Pointing the finger

The post-mortem on the referendum has not been without its finger-pointing.

Referendum culture
As the poll at right suggests, blame on the failure of the MMP side has settled on several areas. I'd like to add to the options at right and say that in my opinion we don't have a referendum culture here in Ontario. Let's face it, if you're not used to voting in a referendum then you're not going to be looking for info about it.

Elections Ontario
Some have indicated that Elections Ontario's campaign was not effective enough. I don't know what more they could have done. The issue has been around since the last election (2003) when McGuinty said he'd set up an assembly to look at electoral reform. Then we had the Citizens' Assembly touring the province to study the matter. Then we had the campaign here in Ottawa. How could people not know there was a referendum???

MMP was too hard to understand
First, anything is more complicated than our current system. A system that asks us to mark two Xs instead of one is of course twice as more complicated... but seriously, it appears complicated only if you get into the details. Basically the question is if you want a proportional system then vote for MMP, if you don't then vote for FPTP.

MMP and MPP
I heard from one person that the Vote for MMP signs were really saying Vote for MPP. In other words, some thought it was a sign reminding people to vote for their MPP (Member of Provincial Parliament). If it had been called the Proportional System then maybe it would have done better.