Posted by blood roses at 3:37pm Jan 24 '06Okay, first some background and history for those who don't know how our system works (some of this is a repost from a previous post I made). Feel free to skip it if you already know!
Background
The way elections work is, the country is divided up into electoral districts. The people in each district vote for a representative. They select from a list of candidates, most of whom are representing one of the major parties. The candidate who gets the most votes wins and becomes a Member of Parliament (MP) and the representative for that district. At the end of the election, the party from which the most MPs were elected forms the government, and the leader of that party becomes the Prime Minister. If the party forming the government has more than 50% of the MPs, they are a Majority Government. Less than 50% and they are a Minority Government. In Canada we usually have majority government, but sometimes there are minorities.
The Prime Minister appoints some of his MPs to the position of Minister (Minister of Health, Minister of Education, etc.) and these Ministers form his Cabinet. Ministers come up with propositions for laws, which are voted on in Parliament. It takes 50% of the votes to get a law passed, and on most bills, MPs have to vote according to the party line. So in the case of a majority government, any laws that the governing party wants passed will be passed. In a minority government, the governing party needs co-operation from the opposition parties to get their laws passed. If the governing party loses a vote on an important bill, it is considered a vote of non-confidence, the Governor General dissolves the government, and we go back to the polls. This often happens in minority governments.
History
The centre-left Liberal party took power in 1993 under the leadership of Jean Chretien, and had three straight majority governments. In December 2003, Chretien was forced out by then Finance Minister Paul [private], who took over the party leadership. He was set to win another majority in June 2004, but then news of a scandal broke... turns out the Liberal party had been funelling federal funds to Liberal-friendly ad companies. This didn't sit well with Canadians, but many Canadians didn't see a viable alternative to the Liberals. The NDP was seen as too left, and the Conservatives were a newly formed party with a new leader who wasn't trusted yet. So the Liberals ended up with a minority government. They worked with the NDP until December 2005 when they were unable to compromise on a bill and the government fell.
Election Results
This election, after seeing more of the Conservatives and Stephen Harper and hearing more about the scandal, Canadians decided the Conservatives were indeed a viable alternative to the Liberals. The voting breakdown is as follows:
Party Seats Vote %
CON 124 36.25%
LIB 103 30.22%
BQ 51 10.48%
NDP 29 17.49%
IND 1 0.52%
OTH 0 5.05%
The Conservatives are in an interesting position. They don't have enough seats to pass bills on their own, so they will have to try to compromise with the other parties somehow. The problem is, the other three parties are all left of centre (BQ is the Bloc Quebecois, the Quebec seperatist party, they represent the interests of the Quebecois who tend to be left wing). THe Bloc will co-operate with them when it comes to giving provinces more powers and responsibilities, but other than that, I"m not sure. For now they'll be aided by the fact that nobody wants another election any time soon, so the other parties will be forced to co-operate with them.
So what does this mean for Canada? Well, as it's a minority government, I dont' forsee any major changes. On the social front... there will be a free vote in Parliament on the same-sex marriage issue, but the NDP, the Bloc and most of the Liberals will vote for same-sex marriage, while most of the Conservatives and some of the Liberals will vote against, so gay marriage will probably stay legal. The abortion issue will probably not come up. The Conservatives will probably try to get harsher sentences for gun violence, and raise the age of sexual consent to 16 (from 14). On the economic front, they've promised to cut the GST (national sales tax) from 7% to 5%. They've also promised to reduce health care wait times, but all the parties always promise that and I'm not sure how they plan to accomplish it. Oh, and they plan to pull out of Kyoto, but I'm not sure they'll be able to do that with a minority government.
That's probably enough on that for now, lol, hope some people found it interesting/informative.
Background
The way elections work is, the country is divided up into electoral districts. The people in each district vote for a representative. They select from a list of candidates, most of whom are representing one of the major parties. The candidate who gets the most votes wins and becomes a Member of Parliament (MP) and the representative for that district. At the end of the election, the party from which the most MPs were elected forms the government, and the leader of that party becomes the Prime Minister. If the party forming the government has more than 50% of the MPs, they are a Majority Government. Less than 50% and they are a Minority Government. In Canada we usually have majority government, but sometimes there are minorities.
The Prime Minister appoints some of his MPs to the position of Minister (Minister of Health, Minister of Education, etc.) and these Ministers form his Cabinet. Ministers come up with propositions for laws, which are voted on in Parliament. It takes 50% of the votes to get a law passed, and on most bills, MPs have to vote according to the party line. So in the case of a majority government, any laws that the governing party wants passed will be passed. In a minority government, the governing party needs co-operation from the opposition parties to get their laws passed. If the governing party loses a vote on an important bill, it is considered a vote of non-confidence, the Governor General dissolves the government, and we go back to the polls. This often happens in minority governments.
History
The centre-left Liberal party took power in 1993 under the leadership of Jean Chretien, and had three straight majority governments. In December 2003, Chretien was forced out by then Finance Minister Paul [private], who took over the party leadership. He was set to win another majority in June 2004, but then news of a scandal broke... turns out the Liberal party had been funelling federal funds to Liberal-friendly ad companies. This didn't sit well with Canadians, but many Canadians didn't see a viable alternative to the Liberals. The NDP was seen as too left, and the Conservatives were a newly formed party with a new leader who wasn't trusted yet. So the Liberals ended up with a minority government. They worked with the NDP until December 2005 when they were unable to compromise on a bill and the government fell.
Election Results
This election, after seeing more of the Conservatives and Stephen Harper and hearing more about the scandal, Canadians decided the Conservatives were indeed a viable alternative to the Liberals. The voting breakdown is as follows:
Party Seats Vote %
CON 124 36.25%
LIB 103 30.22%
BQ 51 10.48%
NDP 29 17.49%
IND 1 0.52%
OTH 0 5.05%
The Conservatives are in an interesting position. They don't have enough seats to pass bills on their own, so they will have to try to compromise with the other parties somehow. The problem is, the other three parties are all left of centre (BQ is the Bloc Quebecois, the Quebec seperatist party, they represent the interests of the Quebecois who tend to be left wing). THe Bloc will co-operate with them when it comes to giving provinces more powers and responsibilities, but other than that, I"m not sure. For now they'll be aided by the fact that nobody wants another election any time soon, so the other parties will be forced to co-operate with them.
So what does this mean for Canada? Well, as it's a minority government, I dont' forsee any major changes. On the social front... there will be a free vote in Parliament on the same-sex marriage issue, but the NDP, the Bloc and most of the Liberals will vote for same-sex marriage, while most of the Conservatives and some of the Liberals will vote against, so gay marriage will probably stay legal. The abortion issue will probably not come up. The Conservatives will probably try to get harsher sentences for gun violence, and raise the age of sexual consent to 16 (from 14). On the economic front, they've promised to cut the GST (national sales tax) from 7% to 5%. They've also promised to reduce health care wait times, but all the parties always promise that and I'm not sure how they plan to accomplish it. Oh, and they plan to pull out of Kyoto, but I'm not sure they'll be able to do that with a minority government.
That's probably enough on that for now, lol, hope some people found it interesting/informative.