Talk:2004 Canadian federal election

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What this article really needs is poll results, poll results, poll results! Monthly poll results for the parties since the last election (showing the sharp decline in Alliance and Bloc support and modest rise in PC and NDP numbers), and poll results showing Martin's massive popularily (i.e. many more people say they'd vote for a Martin Liberal Party and one under Chretien again).

Someone may also want to add some more analysis regarding the effect of provincial politics (e.g. Liberals in Ontario and Quebec, PC's in Newfoundland, possible Alliance-ish government in Saskatchewan, etc. Being from Ontario (where I don't think this has much effect) I can't really comment on the other provinces.

Oh yeah, a breakdown of party policies would help as well (e.g. the NDP seems to have moved even further left, the Alliance and PC's look set to meet somewhere in between the two, etc.). -- stewacide 20:41, 26 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Table too wide

The "Results" table requires horizontal scrolling to read, something undesirable. Is there a reason for making the last column 141 percent? Is there a good reason for specifying column widths at all? Why not just let browsers use their own algorithms for determining column widths?--Indefatigable 16:06, 8 Dec 2003 (UTC)

It fits my browser, but I am aware it doesnt fit them all, as the computer at my school has the same problem as you. Is there any way I can fix it? Also- I plan on putting another table to show the platforms of the parties. User:Earl Andrew 20:53, 8 Dec 2003 (UTC)

I thought that all it would take was removing the explicit widths, but after trying it, I found out it wasn't that simple. Then it dawned on me that the problem is some very long riding names that contain no spaces. Today's browsers aren't smart enough to break them into two lines after a hyphen or an en dash. The only solution I can see is to put a <br> in the longest ones, but that cure may be worse than the disease. I'll do some experiments.--Indefatigable 05:07, 9 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Instead of reducing everything to a table I think it would be better just to give a summary of each party's platform (when they are released). -- stewacide 05:15, 9 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Yes, I'll have to wait until they come out first- and we'll have to wait until the new party has a site. User:Earl Andrew 05:27, 9 Dec 2003 (UTC)

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would it be too much to add candidates when they are announced? for each riding? meh, I just want yet another excuse for why I should add myself to this encylopedia :p Pellaken 12:08, 10 Dec 2003 (UTC)

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Been fiddling rather excessively with the table, and I think I've got something I'm happy with for the time being. I broke up and regionalized the Ontario, Quebec and BC ridings for a couple of reasons. Firsly, simply to cut down on the visual clutter--there was an enormous number of ridings in each. Secondly, and more importantly, if one of the ultimate goals is picking out areas where party support went up or down, then splitting off some of the rural regions from the urban cores ought to allow a reader to figure things out more easily as the election develops. (For instance, we might see a Liberal surge on Vancouver Island and the Lower Mainland but see the BC Interior stay solidly Conservative, or see Conservative pickups in rural Ontario but not urban, or see the Bloc trampled outside their St. Lawrence Valley heartland.... these sort of things are a lot easier to pick up with a regional breakdown then by lumping all the ridings in a province together.) Besides, each of the regions is big enough to be a province in its own right. -The Tom

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Facts pending validation:

Canadian Action Party is now an historical entity, it dissolved and its leader Paul Hellyer urged its members to join the New Democratic Party a couple of years ago. The party was focused on opposing NAFTA and was largely a Hellyer vehicle.

Scott Brison has now joined the Liberal Party of Canada and may become the Liberal candidate in the next election, or not run. He may announce this after The New PM ("what part of "PM" don't you understand?") visits his riding this week.

Jim Harris is the founder of Strategic Advantage (.com) which claims "Jim Harris, internationally renowned author, speaker and management consultant Jim Harris is one of North America’s foremost authors and thinkers on leadership and change, working with Fortune 500 companies, associations and government departments. Association magazine ranked him as one of North America’s top speakers. Jim speaks internationally at over 40 conferences a year on leadership, change, CRM, eLearning, future trends, innovation, and creating learning organizations. He also works with executive teams leading strategic planning sessions.

Jim's latest book, Blindsided! was published in 80 countries worldwide in July 2002 by UK-based Capstone, an imprint of John Wiley & Sons of New York. Both of Harris' prior books are bestsellers. His second book, The Learning Paradox, was nominated for the National Business Book Award in Canada and there are now over 40,000 copies in print. Jim's first book, The 100 Best Companies to Work for in Canada sold over 50,000 copies." He seems to have published four books in all.

