New ridings, new boundaries could affect election outcome

We're halfway through the election campaign but one very important question remains do you evenknow what riding you live in anymore?

And who actually draws the boundaries for the ridings in which you live and vote?

The redistribution that occurred in 2012added 30 new ridingsand carvedup existing ridings, with some areas hived off infavour of others. To add to the confusion, many ridings have changed their names to better reflectat least in theorythe local communities that fall within thenew boundaries.

• Findyour new riding on the electoral map

Not to mention that more than 60 MPsare retiring, which has left a record number ofopen seats.

According tocalculations from Alice Funke, of Pundits' Guide, more than a thirdof the 338 House of Commons seats up for grabs on Oct. 19 will be new or have either an unfamiliar sittingmember of Parliament or no sitting member on the ballot.

Avoidance of gerrymandering

Unlike inthe United Stateswhere electoral boundaries are determined by state legislatures ridings in Canada are determined byindependent electoral commissions in each province.

This ensures that lines on the map aren't redrawn to give one political party in particular anunfair advantage, a practice known as gerrymandering.

This wasn't always the case in Canada. As the CBC's Adrienne Arsenault recounts, in the 1960sunder the leadershipof former prime minister John Diefenbaker, Parliament began the arduous task of taking the politicians out of the process and handing it over to independent officers of the electoral redistribution committees.

The result was some of the fairest electoral boundaries in the Western world.

Watch above for Arsenault's explanation of the changes to our electoral system.