Voting and Consensus Government
Northwest Territories elects members to the Legislative Assembly of the Northwest Territories under a non-partisan system known as consensus government. The election only decides who represents each district. The newly elected members of the assembly convene after the election to vote amongst themselves to decide which members become part of the Executive Council. This system of government has evolved in the Northwest Territories since 1870.
The voting method to elect members is the First Past the Post electoral system. Voters under this system pick the top candidate by the number of votes cast regardless of the percent of votes earned by a candidate. With a few historical exceptions all electoral districts in the Northwest Territories are represented by a single member. First Past the Post has been used since the first election in 1881. Elections NWT is the independent regulatory body in charge of overseeing elections.
Read more about this topic: List Of Northwest Territories General Elections
Famous quotes containing the words voting, consensus and/or government:
“It’s not the voting that’s democracy, it’s the counting.”
—Tom Stoppard (b. 1937)
“A consensus politician is someone who does something that he doesn’t believe is right because it keeps people quiet when he does it.”
—John Major (b. 1943)
“A bill of rights is what the people are entitled to against every government on earth, general or particular, and what no just government should refuse, or rest on inference.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)