The Progressive Conservative Party of Canada voted to dissolve and join a new Conservative Party of Canada with the former Canadian Alliance last week. The two parties will run only one set of candidates in the next election. The recent PC leader Joe Clark refused to join and will sit as an independent, but has retired, so will not be a factor in this next election. Clark is widely considered the best foreign affairs minister that Canada ever had (in the Mulroney cabinet), next to Lester Pearson perhaps, and is the single most trusted politician in Canada, so, this is quite serious.

http://rabble.ca and http://straightgoods.com are good sources on what the NDP thinks - in case anyone's looking for analysis.

The Canadian Action party is still registered under Elections Canada, so it should stay here. As for you Pellaken, the bigger this page, the better ;-) list the candidates if you want. Are you running in one of the PEI ridings? User: Earl Andrew 20:52 December 9, 2003 (UTC)

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Regarding the table: is these some way we could show the incumbants in new/re-drawn ridings? Perhapse even including what part of their old riding is represented in the new riding? -- stewacide 22:53, 10 Dec 2003 (UTC)

I think it's a temporary measure until we find out who exactly is running. Then, we can do a little bit of editing. Keep in mind though, there are 7 new districts. User:Earl Andrew 00:30 December 11th, 2003 (UTC)

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I noticed you put the table below. If you check out the U.S. presidential election, 2004 page, they have it at the top. Plus, I have the table at the top for the 2000 Canadian election User:Earl Andrew 03:28 December 11th, 2003 (UTC)

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yea, a list of cand's would be cool. I dont know if I'm running. someone (who's name is mentioned SOMEWHERE in this encylopedia, and there is a link to his name, though no article on him) wants to run in my riding, and if he does, I'll back him 130% Pellaken 08:02, 12 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Has PEI ever elected a 'Dipper? There seems to be a big emphesis on pork-barrel politics that make the governmet a show-in. -- stewacide

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The first table looks good. With the heading "Current Distribution," even I was able to comprehend it  :-) Sunray 20:35, 2003 Dec 16 (UTC)

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I placed a call to the cheif agent of the natural law party (the only person with contact info on www.elections.ca for the party, who confirmed that the party will NOT be running candidates in the election Pellaken 04:25, 18 Dec 2003 (UTC)

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a new party, which looks like a Rhino party on a few less drugs, has been registered with Elections Canada.
Absolutely Absurd Party
http://www.absolutelyabsurdparty.ca/
Pellaken 01:46, 19 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Site nor reachable...--Chealer 00:54, 2004 Nov 21 (UTC)

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Why isn't Ben Serre listed as the incumbent for the new Nipissing-Timiskaming riding? I don't know much about election rules but I was surprsied to see Bob Wood's name there rather than Serre's SD6-Agent 11:41, 13 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Bob Wood is the incumbent in the current Nipissing riding. I suppose it could be a bit of a tossup as to whether he or Serre would be considered the "incumbent" in the expanded riding, but listing Wood as the incumbent isn't wrong as such. Bearcat 00:28, 15 Jan 2004 (UTC)

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I added a province by province table. I've added this identical table to the 2000, 1997, 1993, and 1921 elections. I plan to add it to ALL canadian elections from 1867 to far into the 2000's (when they happen).

but...

my "spidey sence" ... or I guess my "Pelly Sence" tells me that someone is going to want to delete the table. If so, please send me a note on my talk page, as I feel this table should be here.

Pellaken 21:55, 8 Feb 2004 (UTC)

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I wouldn't say the NDP is "negligible" in Quebec. They've been polling ~10% recently. The 'problem' is that in the past that support never materializes on election day. -- stewacide

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Can something be done about the colour schme (using lighter reds, blues and greens)? It's really difficult to read at the moment. Formeruser-83 15:15, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I changed the color scheme to match Canadian federal election, 2000 and List of Canadian federal elections. Parties that don't have seats should be in gray... it's too hard to invent a new color for every small party. P.T. Aufrette 19:31, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Change the colours back please (of the smaller parties) that took a lot of work, and it is fair to the smaller parties. Earl Andrew 20:06, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)

The old version of the table has so many different colors that it's hard to tell anything apart. A simple rule of thumb should be, parties only get a color if they have at least one seat.

