Electoral Boundaries Commission report reflects petty gerrymandering
Edmonton – Alberta Liberal Deputy Leader Laurie Blakeman says that the just-released report of the Alberta Electoral Boundaries Commission (AEBC) shows that the considerable influence of the ruling Tories has resulted in the gerrymandering of many constituency boundaries. Blakeman also notes that Alberta’s urban areas are underrepresented in the Legislature.
“The Stelmach administration’s sticky fingerprints are all over this report,” Blakeman says. “There’s been major tinkering with boundaries in Edmonton to reflect personal requests from Tory MLAs. Edmonton-Southwest, for example, is a mess.”
Blakeman notes that this entire process would be much more fair, transparent and efficient if the Stelmach administration hadn’t forced the Commission to add four more constituencies – constituencies that Albertans have said the province doesn’t need.
“Edmonton should have received two additional seats, Calgary three, with the balance subtracted from sparsely populated rural ridings,” Blakeman says. “Our position all along has been that constituencies should be redistributed, not added. But the influence of the Premier’s office has preserved rural seats solely for the benefit of his party.”
Blakeman reminds Albertans that the Alberta Liberal Clean Government Initiative (CGI) would require governments to cede the power to redraw electoral boundaries to the Chief Electoral Officer, who would do so based solely on demographics and without political interference.
“Politicians should be held completely at arm’s length during this process. Unfortunately, in the absence of checks and balances like the ones we propose, political interference at the expense of transparency and accountability is the rule of the day,” Blakeman says.
Blakeman is pleased, however, with one aspect of the report, namely that the Commission opted to drop the matrix, the archaic and arbitrary point system used to allocate resources to constituency offices.
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