As the British kick off a fresh federal election campaign, the BBC is raising concerns that Britain is heading towards a minority government which they refer to as "hung parliament". Evidently the British system of parliamentary democracy, the forefather of the Canadian system, is considered dysfunctional by British experts when there is not a stable majority. The Brits have been at this a lot longer than we have. They realize that under their system of democracy, government is far less effective in a minority coalition, hence why so many pundits over there are hoping for a majority, Liberal or Conservative.
It is a lesson that we should embrace here in Canada. After 3 consecutive minority governments, it is time we elect a majority to actually perform the duties of governance the way our system was designed to serve the people. The British expert essentially said that the first past the post system was designed to create majority governments, because minority government most often finds itself in deadlock with the governing party severely diminished in its ability to carry our the duty of running the country.
It would be interesting to see what happened if there was a hung Parliament. Nick Clegg and the Liberal Democratic Party has spent enough time denouncing both Labour and the Tories that they could wind up leaning their support either way... although propping up the architects of Britain's involvement in the Iraq War would be a bit of a stretch for them.
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