If the "Absolutely Absurd Party" and others get recognized by Elections Canada, what colors will be chosen for them?

Also, I'm not sure if the colors chosen in the old table have any relation to the actual colors used by the parties (the pinkish-purple for "Canadian Action Party" doesn't appear on their website.

P.T. Aufrette 20:19, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Website colours are the best choice (lighter versions of course, so you can see) I had orignally used light blue for the CAP, but someone changed it. Earl Andrew 20:32, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Look at it this way: if the page consisted only of the first table (at 2004_Canadian_election#Current_distribution), it wouldn't need colors at all, it would just be an ordinary table.

The only reason colors are needed at all is to enhance the 2004_Canadian_election#Seat_by_seat_breakdown... but for parties that don't have seats, that's not an issue.

The old version of the table is colorful, but too many colors don't add any information content. In fact they seriously detract from readability. Only the colors for parties with seats serve an informational purpose, acting as an index or legend for the colors used in the 2004_Canadian_election#Seat_by_seat_breakdown.

P.T. Aufrette 22:16, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Apologies about the colour-shuffling... I've been going on aesthetics rather than pure-unbridled readability (c'mon, some of those paler colour were godawful), and I hope I've struck the the right balance with the current batch...

I'll agree with P.T. and say that if things get a bit more crowded in that party table I think going back to grey for the minor parties and coloured for the major ones is reasonable. For the time being, though, they seem to be working out without too much conflict.

The_Tom

Readability should be the main consideration, not aesthetics! In any case, aesthetics is debatable and mostly a matter of personal opinion.

The Conservative color in particular is much too dark, you can't read blue links properly against a dark blue backgroun. That defeats the whole purpose.

The paler colors are more readable and they're consistent with what's used in Canadian federal election, 2000 (and other years) and List of Canadian federal elections. If you have dark text against a color background, the background color has to be pale for readability, there's no way around it.

Adding colors for the minor parties adds precisely zero information content. Nothing is accomplished by coloring them, since those colors won't be needed for the 2004_Canadian_election#Seat_by_seat_breakdown section.

I strongly argue for changing it back to the old paler colors. The sole reason for having any colors at all is to enhance delivery of informational content, not any supposed aesthetic considerations (and many will consider the paler colors to be more aesthetic in any case).

Perhaps we could have a call for votes on this. --> never mind, see below, new table format

P.T. Aufrette 00:44, 14 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Perhapse we could try something like coloured outlines around white backgrounds? (i.e. using the cell border property). That would solve any readability and asthetic issues, although the code would be getting even more complex and it kinda' goes against the keep it simple ethos around here (we're making an encyclopedia remember, not a webpage!) -- stewacide

I've de-linked the names in the colourbars to improve readability... there's still at least one link to each name in each table row, so I think we're ok. The Tom 20:28, 14 Mar 2004 (UTC)

New table format

Nearly every incumbent is also a candidate. So I merged the "Incumbent" and "Notes" columns and indicated the incumbent with a &dagger; †

This gives a double-wide Notes column, so notes don't have to be so cryptic. It lets you see at a glance who is the incumbent, without having to move your eyes from side to side. It avoids typing in twice the names of incumbents who are also candidates (nearly all of them). And it sidesteps the color controversy issue, since now it's not an issue to try to read incumbent's names against a too-dark background.

P.T. Aufrette 04:03, 14 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Much as I respect your initiative (and undoubtably all the painstaking find/replace work you had to do to change the table), I disagree with this decision. The most important function of the colour-coded incumbent column was so it would be relatively easy to see at a glance the political leanings of particular regions of the country. (ie, big unbroken red stripe of the GTA or unbroken blue of the BC Interior). My plan, post-election, was to colour in the appropriate winning candidate cells as well, and so party gains/losses and the regional nature of where stuff happened would be easy to pick out.

Here's what I propose... I'll revert, and and see what other feedback appears here. If I'm clearly on my own on this particular fetish for colour bars, then I'll happily concede this one.

