Will competing elections help or hurt democracy? Here are 2 different views

With Canada's 44th federal election on Sept. 20, and municipal elections in the province slated for Sept. 28, Newfoundland and Labrador voters will be heading to the polls twice in just over a week.

It also means the province will see three elections in just seven months — something that hasn't happened since 1993. 

Amid pandemic woes, and fresh memories of an historic error-ridden provincial election, Justin Trudeau's federal election call Sunday has one expert nervous about people in the province having to hit the polls twice in eight days, while another is hailing the double-whammy a win-win.

"It's definitely going to have an impact [on voter turnout]," says Craig Pollett, chief executive officer of Municipalities Newfoundland and Labrador. 

"A lot of voters in the municipal elections were already pretty low, so it's definitely a concern," he said. "We really can't afford to lose."

When it comes to engaging voters for the fall election, pandemic fatigue was already a problem, Pollett said. Factor in election fatigue, and he says the prognosis can seem grim.

Pollett expects a tug of war between local and federal candidates for human resources, advertising space and mental real estate.

"It's going to be harder for local candidates to get the attention of voters because most of their attention will be turned to the federal election," he said.

As for advertising, Pollett fears those vying for local office will be outdone by federal candidates with deeper pockets.

But Pollett's biggest fear is that local issues will take a back seat to federal policy priorities, which are not always the most pressing issues in communities, such as Westport, which struggle with access to clean drinking water.

"Most of these [municipal] elections will have two or three, if not more, serious local issues that they're trying to resolve, and elections are one of the key ways that we help resolve those issues," Pollet said. 

"Whether people are hearing the solutions to those local issues or not is a big issue as well." 

Two birds, one election

But Stephen Tomblin, a professor emeritus from Memorial University's department of political science whose work focuses on public policy, says two elections being held close together is welcome news.

Tomblin says concurrent federal and municipal elections do hold some promise because they can localize larger issues like climate change and affordable housing, which are typically seen as federal jurisdiction.

"These are all municipal issues," he said, "so there is an opportunity … to make the connection to say, 'Listen, when you're voting in that election, it's connected to what you're voting for in this election." 

Tomblin said partisanship and territoriality can be an enemy to policy reform, whose essence lies in collaboration. Seeing certain challenges as shared between federal and local levels of government means they can be faced together.

"Good public policy requires being less partisan and less territorial and being able to work together across borders or boundaries," he said.

"Most issues are cross-border. Most of the things that matter are not really set in terms of certain places," he said. "It's nice that you can actually have a conversation between Ottawa and some municipalities at exactly the same time."

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