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That’s not terribly complicated, either to understand or to implement, meaning it could be done in time for the next election — especially if it were done without a referendum. That would certainly please the Liberals. Not only is it the system they most probably prefer, but it would allow them to say they had kept their election promise.

And the opposition? Why might they agree to this plan, notwithstanding their hostility to ranked ballots? In return for the second part; an all-party agreement — it would have to be ironclad — to hold a referendum on proportional representation on a day fixed after the election: say, in the fall of 2020.

The Tories would presumably accept this: a referendum has been their only demand. For the other opposition parties, it might well be worth accepting a few years’ delay, in exchange for a referendum that had some chance of passing.

There’d be more time to educate people on the alternatives, for starters. And we’d already be halfway there, having adopted ranked ballots in the interim. The referendum question would distill the issue to its essence: single- versus multi-member ridings. Rather than forcing people to weigh the philosophical merits of whole electoral systems, they would be faced with a relatively simple, nuts-and-bolt issue: do you want just one MP to represent you, or several?

That’s much more digestible, less intimidating. Having made the switch from first-past-the-post, moreover, we would have eliminated the biggest obstacle to reform off the top: that instinctive popular attachment to the “devil you know,” whatever its defects — the unexamined belief, not only that whatever system happens to be in place now must be the best, but that it is the only system there is.

So that’s one possible way out of this. I see it as being not just win-win, but win-win-win-win-win. The Liberals get to keep their promise. The Tories get their referendum. The other parties get the best shot they are ever likely to have at PR. Any takers?