Canada Federal Representation 2024

[Hatman 🍁]

Quebec released their final map yesterday

They made the following changes from the report:

-Beauharnois—Soulanges renamed Beauharnois—Salaberry—Soulanges—Huntingdon
-Bécancour—Saurel—Odanak renamed Bécancour—Nicolet—Saurel—Alnôbak and reverts to the current borders of the Bécancour—Nicolet—Saurel riding.
-Alma is moved from Jonquière—Alma to Chicoutimi—Le Fjord and is traded for a bunch of small municipalities, also involves Lac-Saint-Jean. Jonquière—Alma is renamed back to Jonquière.
-Côte-Nord—Kawawachikamach—Uapashke renamed Côte-Nord—Kawawachikamach—Nitassinan
-Compton—Stanstead reverts to nearly its current borders, save for taking one neighbourhood from Sherbrooke
-Dorval—Lachine renamed to its current name of Dorval—Lachine—LaSalle
-Hochelaga renamed Hochelaga—Rosemont-Est (wonder if we'll get an English translation)
-LaSalle—Verdun renamed to its current name of LaSalle—Émard—Verdun
-Mégantic—L'Érable gains back some territory and is renamed Mégantic—L'Érable—Lotbinière
-Montarville renamed Mont-Saint-Bruno—L'Acadie
-Montmagny—Témiscouata—Kataskomiq renamed Côte-du-Sud—Rivière-du-Loup—Kataskomiq—Témiscouata

So, unfortunately a few quadruple barrelled names. Such is Quebec. Better than naming them after people, I guess.

[Njall]

I was curious how representation would look if Quebec's average population per electoral district of 108,998 was applied to the provinces with averages greater than Quebec's. Since Canada rounds up to the next whole number when assigning seats, I will also round up.

Alberta: 41 seats

British Columbia: 48 seats

Ontario: 137 seats

+ 78 Quebec seats

+ 63 seats from the 6 other provinces and 3 territories

Would give a House of Commons consisting of 367 members.

I almost always roll my eyes at claims of "western alienation" in Alberta, but if keeping Quebec at 78 seats was that important, then adjusting the quotient and adding more seats to Alberta, BC, and Ontario as a result is exactly how they should have done it.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

I was curious how representation would look if Quebec's average population per electoral district of 108,998 was applied to the provinces with averages greater than Quebec's. Since Canada rounds up to the next whole number when assigning seats, I will also round up.

Alberta: 41 seats

British Columbia: 48 seats

Ontario: 137 seats

+ 78 Quebec seats

+ 63 seats from the 6 other provinces and 3 territories

Would give a House of Commons consisting of 367 members.

I almost always roll my eyes at claims of "western alienation" in Alberta, but if keeping Quebec at 78 seats was that important, then adjusting the quotient and adding more seats to Alberta, BC, and Ontario as a result is exactly how they should have done it.

On the opposite end, how would Albertans feel if Quebec got a guaranteed 1/4 of Commons seats, per the Bloc's wishes?

[Njall]

I was curious how representation would look if Quebec's average population per electoral district of 108,998 was applied to the provinces with averages greater than Quebec's. Since Canada rounds up to the next whole number when assigning seats, I will also round up.

Alberta: 41 seats

British Columbia: 48 seats

Ontario: 137 seats

+ 78 Quebec seats

+ 63 seats from the 6 other provinces and 3 territories

Would give a House of Commons consisting of 367 members.

I almost always roll my eyes at claims of "western alienation" in Alberta, but if keeping Quebec at 78 seats was that important, then adjusting the quotient and adding more seats to Alberta, BC, and Ontario as a result is exactly how they should have done it.

On the opposite end, how would Albertans feel if Quebec got a guaranteed 1/4 of Commons seats, per the Bloc's wishes?

It would become another thing on the list of things that Trudeau has done to wrong Alberta. Which is to say that anyone who is politically engaged enough to know about it would be varying degrees of angry, but realistically the majority of eligible voters in Alberta likely wouldn't know about it or care. Or would assume that that's the way it already was.

Seat allocation is already a point of contention amongst western alienation types, but the example they usually use these days contrasts the population per seat of Alberta vs the Atlantic provinces.

[adma]

The irony is that if Western alienation is hung up over Quebec being "over quota"--well, technically, both Manitoba and Saskatchewan are, too.

[emmettmark]

With the release of Final Reports for Ontario, Alberta and British Columbia, it appears the only major boundary change from MP objections has been in Vancouver.