Sorry for being such a whiner :-)

The Tom 18:32, 14 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Still uses up valuable space by repeating the same name twice in two separate columns, in a table that's already too wide. The unbroken stripe idea doesn't work anyway because each row is too wide already, so you only fit a small number of rows on one screenful.

I don't agree, but I'll go edit other stuff for now.

P.T. Aufrette 20:40, 14 Mar 2004 (UTC)

PLEASE

can someone... PLEASE... edit the table, splitting the provinces, so we can edit things province-by-province, rather then having to edit all 308 ridings at once?? I'd do it myself, but I dont know how. Pellaken 01:26, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I guess even diving it so that you have a few basic splits. - The Atlantic & Quebec - Ontario - The West & The North -, for example, So we can click on edit (like if you click on edit beside my "please" here) and just edit those 100 ridings, rather then doing all 308. Pellaken 01:29, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Better? The Tom 05:33, 31 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Pellaken runs over and gives The Tom a big hug, and says "Thanks man!"*

Now that we have the tables seperated, can someone please add a new party column for Quebec known as "Other" Quebec of all places should have this column, as it has very high voter rate for minor parties. Earl Andrew 16:00, 1 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Subtle anon vandalism by 66.185.84.80

Contributions by 66.185.84.80

Check this out:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Canadian_federal_election%2C_2004&diff=2707346&oldid=2700725

From his other contributions, appears to be a vandal. He did this same sort of edit to the Clarity Act article.

Beware of internal links that have an external link color (subtly different). It breaks the "What links here" feature.

Internal link: Clarity Act
Faked link: Clarity Act

Note color difference.

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I think there should be a a page exclusively listing Canada's electoral districts and another for census divisions. I haven't seen that yet. SD6-Agent 22:47, 14 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Graphic coming

Hi folks. I just wanted you to know I'm gonna be doing a schematic graphic of the parties' results in each province. (Boxes will represent each riding.) - Montréalais 04:53, 28 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I hope you don't mean something like what's in List of candidates in the 2004 Canadian election cause that'd just be wasted effort. But something like a diagram of the house of commons floor (from above) that's coloured in would be cool. Also, I was wondering if anyone would be able to make a map of the country divided into ridings so we could colour in the winners. Elections Canada has maps of all the ridings under copyright for non-commercial use that I think complies with the GFDL (someone want to check) but there's no map of the country as a whole. And on the topic of the riding maps, if it falls under the GFDL, wikipedia could definitely benefit from having it (I'd do as much of it as I had time for if it complied). Telso 05:44, 28 Jun 2004 (UTC)

It doesn't look like anything on either page - it'll be newly created. The idea is essentially maps of the provinces and large cities composed of little squares, one for each riding, that can be coloured appropriately. I'll take care of it, and I hope you like it :) - Montréalais 07:31, 28 Jun 2004 (UTC)

It's a little hard to read, but good work! I think you misspelled Waterloo though. It looks like "Weterloo" to me. --Timc 16:56, 29 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Yuck! no offence, but that's not like anything I've seen before. I was hoping for a map, not a bunch of cloloured boxes. (perhaps I'm guilty of that too ;-)) I can make a map if you guys want, you think we should have a vote on it? Earl Andrew 19:36, 29 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Maybe map was the wrong word. What I wanted to show was the geographic distribution of seats without the visual distortion of having a vast red area for Nunavut and a teeny-tiny orange one for Burnaby-Douglas, for example, both representing one seat (as on this map - huge pdf file). Though pretty, such maps don't strike me as extremely useful.

An example of another map similar to mine can be seen on page 3 of this document - also a huge pdf file). - Montréalais 03:54, 30 Jun 2004 (UTC)

However, if we had a floor plan of the commons, we'd be able to see very easily one side as a mix of red and orange and the other with at least one square of orange (election prediction says we're only 5 seats away!). However, as you (of all people) undoubtedly know, the extension of the orange has been delayed by 18 months ;) And I'm sure I'll like your graphic. Telso 08:29, 28 Jun 2004 (UTC)

