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National Post

Michael Taube: The Longest Ballot Committee is annoying, but that doesn't mean it's undemocratic

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is running in a federal by-election in the Alberta riding of Battle River-Crowfoot. Advance voting begins on Friday, and he should win quite comfortably on Aug. 18. Article content Article content The Longest Ballot Committee has attempted to flood ballots in seven targeted federal ridings (and one Ontario riding) since 2019. This activist movement is critical of Canada's first-past-the-post electoral system, and has signed up candidates to defend a single issue: why Canada should shift to a more fair and balanced political model of proportional representation. Article content Article content Has this campaign worked? They claim it has. In reality, its impact bas been negligible at best. Article content The Longest Ballot Committee, through its association with the now-defunct Rhinoceros Party, attempted to set a Guinness World Record during the 2019 election with the 'longest ballot papers in history.' They targeted then-Conservative leader Andrew Scheer's riding of Regina-Qu'Appelle. It was a failure: Scheer earned over 63 per cent of the vote, and only two of the eight candidates were aligned with them. Article content The Longest Ballot Committee had 15 of the 21 candidates running in St. Boniface-St. Vital (2021 election), 33 of 40 candidates in Mississauga-Lakeshore (2022 by-election) and 42 of 48 candidates in Winnipeg South Centre (2023 by-election), but the Liberals held all three seats. It also flooded two 2024 by-elections in Toronto-St. Paul's (77 of 84 candidates) and LaSalle-Émard-Verdun (79 of 91 candidates). The voters shifted to a Conservative and Bloc Quebecois candidate, respectively, for reasons that had nothing to do with proportional representation, however. Article content Article content Nevertheless, this movement has suggested it played a pivotal role in Poilievre losing his seat in Carleton in this year's election. 'This one-of-a-kind campaign has been a whole lot of fun and we want to thank again all of the volunteers, candidates, and supporters who made this year's longest ballot possible,' spokesman Tomas Szuchewycz told the Canadian Press on April 30. 'It's been a success,' said one candidate, Mark Moutter, who went off on a tangent and remarked, 'I've never seen people looking more optimistically at electoral reform, ever.' Article content