Electoral Systems

First Past the Post Additional Member System

A Product of Historical Development First Past the Post (FPTP)

Representational Principles The Representation of Places The Representation of People

Conflict Between Representation of- Local Constituencies (Places) National Constituencies (Political Parties)

General Elections are not national but local They consist of 646 different elections

But where is the Post? T h e r e i s n t o n e ! ! T h e S y s t e m i s r e a l l y F u r t h e s t D o w n t h e C o u r s e

…..when the voting stops

Inverness, Nairn, & Lochaber, 1992 General Election

Who does FPTP favour? Butter more than margarine The parties whose support is geographically concentrated By and large the bigger parties

The General Election, 1983

The General Election, 2005

2005 General Election Labour 356* Con. 198 Lib/Dem 62 SNP 6 Plaid Cymru 3 Kidmster Hsp 1 Respect 1 Ind (Lab) 1 Ulster U 1 Democratic U 9 SDLP 3 Sinn Fein 5 *Inc. Speaker

Usual Consequences of FPTP Single Party Government General Elections decide who shall form the government Close connection between the government and electors Strong government, weak parliament Unfair allocation of seats in the parliament

Additional Member Systems (AMS)* or Mixed Member Consists of two elements: –1. First Past the Post –2. Proportional Representation

AMS has a number of variations In some cases the two elements are not linked The proportion of AM to FPTP seats vary The AM s may be distributed at a National or Sub-National level The elector may have one or two votes

AMS Scottish Style

Scottish Additional Member System Consists of two inter- connected elements: –1. First Past the Post –2. Proportional Representation

Why the Additional Member System? (AMS) Labour wanted All-Party Support AMS was Labours Preferred Alternative Liberals Prepared to accept AMS as a compromise Labour also felt it would make it more difficult for the Nationalists to get a majority of seats

Features of the Scheme 73 FPTP Seats (Westminster Seats pre- 2005, but Orkney and Shetland divided) 8 Regional Constituencies each returning 7 Additional Members

Voting Each elector has two votes One for the FPTP seat One for a Regional party list

Nomination Strategies Disincentive for small parties to contest the constituency seats Thus: Few parties contest the constituencies A plethora of parties context the lists

North East Constituencies In eight out of nine seats only the four main parties stood In Gordon the four main parties stood + Scottish Enterprise Party and two Independents

Scottish senior citizens united party Green North East Regional List

The Voter Does Not Have to Vote for the Same Party with both of His/Her Votes

) Patrick Harvie Rosie Kane Tommy Sheridan Give us your second vote

Allocation of Regional Additional Members The regional list votes across all the FPTP constituencies in a region are added up Each partys 2nd votes are then divided by the number of FPTP seats already won +1 (DHondt Quota)

Allocation of AMs continued After the division the First AM is allocated to the party whose divided vote is highest The 2nd AM is allocated by dividing the 2nd Votes by seats already won, including the 1st Additional Member. The process continues until all seven AMs have been allocated

The Allocation of Regional List MSPs in the North East (see handout)

The Ballot and Dislike of Small Parties

The Ballot Prior to 2007 two pieces of paper 1 st for Constituency Vote 2 nd for the Regional List 2007 One piece of paper 1 st vote for the Regional List 2 nd vote for the Constituency

Working of the system in 2007

Overall Result of the Scottish Parliamentary Election 2007

the main cast: Party Leaders

Turnout 1997: 58.2% 2003: 49.4% 2007: 51.7% (Turnout reduced by 2.2% due to a large number of spoiled ballots). A second order election.

Electronic Counter

Dear Me!

2007 Summary

2007 Seats by Type

2007 Fair Shares?

Working of the system continued High level of female representation, esp. Labour and SSP. (2003)

Working of the system continued High level of female representation, esp. Labour and SSP. (2007)

Working of the System continued The Conservatives MSPs were mostly returned from the regional lists The Labour MSPs were overwhelmingly returned by First Past the Post Labour and the SNP were over- represented (5 to 7/8).

Working of the system continued The way the votes were counted affected the outcome: –Labour would not have won AMs had they been aggregated at national rather than regional level. (Based on 2 nd Vote-share). Other parties were under-represented by 13 seats

Working of the system continued The Liberals held the balance of power in the parliament More parties contested the regional lists than FPTP constituencies All four main parties won fewer regional list than FPTP votes, esp. LibDems

Working of the system continued Ticket-Splitting –Minor parties gained representation through the regional lists (SSP and Greens) in 2003 but barely so in 2005 (2 Greens + Margo MacDonald).

Government Formation The Labour-LibDem Administration was defeated. The SNP as the largest party sought a coalition with the LibDems LibDem activists would not support coalition with the SNP

Government formation continued The Conservatives are pariahs The odds and sods too few and flakey Therefore a minority single-party SNP administration seeking support from others on an issue by issue basis, including the Conservatives. The minority status of the administration makes this an interesting parliament to follow