VANCOUVER—Support and opposition to electoral reform in B.C. falls largely along generational lines, according to a new poll from local public opinion research firm, Research Co.

And the fact that age appears to be such a powerful predictor of whether a British Columbian favours proportional representation (PR) or first-past-the-post (FPTP) likely has to do with how much experience disparate generations have with the current system, said Mario Canseco, president of Research Co.

“When you look at the differences in ages, there’s so many 18-to-34 voters that maybe live in an area where the Greens don’t do well and feel their vote is wasted,” he told StarMetro in an interview. “So there’s that sense of, ‘Let’s make it a little fairer, I want to know that my vote counted to elect at least one person who’s going to be accountable to me.’”

Voters in the over-55 bracket, however, see things differently, Canseco said.

“They’ve been through all the elections, they’ve gone through all the processes of knowing what it’s like to vote a party out,” he said. “I know it sounds ridiculous, but it’s more about tradition. It’s a Westminster thing. You vote for the candidate in your riding, if they win that’s great, if they don’t they didn’t, and then you wait it out and there’s an opportunity to topple the government.”

Research Co’s poll — which took an online survey of 800 adults in B.C. over three days last week — shows 40 per cent of British Columbians would “definitely” or “probably” choose PR if voting today. And the same number would, if voting today, “definitely” or “probably” choose FPTP. But when broken down by age, 57 per cent of voters age 55 and older support FPTP, while 53 per cent of voters ages 18 to 34 support PR.

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This can create tension between political affiliation and age demographic, said Canseco — a tension which plays out very clearly on Vancouver Island, which is a stronghold for both the NDP and the Greens. Given that ideological environment, one would expect the Island would be an easy sell for electoral reform, he said. But the Island is also full of people who are older than 55, and looking at the poll results shows there is nearly even support for both FPTP (42 per cent) and PR (43 per cent), he said.

Even more “mind-blowing,” however, is the fact that Research Co’s poll found “confusion” around how PR works to be the top reason cited by voters for their support of FPTP, Canseco said. The notion that FPTP is fair, or that it is a system which “works well for everybody,” come in a distant second and third.

And in terms of a referendum which could fundamentally shift the way the province conducts its elections, this confusion is a problem, Canseco said. The 2011 HST referendum, for example, was framed in a far more simple way, he said. The choice on that ballot was to keep or to scrap the sales tax.

But in terms of the current referendum, “moving into the second question is the thing that is making people uneasy,” he said. “Two of the systems have never been tested, the other one is a little bit easier to understand but it’s still confusing for somebody who has spent all of their adult life voting for one candidate in one riding.”

This might help explain why older voters are more generally in favour of keeping FPTP, he said. It would also explain, he added, why the current premier used terms such as “lit” and “woke,” in his recent debate with BC Liberal leader Andrew Wilkinson — he understands that mobilizing millennial voters will be key to passing reform.

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“What (FPTP) does is it sends the message that sometimes you win, sometimes you lose …whereas the number one issue for the PR voters is fairness,” he said.

“To me, that’s the essence of the argument.”

Referendum voting packages must be received by Elections B.C. before 4:30 p.m. on Nov. 30, either by mail, or in-person at Service B.C. or local referendum offices.

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