1. Slide Deck 10: Federal Elections

2. How are candidates elected in federal elections?

3. What is a candidate?
A person who competes for the job of elected representative is called a candidate.
At the federal level, most candidates are associated with a political party.
Candidates not associated with a party are called independents.

4. What is a riding?
Canada is divided into 338 geographic areas called ridings.
The size and shape of ridings is determined by population size, geography and social factors like culture and language.
The number of people represented in each riding is as equal as possible. 

5. What is a voting system?
An voting system is the way in which voters choose their elected representatives. Different voting systems exist around the world..

6. What is our voting system?
Canada uses a system called First-Past-The-Post (FPTP) or Single-Member Plurality.
Only one member is elected per riding.
The rules:
Voters can only choose one candidate on their ballot.
The candidate that receives the most votes wins (this is called plurality).

7. How are candidates elected?
An example of FPTP, in a riding with 100 ballots cast: CANDIDATE NUMBER OF VOTES Laura Diaz (Independent) 15 Rachel Grace (Pink Party) 40 Kevin (Yellow Party) 11 Alexia Patel (Peach Party) 34 Rachel wins because she has the most votes (40). The winning candidate does not need receive support from the majority of voters – just one more vote than any other candidate.

8. How are ridings distributed across Canada?
Province or Territory
Number of Ridings
British Columbia 42
Alberta 34
Saskatchewan 14
Manitoba
Ontario
121
Quebec 78
New Brunswick 10
Prince Edward Island 4
Nova Scotia 11
Newfoundland and Labrador 7
Yukon 1
Northwest Territories
Nunavut
Total
338
There are 49 electoral districts for the general election on September 24, 2018.

9. How do I find my riding and candidates?
Visit: (“My voter information” service)
Point out the location of your school within the riding