Down to the wire: Will B.C. voters choose electoral reform?

As British Columbians head to the polls Tuesday, May 12, one of the results that will be monitored most closely across the country is the referendum on electoral reform. The B.C. Single Transferable Vote (BC-STV) system needs 60 per cent approval to pass -- in 2005 it came close to reaching that threshold with a 58 per cent 'Yes' vote.

Judy Rebick, among others, thinks that the stakes are high [2] for advocates of electoral reform across the country: "If this referendum fails in B.C., it will set back the cause of electoral reform for a long time."

Over the past month at rabble, we've presented the views of both the 'Yes' and 'No' [3] camps. Some progressives argue that women's representation will suffer [4] under STV, but Dr. Dennis Pilon [5], an academic who has studied electoral reform extensively, says that claim and others [6] made by the 'No' side are not backed up by the evidence.

Tomorrow's result is very much still in question. All the online buzz [7] and lawn sign presence has favoured the 'Yes' side -- in fact 'Yes to STV' proponents dwarf both the NDP and Liberal groups on Facebook. And yet polls indicate that STV may still fall short of the 60 per cent line. We'll know by tomorrow night.

And we'll know then if B.C. (neo)Liberal Premier Gordon Campbell has been elected for a third term or if the NDP has been returned to power. With poll results narrowing, the Vancouver Sun [8] and Province are putting on their usual push to help the Right. CanWest's bottom line may be struggling, but unfortunately the bottom line is that their twin-headed daily newspaper dominance can still have an impact on a close election.

If you are following the B.C. results, log-in to babble [9] and join the prediction [10] and debriefing discussion threads.

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