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What's Wrong With Summer?

June 19, 2009 20:06

Now that Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff has taken a load off Canadians' minds by standing down from his threat to force a summer election, there's one question that hasn't been answered.

No, not employment insurance, deficit reduction, the medical-isotope crisis or the confusion surrounding the Conservative stimulus package.

This question is more basic: What's the big deal about a summer election? Ignatieff, Prime Minister Stephen Harper and the NDP's Jack Layton all insist Canadians don't want to be forced to the polls in July or August.

It's nowhere in the Constitution or the rules of parliamentary procedure, but, somewhere along the line, it became unchallenged wisdom that a party that provokes a summer vote will feel the wrath of an angry electorate.

This may be true - it happened to John Turner's Liberals in 1984, although that was a September vote and other factors came into play - but no one seems to be asking why.

Fewer than 60 per cent of Canadians bothered to vote in the last federal election, so the opinion of the other 40 per cent on the issue of summertime ballots doesn't matter.

Of the 60 per cent who vote, it's highly probable that a July or August election would be a severe bother to only a very few. Sure, some folks might object to their vacation being interrupted by the nuisance of marking a ballot, but that's what advance polls are for.

In most cases, voting takes no more than 10 minutes or so. Summer is more than 135,000 minutes long. Is it really too much to ask to spare a handful of them? It's a moot point now, but politicians may want to think twice the next time they assume Canadians are too lazy or disinterested for a summer election.

For democracy to thrive, we all must participate - and not just when it's convenient.

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