Federal Election of Canada 2011, Part 4, Why are there some many election?

Why are there some many election? It seem that there is an election every 2 years. Our style of government is based from the British Parliamentary. Currently there are 4 parties that has seats in the House of Commons and there are 308 seats and to form majority government, a party needs 155. The last 4 elections Canadians voted in minority government. So the party with the most seats did not get 155, so the last election the Conservatives 143, Liberal 77, NDP 37, Bloc Québécois 49. The opposition parties has 240 seats. Now it is possible that the Conservatives could have got support from 1 or more opposition(s) by have a loose agreement that the second party will vote on bills to support so that they can pass or form a coalition government, witch means that the second party would get some cabinet positions.

When a government is voted in, they do have 4 years to govern the country, unless they lose an non-confidence vote. Not all bills are confidence vote. If a government loses a non-confidence vote, the Prime Minster will go to Governor General, and at this time the Governor General can call a new elections or go to the opposition party(s) to see if they can form a new government.

This is one style of governing another one is like the USA. Lets compare the 2 different styles with the budget for this year.

Canadian – the opposition parties vote nae, the government falls with a non-confidence vote, Canadians go to another elections (** Please NOTE that, this is not the reason why we are in an election. I used the budget as example).

USA – they can not agree on their budget and it does not pass, the USA government shuts down. Yes it shuts down putting hundreds of thousands of Americans out of work. Because they can not pay them. And minority of their services will stop operating.

So the question is this: 1- do you want to elect a newer government? 2- a government that is shuts down until they can work thing out.

So do the Americans have less elections? No they have more then we do. A President is elected for 4 years. Here is a brake down of their elections. They do have fixed elections date, November 4^th

Example:

Year	2008	2009	2010	2011	2012
Type	Presidential	Off-year	Midterm	Off-year	Presidential
President	Yes	No			Yes
Senate	33 Seats Class II	No	34 Seats Class III	No	33 Seats Class I
House	All 435 Seats	No	All 435 Seats	No	All 435 Seats
Gubernatorial	11 states DE, IN, MO, MT, NH, NC, ND, UT, VT, WA, WV	2 states NJ, VA	36 states AL, AK, AZ, AR, CA, CO, CT, FL, GA, HI, ID, IL, IA, KS, ME, MD, MA, MI, MN, NE, NV, NH, NM, NY, OH, OK, OR, PA, RI, SC, SD, TN, TX, VT, WI, WY	3 states KY, LA, MS	11 states DE, IN, MO, MT, NH, NC, ND, UT, VT, WA, WV

So Some Americans vote every 2 years and others vote every 4 year. And Canadians will have election very 4 years unless if the government is brought down on an non-confidence vote. Here is a time line from 2000:

November 27^th, 2000, it was the end of the Liberal party mandate, the Liberal won majority government.

June 28^th 2004, it was the end of the Liberal party mandate, the Liberal won minority government.

January 23^rd, 2006, Stephen Harper tried to setup a coalition government but failed, but the Conservatives brought down the government with an non-confidence vote. The Conservatives won a minority government.

October 14^th, 2008, Stephen Harper called an election to get a majority government, The Conservatives won a minority government.

May 2^nd, 2011, Liberal brought down the government with non-confidence vote. The vote was about contempt of Parliament. This was the first time a contempt of Parliament charge has resulted in a motion of non-confidence not only for a Canadian Government, but for a national government anywhere in the Commonwealth of Nations.