Following public consultation, Vancouver Quadra and Vancouver Granville were initially realigned north-south to become Vancouver West Broadway and Vancouver Arbutus. However, in the final report, Vancouver's 2 westside ridings revert to form, with Vancouver Granville losing Kerrisdale (to Quadra) and Marpole (to Richmond Centre), but gaining territory in Sunset/Punjabi Market and False Creek South.

https://redecoupage-redistribution-2022.ca/com/bc/rprt/repfin/adm_e.aspx#b2

[Hatman 🍁]

People are criticizing that change as a Liberal gerrymander, as it moves the NDP friendly Marpole area into Richmond.

Overall the BC map is the worst of all the commissions. Absolute sh*t. Lots of crossing major waterways and splitting municipalities, and there's that horrendous looking Kelowna riding.

[emmettmark]

People are criticizing that change as a Liberal gerrymander, as it moves the NDP friendly Marpole area into Richmond.

Overall the BC map is the worst of all the commissions. Absolute sh*t. Lots of crossing major waterways and splitting municipalities, and there's that horrendous looking Kelowna riding.

The Commission decided to keep to a very low self-imposed population variation, which isn't helped by BC's lack of municipal amalgamation and challenging population distribution/geography.

Per Vancouver, I thought it was poor form to defer to an objection from the incumbent MP, particularly after robust public consultations - I don't recall any Vancouver Liberal MPs, including Joyce Murray, participating during this period either. Notably as well, MP Murray's objection wasn't made jointly with other affected MPs.

I could see what they were trying to achieve with Kelowna's riding, as Big White Ski Resort has made extensive efforts in the last provincial and federal boundary redistributions to be added to a Kelowna-based riding. Though certainly, there were far more graceful geographic configurations the Commission could have chosen.

[Hatman 🍁]

The Ontario commission also made a weird boundary choice with the new New Tecumseth-Gwillimbury riding. They made a last minute decision to remove a small part of King Twp that was in the riding to keep all of King in one riding. The result though, was basically dividing the riding into two parts, with no transportation connections between them. On paper it looks like they're connected, but the Holland River divides the two parts. 

[emmettmark]

The Ontario commission also made a weird boundary choice with the new New Tecumseth-Gwillimbury riding. They made a last minute decision to remove a small part of King Twp that was in the riding to keep all of King in one riding. The result though, was basically dividing the riding into two parts, with no transportation connections between them. On paper it looks like they're connected, but the Holland River divides the two parts. 

Still, not as egregiously configured as Burnaby North-Seymour, which is far worse and will now exist for two representation orders - at least King-Vaughan now unites a municipality with negligible deviations from the provincial quota.

[CascadianIndy]

Do we know when we'll be getting the census profiles for the new redistributed ridings?

[Upper Canada Tory]

Do we know when we'll be getting the census profiles for the new redistributed ridings?

The redistribution will not be complete until September 2023, but it is based on data from the 2021 Canadian census, so I assume the census profiles will be available when the redistribution is complete?

[CascadianIndy]

Do we know when we'll be getting the census profiles for the new redistributed ridings?

The redistribution will not be complete until September 2023, but it is based on data from the 2021 Canadian census, so I assume the census profiles will be available when the redistribution is complete?

I was thinking it’d either be September 2023, when the map is passed, or April 2024, when the maps become law and come into effect. Not sure which one it is.

[Hatman 🍁]

Do we know when we'll be getting the census profiles for the new redistributed ridings?

The redistribution will not be complete until September 2023, but it is based on data from the 2021 Canadian census, so I assume the census profiles will be available when the redistribution is complete?

It is already complete, actually - though it still has to pass through Parliament.

[MaxQue]

Do we know when we'll be getting the census profiles for the new redistributed ridings?

The redistribution will not be complete until September 2023, but it is based on data from the 2021 Canadian census, so I assume the census profiles will be available when the redistribution is complete?

It is already complete, actually - though it still has to pass through Parliament.

It doesn't. The orders need only to be sent to the relevent minister.
https://www.elections.ca/content.aspx?section=res&dir=cir/red/over&document=index&lang=e

[Upper Canada Tory]

Do we know when we'll be getting the census profiles for the new redistributed ridings?

The redistribution will not be complete until September 2023, but it is based on data from the 2021 Canadian census, so I assume the census profiles will be available when the redistribution is complete?

It is already complete, actually - though it still has to pass through Parliament.

Based on the link MaxQue sent, the chief electoral officer still needs to draft the Representation Order, which describes the boundaries of the ridings agreed upon by the commissions. Then once it is provided to the Minister and declared to be in force by Cabinet it is complete.

[Oryxslayer]

Anyone interested in Quebec provincial boundary proposals? Two seats reapportioned: Gaspé and Bourget are eliminated, one seat created in the center near Drummondville, the other taking in half of Saint Jerome and some neighboring suburbs.

