The News has done a fine job in its extensive coverage of the local races in the recent election campaign and the election results. Your May 12 editorial, however, makes a point that is not supported by the facts.
The editorial states that minority legislatures are a result “not of some overwhelming desire for inter-party peace but rather of general dissatisfaction with both the governing party and the alternatives.”
Without a separate opinion survey ascertaining why people voted as they did, it is just as possible that the election result was what it was, using the present incomplete numbers, because 41.2 per cent strongly supported the Liberals, 39.7 per cent enthusiastically voted NDP and 16.5 per cent eagerly affirmed the Greens. There is no evidence to assign dissatisfaction to those who voted.
The fact of the matter is that it is more logical to assign satisfaction to the various party supporters who actually voted – that’s why they voted.
John H. Redekop Ph.D
Professor Emeritus, Political Science
Wilfrid Laurier University