House representation

I like the graphic showing the house representation, and I think it may be a useful addition to other election pages. I have a couple of questions. First, is there a rule to how the seats are distributed? I would like to give a fairly accurate representation of the actual seats in the house and who held them. Second, how are new seats added? What was the orientation of the seats in the previous Parliament (301 seats), or 1993 (295 seats)? I added the image to Canadian federal election, 2000 but I don't know if I got it right. --Timc 13:45, 29 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I have no idea, I just added the image because I wanted to display the fact that we have sort of a tie in parliament. I wish the media would emphasize that more. :D Earl Andrew 19:34, 29 Jun 2004 (UTC)

On the subject, I am almost sure that the Westminster system, or at least the customs in Canada (and Quebec, from what I have witnessed and read), the members of the party in power are seated to the right of the speaker (the left of someone facing the speaker's chair) and (of this I am less sure; I am guessing from observations) the Official Opposition is seated the closest to the speaker on the "opposite" side (as it is conveniently called). If the amount of seats of the governing party is higher than the number of chairs to the right of said speaker, I ignore if there is a rule on where the other MP's of the party in power are placed, although I can testify that, in the parliament of the current National Assembly of Quebec, the extra liberals, in power, are in the back, the third party (ADQ) is to the back of the room also and the Official Opposition (PQ) is at the front of the room and to the left of the "Président de l'Assemblée" (the Speaker). I think it was the same from 1998-2003, and probably before that also. - Liberlogos 03:23, 3 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I believe that all that you are saying is indeed correct. The Government should be on the Speaker's right and Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition on the left. In fact, the diagram does indeed depict this. What I am not sure about is the arrangement of the physical seats in the house. Are they in rows and columns as in the diagram? I didn't pay enough attention when I toured the House in the past, and I can't seem to find any overhead pictures of the house or similar diagrams. A reference would be nice. --Timc 03:19, 5 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Actually in PEI and in Newfoundland and Labrador the government sits on the left of the speaker. And I have no idea what the seating arrangement in the House of Commons in terms of where the physical seats are is. I just saw from the picture on the [[Canadian House--Chealer 00:54, 2004 Nov 21 (UTC) of Commons]] page that there were 5 rows and the seats were in couplets. I drew my own conclusions from that, literally. Earl Andrew 03:26, 5 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Parties not registered at dissolution

Wouldn't it make sense that the parties that didn't exist at dissolution (CHP, PCP, libert.) have a blank box instead of a 0 in the before column in the Results--National box? Telso 19:57, 28 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Anyone know where we can get exit poll data, or data from Eastern provinces, as it happens? dave 21:45, 28 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Congrats

Just to say that this page looks really impressive. Well done to everyone! Secretlondon 02:48, 29 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I absolutely agree. Bravo all. - Liberlogos 03:23, 3 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Province and Territory tables

Are these tables really necessary? The page is already bulky enough as it is. Maybe they could be put in the results of the Canadian federal election, 2004? --Timc 23:34, 2 Jul 2004 (UTC)

First, I think we should thank Adam Carr for including this quite useful information. However, I also thought that it could be placed instead on a seperate page. Putting it in results of the Canadian federal election, 2004 might be an even better idea. - Liberlogos 03:23, 3 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Agree with moving too--Chealer 00:54, 2004 Nov 21 (UTC)

If I might offer an opinion, there is far too much difficult visual material in this article. I think the multi-coloured tables are really ugly and visually difficult for readers. The results could be displayed in a much simpler form. I also the "schematic map" is pretty worthless and should be dropped. Also, now that the elections are over, the article should be rewritten so that it reads retrospectively and not like an accumulation of news bulletins. Finally, the article's English is very odd in places - was it written in French and then computer-translated? Adam 06:50, 3 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Election Race

I propose creating a new article, Canadian federal election race, 2004 to take some of the content from this page. The particular sections I am thinking of are Major Parties, Minor Parties, Campaign Slogans, Issues, and Recent Poll Numbers. That should lighten up this page a bit. I know I should just "be bold", but I think this might be a controversial edit and I would like some input from the others here. Does anyone else have an opinion? --Timc 12:29, 6 Jul 2004 (UTC)

No, I think this page is fine in length. With my plans of creating a new page for some maps, we we will end up having four pages on the election, with a page on the election race, that will give us five! FIVE PAGES! That's a bit much I think? But If I'm the only one that feels this way, then I must bow down to democracy. Earl Andrew 16:35, 6 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Turnout figures

