Friday, February 17, 2012

The Cullen Plan - and why it won't work

For those following the federal NDP leadership race, here is an analysis of the Cullen plan for electoral cooperation, extrapolated to the 2011 general election.

There were 53 constituencies in 2011 where the combined New Democrat, Liberal and Green vote exceeded the vote of the Conservative victor.  With 166 seats, it would take the loss of 12 seats for the Conservatives to lose their majority.  It would take a gain of 13 seats for the three national opposition parties to form a majority coalition with the support of the Bloc Quebecois.  It would require a gain of 17 seats for a Liberal – Conservative – Green coalition to have a majority.  It should be noted that 27 of those seats were Conservative gains from the Liberals (25) or New Democrats (2) and therefore would not have been a part of the electoral arrangement under the Cullen proposal.  Those seats are shaded grey.

Column 2 sets out the margin between the Conservative victor and the nearest notional coalition party.

Column 3 sets out the number of votes gained by the other two notional coalition parties.

Column 4 sets out the net retention percentage the leading coalition party would need to retain from the other two parties’ votes.  This is a net retention.  Since an unknown percentage of the other coalition parties’ supporters would certainly choose to vote Conservative absent a candidate of their own party, the required number of votes would be the net retention figure plus the number of votes which went to the Conservatives.

Example:

In London West, the Conservative candidate defeated the Liberal candidate by a margin of 11,023 votes.  The New Democrat and Green candidates combined received 17,812 votes.  In order to make up the margin, the Liberal would have had to hold 61.9% of New Democrat and Green votes to make up the 11,023 deficit. 

However, for each New Democrat or Green voter who voted Conservative, the Liberal would have to retain an additional vote.  If 20% of New Democrat and Green voters (3,562) chose to vote Conservative instead of Liberal, the Liberal would now need to retain 14,585 votes, or 83.4% of the combined New Democrat and Green vote. 

That some New Democrats and Greens would choose to vote Conservative in this scenario is inevitable.  The prospect of 20% of New Democrats and Greens choosing to vote Conservative rather than Liberal is entirely credible based on both pre-election polling on second preferences and previous Canada Election Studies.

In addition, some number of New Democrat and Green voters would also choose to stay home, to spoil their ballot or to vote for a fringe party candidate.  In this case, assuming a 20% leakage to the Conservatives, a mere 17% of New Democrat and Green voters choosing one of these options would render it impossible for the Liberal candidate to have taken the seat.

In the chart I also note the constituencies with high profile “other” candidates who would likely be able to take some significant share of the Liberal/Green, New Democrat/Green vote.  I also highlight those Conservative gains which would not have been part of the arrangement under the Cullen proposal.  And I note one example of a seat where the social views of the Liberal candidate would be anathema to the vast majority of New Democrats.

While noting the many artificialities of this calculation, it is worth noting that the Cullen Plan as proposed, extrapolated to the results of the last election, does not produce a stable New Democrat – Liberal – Green coalition until a net voter retention of 77.6%, a percentage so high is is difficult, if not impossible, to achieve.




CONSTITUENCY

MARGIN

OTHERS

NET %

COMMENTS

1
Nippissing – Temiskaming
18
11299
0.2%

2
Etobicoke Centre
26
9112
0.3%

3
Yukon
132
5345
2.5%

4
Bramalea – Gore Malton
539
18150
3.2%

5
Labrador
79
2359
3.4%

6
Mississauga East – Cooksville
676
9868
6.9%

7
Don Valley West
611
7983
7.7%

8
London North Centre
1665
15173
7.7%

9
Winnipeg South Centre
722
9328
7.8%

10
Don Valley East
870
10992
8.0%

11
Willowdale
932
9777
9.6%

12
Elmwood – Transcona
300
2677
11.3%

13
Pickering – Scarborough East
1207
10683
11.3%
antiChoice antiGay Lib
14
Scarborough Centre
1470
12441
11.9%

Coalition Minority with Bloc Quebecois support if Cullen Plan implemented in all constituencies
15
Moncton – Riverview – Dieppe
2161
16069
13.5%

16
Kitchener – Waterloo
2144
13764
15.6%

17
Sault Ste Marie
1861
9288
20.1%

18
Lobitiniere – Chute de la Chaudiere
777
3802
20.5%
BQ Candidate
Coalition Majority if Cullen Plan implemented in all constituencies
19
Etobicoke Lakeshore
2869
13205
21.8%

20
Madawaska – Restigouche
1915
7852
24.4%

21
Palliser
766
2792
27.5%

22
Vancouver Island North
1827
6057
30.2%

23
Ajax – Pickering
3228
9831
32.9%

24
South Shore – St. Margaret
2915
8616
33.9%

25
Mississauga Streetsville
3453
9636
35.9%

26
Ottawa Orleans
3935
10925
36.1%

27
Vancouver South
3900
9703
40.1%

28
Saskatoon – Rosetown – Biggar
538
1323
40.7%

29
Richmond Hill
4407
10265
43.0%

30
Kitchener Centre
5527
12714
43.5%

31
Denesthené – Missinnippi – Churchill River
794
1704
46.6%

32
Mississauga Brampton
5053
10509
48.1%

33
Brampton West
6192
12449
49.8%

34
Ottawa West Nepean
7436
12407
56.0%

35
Nanaimo – Alberni
5304
9466
56.1%

36
Eglington Lawrence
4062
7147
56.9%

37
Mississauga South
4598
7886
58.4%

38
London West
11023
17812
61.9%

Coalition Minority with Bloc support if Cullen Plan implemented as proposed
39
West Nova
4572
7118
64.3%

40
Mississauga – Erindale
8252
12621
65.4%

41
West Vancouver – Sunshine Coast – Sea to Sky Country
13786
18559
74.3%

42
Essex
6789
8755
77.6%

Coalition Majority if Cullen Plan implemented as proposed
43
Fleetwood – Port Kells
7417
9517
80.0%

44
Kenora
4712
6017
78.4%

45
York Centre
6377
7635
83.6%

46
Brampton – Springdale
10397
11948
87.1%

47
North Vancouver
11331
12621
89.8%

48
Glengarry – Prescott – Russell
10469
11657
89.9%

49
Fredericton
10947
12126
90.3%

50
Brant
11694
12638
92.6%

51
Nunavut
1670
1785
93.6%

52
Edmonton Centre
11145
11713
95.2%

53
Peterborough
14670
14769
99.4%



1 comment:

Ian said...

Great analysis. The only thing it misses is turnout, which I believe would drop with fewer options on the ballot but some might argue (with no evidence) that more might form out if they knew their progressive candidate would have a chance to unaware Harper.