Public Dollars for Votes: Potential Abuse of Public Financing of Parties?

Globe and Mail:

A recent court ruling that gives small political parties $1.75 for each vote cast in their direction is ripe for exploitation by any mischief-maker or frat-house drinker who decides to run a fake party in the next federal election, a federal prosecutor warned yesterday.
…
“One can only imagine that in a city like Kingston . . . a student union may decide it wants a bigger budget for beer,” [Crown counsel Roselyn] Levine said. “It can have 10,000 students vote for its Beer Party; $17,500 is not a bad take. I don’t want to single out students, but it is open to abuse to any entity that wants to obtain public funds.”

It seems Ms. Levine is not particularly familiar with riding-level campaigns, or with university students.

First, 20,000 votes is often sufficient to win at the riding level. Many candidates from legimitate parties fail to get half that number. If one-issue campaigns like promising beer were all it took to get 10,000 votes in a single riding, this would be being done already.

Second, speaking as a university student, I would be shocked if 10,000 of us voted for anything. Hell, I’d be shocked if there were 10,000 students in a given riding who knew there was an election happening.

Levine’s general point is sound though. Public funds going to political parties of any size is a terrible idea. Public funds going to fringe parties is even worse. Thanks to the recent court ruling, we can’t have the former without the latter.

Contra Levine, however, I don’t think it’s going to be funding for frats that will cast light on the true asininity of this policy. But if a Canadian version of, say, the National Front were to contest an election, and win even 0.5% of the vote (with the accompanying public funding) — I think we would then see the type of outcry necessary to abolish this ridiculous legislation.