123 Canada, the national non-partisan electoral reform organization, wishes to congratulate all candidates, volunteers, and voters who took part in the five April 3, 2017 byelections.

This is a rare day in Canadian electoral history: every riding has a true majority.  Welcome to the House of Commons, Bob Benzen, Stephanie Kusie, Mary Ng, Mona Fortier, and Emmanuella Lambropoulos, who at the time of writing all seem headed to win with over 50% of the vote.

In this instance, Preferential or Two Round voting would not be necessary.  However, many elections are won without a majority mandate from voters.  In those cases, the mandate of the MPs can be clear cut.  First Past the Post allows an MP to be elected even if the majority of the voters do not want to be represented by that MP.  Allowing voters to express their second choice means candidates will seek the consensus that they need to get the true majority support.