Corrected turnout figures which were released 28 October in this report [1], p. 92. The vote count of 13,683,570 does not match the totals in table that follows now. The figures in this table appear to be the preliminary results from Elections Canada's website, and they have not yet released the official vote counts (other than the total number of ballots cast). Christopher^ 05:17, 2004 Dec 8 (UTC)

Final Results

The results are not the final ones (which is why there is often a mention of 99% of polls reporting). Does anyone know where we can get the final results? Deleting Unnecessary Words 20:30, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Effect of Reagan's death on the election

I have deleted this pending some citations or support for the premise: Some have speculated that it wasn't helped either by the passing of former U.S. president Ronald Reagan on June 5, who was admired by conservative-minded Canadians, yet was deeply reviled by left-of-centre citizen, but when Canadians learned of the former president's passing, they forgot all that--Canadians acknowledged his love for the United States, and his spirited and principled leadership; all major party leaders expressed their condolences to Nancy Reagan, her family, and the American people. NDP Leader Jack Layton cited that "it's always sad to lose someone who has led a nation and we want to express our best wishes and sincere condolences." I don't recall anyone in the media connecting Reagan's death with the Canadian election. How could his death increase or decrease support for any of the parties? This just doesn't make sense to me. Indefatigable 21:07, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I'm with you on this one - this sounds like a non sequitur to me. Good work, Indy. Kevintoronto

Results table

I've replaced the results table with the one prepared by User:Jord as part of the discussion at Talk:Canadian federal election results since 1867. That discussion ran for a couple of months to develop a standard format for elections tables that would improve the legibility of the information. Putting a "colour box" at the beginning of the line ended up being the preferred option of those whose participated in the discussion because it allows us to use colours that better reflect the party's official colours while improving legibility. The table uses templates that will mean that a party's colours for all tables can be changed at the same time by changing the template, instead of by changing each individual table.

Over time, all of the federal elections tables will be changed over to this format. Assistance would be greatly appreciated! The Ontario provincial elections from 1867-1943 aleady use this format.

I have also removed the "Minor Parties" table because this duplicated information that is in the table - party name, leader, number of candidates. I also edited the subsection on the Green Party because it was unencyclopedic and POV. Most of the information was speculation or shameless boosterism. Kevintoronto 18:46, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Issues

Recently we've had the platforms of the CHP and the Communist Party added. I don't think that Wikipedia should be bound by "equal" time provisions for all parties. As an encyclopedia, it should give the most emphasis to those parties that attracted the interest of voters. The lack of appeal to voters of the CHP and the Communist Party in the 2004 election has been proven by the results. They were marginal forces, and an encyclopedia article can justly give them only passing mention. Their platforms can be fleshed out in gory detail in the parties' articles, but not here. Anyone agree with me on this? Ground Zero 19:43, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

What is the job of the media?

Wikipedia has a role as part of the media - it is referred to as a source of information.

The job of the media is to inform, to enable the electorate to make an informed decision. If people choose to skim over information because they don't consider it relevant is a voter's decision. A refusal to provide equitable information from all registered parties (and there are parties that have met the rigorous standards to be accepted) only serves the interests of entrenched parties. I oppose the Communist Party, but I fully support their right to have their point of view represented on an equitable basis, because I believe people should be aware of that choice. I also believe it is good to shake up the political establishment by ensuring minority parties can expose the shortcomings of the major parties that don't think "outside the box". In the end, voters still have their choice at the ballot box. GBC 05:59, 21 July 2005 (UTC)

This is an article about a past event. People cannot make choices about the 2004 election at the ballot box -- it is over; the ballots have been counted. Wikipedia is an encylopedia, not a newspaper: its role in this case is not to inform voters about the choices that they could have made, but to inform any readers about the choices that voters made and why. The CHP and the Communist Party demonstrably failed to make a mark in that election: people just didn't vote for them. They were clearly marginal, unimportant factors in the election, and therefore, detailed explanations of their views should not be included in this overview article. The World War II article should not provide extensive detail about a minor battle in Bulgaria that had no impact on the outcome of the war -- that information should appear in a branch article even though, obviously, that battle was part of the war. The links to the parties should be maintained in the article so that readers who are interested in following up for more information can go to these branch articles and find more information about their platforms, ideally in sections entitled "2004 election". Ground Zero 06:12, 21 July 2005 (UTC)

I agree, and will edit the article to remove mention of those parties from the Issues section. 24.71.155.147 19:38, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

• Thanks! I had forgotten about that! Ground Zero | t 19:58, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

The minor parties, where they did run, actually gave indications of how much support they had in those ridings. Had they been able to run full slates, the percentage would have been similar (higher where they ran, lower in some other ridings), and with a full slate, drawn more national attention and respect of voters who may regard a partial-slate party as "unable to form a government".

