The loser was then pitted against another candidate and so on, the system of elimination being carried on till eventually a winner was found. While this ’ system certainly had merits over other systems of preferential voting, ho maintained it was not all it claimed to bo. Speaking on Proportional Representation, which he advocated over al] other systems, Mr Lashlio gave his definition of the system as representation in .Parliarment of parties according to their voting strength. If, say, 15,000 votes were cast by the Social-

ista, and 5.000 votes wore required to elect a candidate, the Socialists would ho entitled to throe members. H the Liberals got' i id,(II10 voles, they were entitled to 12 members, and if the Reform Party secured 00,000 votes they were entitled to six members, on taking tho figures for 1011, it was shown that' it took 0,(j38 votes to elect, a Liberal, 5,071 to elect, a Reformer, and 0,700 to elect an Independent, yet the voting power of members of Parliament was exactly equal ; this despite the fact that (he Independent had polled 0,700 votes. To bring Proportional Representation into effect, it would be necessary to have larger electorates. lie suggested 15 electorate*, each returning 5 members. The odd numbers wore preferable! This system would do aWay with parochialism and parish pump politicians would become extinct. The larger areas would produce men with larger ideas. 'This system was in operation in 'Tasmania, and had been fairly successful, but the objection there was brought' about through electing oven numbers of members instead of odd members. They elected G •members in an area instead of, say, five. In regard to the objection that largo areas would benefit the rich man’s candidates, ’Mr Lashlio said if (he Government could subsidise second ballot candidates, they coAild also subsidise I hem under this System. At tho close of the address, which was highly appreciated, one question was asked, and Mr Lashlio answered it satisfactorily. Mr Lashlie was also asked to explain (he three-fifths majority and how it. worked in regard to the liquor question, and this he did by tlic aid of (he ’blackboard. A vote of thanks to Mr Lashlie closed an interesting meeting.