[MaxQue]

Anyone interested in Quebec provincial boundary proposals?

I did a big summary post in the Quebec election thread.

[Krago]

I reviewed the final boundaries commission reports to put together a combined list of the new FEDs.

One interesting tidbit.  When producing their chart of riding names and populations:

• Five provinces used the term 'Deviation' (AB, NL, NS, ON, QC)
• Three provinces used the term 'Variance' (BC, MB, NB)
• Two provinces used the term 'Variation' (PE, SK)

I will calculate the Gini index and Loosemore-Hanby Index for each commission.  I had never heard of the last one, but it was mentioned in the Quebec report.  Any other statistical measures of population inequality that anyone would like to promote?

[toaster]

Speaking of "deviation" or variance, the rest of the country should follow BC's strict low % variance. I still can't believe how an urban city of almost 200k (Thunder Bay in Ontario) got through being granted "Special consideration" to have not 1 but 2 below variant ridings.

[MaxQue]

Speaking of "deviation" or variance, the rest of the country should follow BC's strict low % variance. I still can't believe how an urban city of almost 200k (Thunder Bay in Ontario) got through being granted "Special consideration" to have not 1 but 2 below variant ridings.

Given Thunder Bay has 110k inhabitants, I shall be giving this post no consideration, special or not.

[Krago]

PROV	PR	2021 Population	Seats	Quota	Gini	Rank	L-H	Rank
NL	10	510,550	7	72,936	0.1134	10	0.0906	10
PE	11	154,331	4	38,583	0.0077	1	0.0057	1
NS	12	969,383	11	88,126	0.0688	7	0.0596	9
NB	13	775,610	10	77,561	0.0724	9	0.0545	8
QC	24	8,501,833	78	108,998	0.0325	5	0.0238	5
ON	35	14,223,942	122	116,590	0.0458	6	0.0321	6
MB	46	1,342,153	14	95,868	0.0241	3	0.0176	4
SK	47	1,132,505	14	80,893	0.0699	8	0.0544	7
AB	48	4,262,635	37	115,206	0.0223	2	0.0154	2
BC	59	5,000,879	43	116,300	0.0243	4	0.0160	3

[Krago]

All thirty electoral boundaries commissioners are being summoned to Ottawa in the first week of October. They will be discussing their experiences and making recommendations for changes to the EBRA legislation.

A friend of mine will be there and has offered to convey some of the more sane suggestions. If anyone would like to post their best ideas I will make sure that he sees them.

[Krago]

Here are some of the ideas so far:

(1) Allow Commissions to publish multiple proposals.

Nova Scotia and Saskatchewan would have been better off if they have been able to create ‘status quo’ and ‘change’ proposals, that would encourage more public participation.

New Brunswick could have had both a ‘split Saint John’ proposal and a ‘split Moncton’ proposal.


(2) Relax the notification requirements for people who want to present at hearings.

The ‘23-day notice rule’ is too restrictive, particularly when hearings are often added or rescheduled.


(3) Consider expanding the Commissions from three to five members.

Guarantee that at least one member be from an Indigenous community.  Require that one of the commissioners be an academic expert in the field.


(4) Have a ‘Riding Builder’-type app that actually works!

Lord know how much money Elections Canada spent on that piece-of-sh**t that they eventually abandoned.


(5) Allow public participation after the second map (Report) as well.

There were changes made after the second round that the public probably wouldn't have supported.

The Ontario Commission in 2012 added hearings at the end of their public consultations to consider big changes proposed at the earlier meetings.

[patzer]

PROV	PR	2021 Population	Seats	Quota	Gini	Rank	L-H	Rank
NL	10	510,550	7	72,936	0.1134	10	0.0906	10
PE	11	154,331	4	38,583	0.0077	1	0.0057	1
NS	12	969,383	11	88,126	0.0688	7	0.0596	9
NB	13	775,610	10	77,561	0.0724	9	0.0545	8
QC	24	8,501,833	78	108,998	0.0325	5	0.0238	5
ON	35	14,223,942	122	116,590	0.0458	6	0.0321	6
MB	46	1,342,153	14	95,868	0.0241	3	0.0176	4
SK	47	1,132,505	14	80,893	0.0699	8	0.0544	7
AB	48	4,262,635	37	115,206	0.0223	2	0.0154	2
BC	59	5,000,879	43	116,300	0.0243	4	0.0160	3

Provinces east of Ontario (QC, NB, NS, PE, NL): 10,911,707 people; 110 seats
Provinces west of Ontario (BC, AB, SK, MB): 11,738,172 people; 108 seats

How is that meant to be remotely fair?