Green earned 4.3 percent, the CHP 1.513 percent, Progressive Canadian 1.40 percent, Marijuana Party 1.025 percent, Libertarian Party 0.518 percent, Canadian Action 0.41 percent, Communist 0.307 percent, Marxist-Leninist 0.253 percent. For the record, the Liberals earned 36.7 percent, the Conservatives 29.6 percent, the Bloc Quebecois 48.8 percent, the NDP 15.7 percent. I don't think 174,137 Canadians (who didn't vote for the big four or Green) would appreciate being told that they're nobodies as in "people just didn't vote for them". That's as many voters as in three or four ridings, and these people don't have three, two or even one MP to represent their opinions which are diverse from the Big Four. Are they chopped liver or something?! GBC 06:31, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

Nobody said they are nobodies. These parties have articles on Wikipedia. the question is, should an overview article like this one cover all of the eatils of the platforms of all parties in candidates? There were probably over 100 independent candidates, and we don't cover their platforms here, only in their individual articles (if they exist -- see Edward John Slota/Global Party of Canada, which I created.) I don't think that you and I will see eye to eye on this, so I will post this for comment on the Canadian Wikipedians' page. An as an aside, I agree with you that the first-past-the-post system unfairly fails to represent the views of minority political groups. I would be in favour of a different system. Ground Zero | t 18:39, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

I agree with GroundZero on this. Wikipedia is not a conglomeration of facts. The material here is chosen for its importance. We regularaly set priorities and decide that some things are more important than others. The minor parties played a negligible role in the election campaign and should thus have a negliglible role in this article. To do otherwise, would paint a false picture of the event. HistoryBA 14:43, 6 September 2005 (UTC)

very well, if insisted on. I have therefore restored the information in a separate article, moved minor party opinions from the 2005/2006 election article to the same separate article, and installed links from the main election articles. The minor party positions no longer "clutter" the main article, but if someone wants to know, there is a direct link to a page which has all elections for which minor party positions have been recently removed from Wikipedia. I encourage adding to that minor parties article. I hope this is an acceptable arrangement. GBC 06:55, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

I think this is a good approach, Geoff. I have wikified the new article, and added some more content. I also took the "small" tags off the link from the main article. I don't think they were necessary. At some point, we may break off parts of the new article so there is a separate article for each election, probably starting with the 05/06 election. Ground Zero | t 14:50, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

Debate transcript/video

Anyone know where I could find a video (or transcript, preferably) of the English leaders' debate of June 15, 2004? --Ultra Megatron 03:27, August 23, 2005 (UTC)

Changing the + and - signs to templates

What is your opinion on changing the + and - signs to and for more visual effect? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kndimov (talk • contribs) 15:32, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

It is against the template documentation, and Wikipedia's goal to be assessable for blind users, who use text readers. 117Avenue (talk) 03:57, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

I, for one, prefer the coloured arrows. The arrows do have the alt text "increase" and "decrease", and the images are in-line, so would screen readers just read those words in the place of the image? Either way, we would have to make this change across election articles rather than just in one, so this discussion would have to be moved. —Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 04:56, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

I also do like the look of the triangles best - However visual appeal should never ever override our accessibility guidelines. Our mission here is for "ALL" to have access to the information including the blind. Is there a way to find-out if the arrows are readable by its alt text or something? Moxy (talk) 05:01, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

I would like to point out that the + and - signs are still on the table "National Results". Kndimov (talk) 23:02, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

Maybe I'm not seeing it, but how does it violate MOS:ACCESS? It has the alternate text which is imo better than just "plus" (+), and where in the template documentation does it state this?--UnQuébécois (talk) 06:10, 15 June 2012 (UTC)

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