Let's make the federal NDP relevant again...

Do you think you’ll see serious federal electoral reform in your lifetime? Neither do I.

That’s just depressing, because the system we have isn’t working very well for us at the moment:

Since May of 2004 we’ve had three elections, each costing us about $300 million, each producing a minority government. Our most recent government, elected last September, almost didn’t make it to Christmas, and could easily fall before Spring if the Conservative leadership hasn’t learned how to govern according to their mandate. (that’s under 38% of the 59.1% of eligible voters who bothered to turn out – the lowest percentage in Canadian history)

At present we have 5 competitive parties, the least of which (Greens) pulled 6.8% of the vote last time. This means the next election will probably produce another minority. However, should it produce a majority, the party that forms government will almost certainly have commanded far fewer than 50% of the votes cast, and will nonetheless rule as if the Prime Minister were an absolute monarch.

We’ve already experienced that, and it didn’t make us happy. Lots of us agreed with the Globe’s Jeffrey Simpson at the time when he complained that Prime Minister Chrétien had concentrated so much power in his office that Liberal MPs had effectively become rubber stamps. Since then the situation has only grown worse; the democratic ideals of the Reform Party (remember when it ran on a platform of MPs representing constituents rather than a party?) have transmuted into the absolute obedience to Prime Ministerial diktat required of Conservative MPs. One really cannot blame voters for tuning out.

So people like me were pretty impressed by the Liberal-NDP “Accord on a Cooperative Government” signed in December, just before the Governor-General prorogued Parliament. For one thing, the proposed coalition represented 44% (as opposed to 38%) of the electorate, and would have represented 55% when supported by the Bloc. (over 60% if one includes the Greens, who of course didn’t win a seat). For another, it proved political parties could cooperate to work in the best interests of the country. It set out an achievable agenda and a time-frame. It appeared to put off another inevitable election. It held promise of reflecting the views most Canadians have of the common good.

To us it appeared to be a welcome and civilized alternative to an unusually-petty and dogmatically-partisan government.

Well, we all think we know how that turned out, although the final pages of the script have yet to be written. The punditry has pretty uniformly concluded that events have killed the deal, even though in the meantime popular opinion turned from overwhelmingly against in December to 50% in favour by mid-January. Apparently so far voters tend to like the idea of Prime Minister Ignatieff.

And what’s not to like? A Liberal-NDP government could surely find (or compromise on) policies on the big issues of the day – the economy, the environment, social policy...– which would be an improvement on what we have presently and wouldn’t offend any of our core values. Surely we can accept incrementalism, particularly if it’s effective.

I suspect we’d be a lot less happy with prime Minister Ignatieff, the leader of a majority Liberal government.

Whether the coalition comes together or not, we NDPers should hold on to the idea. During the last election many of us were not happy with the “I’m Jack Layton, and I’m running for Prime Minister” campaign, when nobody, Layton included, thought he’d actually be Prime Minister in the foreseeable future. But he and the rest of the New Democrat caucus could be a key part of any number of coalition governments in the future, and the country would be the better for it, because all our MPs would have a voice in the government caucus, inevitably some of our policy ideas would be in play, and some of our people would even hold portfolios in cabinet.

I bet we’d still pull about 15% of the vote, maybe more if voters knew that voting NDP could mean a vote for an ethical, socially and environmentally-conscious, majority government.

That may not be the proportional representation we really need, but it’s doable, now.

And it could be a lot better than what we have.