The Star. SATURDAY, APRIL 28, 1928. VIGILANCE NEEDED.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17027, 28 April 1923, Page 8

The Star. SATURDAY, APRIL 28, 1928. VIGILANCE NEEDED.

Proportional representation has enough enemies to ensure an early attack on it from a section of the now council, and thea-efore it is well that supporters of the system should not only be on their guard against any attack, but should also do thair utmost to secure the perfecting of the system in one or two minor details. So far it has had a. hard fight to establish itself, principally because it has never appealed particularly to those in power, since they have owed their success to other systems. An instance of this is to be found, in general politics, in the Reform Party’s hostility to the system, w4iich is anathema to Mr Massey, although he used to think it -was good enough for the Upper House. The old systems always appeal to the conserva-tive-minded, notwithstanding the obvious jerrymandering to which they lend themselves. Mr Massey has been able to retain office for j-ears on a minority vote in the country, a fact which he conveniently overlooks in his somewhat bombastic anticipations of a record equal to that of Seddon’s. Rut of course the old systems do not offer a. premium to Conservatism, as such. They are likely to be seized on by any compact body that- can rely on a division in the oamp of its opponents. An illustration of this fact was forthcoming in the Wellington Mayoral contest, in which the successful candidate, with 10,830 votes, had 14,897 votes cast against him. It so happened that the winner on this occasion was a Conservative, but the Labour candidate, a particularly “Red” standard-bearer, only required a turnover of 127 votes to have secured the seat. A still more striking illustration of the unfairness of the old system occurred in tile election of councillors for Wellington. Although 10,576 votes were east for the Labour candidate for the Mayoralty—or more than 41 per cent of the total—Labour secured only two seats out of fifteen on the council, or 18.3 per cent. This result. clearly, was attributable to the working of a bad electoral law. Christchurch has outgrown such a system, but it is as well to point out to those who may contemplate a reversion to the old aj-stem (for the purpose, let us say, of putting Labour clean out of the Christchurch City Council) that the evils of the system do not always lend themselves to manipulation by majorities, but may be availed of to the advantage of well-organised minorities. However, it is hardly necessary, at this late hour, to extol the proportional system, which has such obvious advantages, and is so well appieciated, in principle, by the majority of the people. But it is quite necessary to disarm any unfair criticism that may be levelled at the system. It is true that 1380 invalid votes were cast at the election of councillors in Christchurch on Thursdays or nearly 7 per cent of the total votes cast, but fortunately for proportional representation there was an even greater percentage of invalid votes (nearly 9 per cent) in the simple “ yes ” or “no” loan proposal for a concert hall, while 500 persons or more invalidated their papers on the straight-out Mayoral issue. Therefore it appears that the removal of the cause of confusion—the multiplicity of the methods of marking the papers—would get over the invalid vote difficulty. There is another matter, however, that might very well be considered in time lor the next election, and that is the division of the city into two areas for the purpose of simplifying the voting papers. Cointhe law- should be amended to provide some penalty for what might be called a hopeless entry. In Thursday’s election one of the candidates received only twenty-four first preferences. while another received eoventyfour. These candidates, under any other electoral law in New Zealand, would almost certainly have forfeited their deposits, but under proportional representation they escape this penalty, and a formula has yet to bo devised that will fairly determine at what point the candidate should lose his deposit. Then again the “ alphabetical advantage ” should be eliminated b> a ballot for place* on the voting papers, and It would be better to print the instructions to voters at the top of the ballot paper than at the bottom. With these amendments the system of voting should be simple enough for the average intelligence, and the work of the returning officers would bp simplified.