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With the declaration that “people don’t care about politicians,” Ontario premier Doug Ford has announced plans to immediately reduce the size of Toronto’s city council by almost half.

Toronto does indeed have one of the country’s largest city councils. With 44 councillors and a mayor, it’s large enough even to rival the size of provincial legislatures in Atlantic Canada.

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Nevertheless, when ranked against other major Canadian cities, Torontonians already have fewer councillors than almost anyone else.

Under the plan that would take effect after the 2019 election, Toronto would gain three more councillors and average one elected representative for every 56,907 residents.

Should Ford be successful in reducing the number of councillors from 44 to 25 plus a mayor, the city would have an average of one elected municipal representative for every 105,060 people.

In Metro Vancouver, by contrast, there are currently 15,893 people per elected municipal representative. Having never faced regional amalgamation, the Vancouver area is still governed by a patchwork of city, town, village and district governments.