Transcript Electoral Reform

Electoral Systems
week 5
Does the defeat for AV referendum
mean that reform is off the agenda?
Joy Johnson
Electoral systems – key texts
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Morrison, Public Affairs for Journalists
King, British constitution
Laws, 22 Days in May
Renwick, a citizen’s guide to electoral reform
Baston & Ritchie Don’t Take No For An Answer the 2011
Referendum
• The Coalition Constitution and the Constitution,
Bogdanor
• Various papers inc:
• John Curtice, Parliamentary Affairs, Vol. 63 No. 4, 2010,
623–638
Labour defend their position
result a hung Parliament
• http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/electio
n_2010/8667457.stm
• UK polarised – Conservative in the South,
Labour in the North and Scotland
• Result - First Past the Post (winner takes all)
Day after the night before
• http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/election_
2010/8669690.stm
• Clegg addresses media following the 2010
general election
• With no outright winner he tells reporters that he
would talk to the Conservatives as they had the
most votes
• He declares that this election showed that the
present system is broken
Protesters demand electoral reform
• http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8670002.stm
Examples - Safe Seat – Birmingham
Erdington (2005)
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Turnout 64939 (48.9%)
Simon S.L. (lab) 16,810
Evidge V.T. (Con) 7,235
Evans, J (LD)
5,027
Ebanks S.E (BNP) 746
Williams, T (NF)
416
• Lab majority 9.575
(53.0%)
(22.8%)
(15.8%)
(2.3%)
(1.3%)
(Robinson p10)
Result of Erdington
• Single plurality system Simons won the vote
• And with more than half the vote
• Other candidates votes wasted
• Party machines tend to ignore the safe seats and
concentrate on the marginals – key seat
battleground
• 2011 labour party defended their seats – helped
prevent a Conservative overall majority
Examples – Argyll & Bute
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Turnout 67,271 (64.3%)
Reid, A (LD)
15,786 (36.5%)
Mcgrigor, J.A.R.N (Con) 10,150 (23.5%)
Mnson, C (Lab)
9,692 (22.4%)
Henderson, D (SSP)
881 (2.0%)
• LD majority 5,636
Result of Argyll & Bute
• Winning candidate well short of fifty per cent
• Those opposing Liberal Democrat accounted
for nearly two-thirds of the vote
Result of 2005 UK Gen Election
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Party
%votes
Labour
35.3
Con
32.3
Lib Dem
22.1
Other
10.3
No of seats % seats
356
55.1
198
30.7
62
9.6
30
4.6
Result
• Labour’s majority reduced from 2001 yet the
party achieved 55 per cent share of H of C
seats with just 35 per cent of the national
vote.
• Majority of the seats with a minority of the
votes
2010 election result
• http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/election2010
/results/
Scotland’s electoral system – Scottish
Parliament
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How the Additional Member System (AMS) works
129 Members of the Scottish Parliament (MSPs)
Each elector (voter) has two votes.
73 constituencies
Each constituency one MSP on first past the post (as in Westminster elections._
This is the elector's 'first vote'.
The 'second vote' is used to elect 56 additional members.
Scotland is divided into 8 parliamentary Regions and each region elects 7 regional
MSPs.
The parties are then allocated a number of additional members to make the
overall result more proportional.
The regional MSPs are selected from lists compiled by the parties.
These MSPs are also sometimes referred to as List MSPs.
Fixed terms (Scottish Parliament)
• General elections for the Scottish Parliament
take place every four years, normally on the
first Thursday in May.
• First Minister cannot call an election before
the end of four years.
• Only in extraordinary circumstances can the
date be changed by a two-thirds majority of
all MSPs.
Majoritarian systems
• Term used to classify candidates who win by
obtaining majority of votes cast
• (first past the post can result in candidates
winner on fewer than half the total votes cast)
Supplementary vote
• Supplementary vote – used in London Mayoral
election
• If only two candidates first past the post used
• More than two
• Votes cast on preference 1st and 2nd choice
• If candidate wins more than half (majority) he or
she elected
• If not, others drop out and their 2nd preference
redistributed
Result UK councils/BBC
• At-a-glance: Elections 2012
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PM hails Johnson mayoral victory
Labour are back, says Ed Miliband
Cities say 'no' to elected mayors
Vote 2012: As it happened
Projected vote share: Labour 38%, Conservatives 31%, Lib Dems
16%, others 15%
• Labour have gained 823 councillors seats, the Conservatives have
lost 405 and the Lib Dems 336
• The Conservatives are nine points down on 2008, Labour are up 16
points and the Lib Dems down eight points
• Turnout is projected at 32% - the lowest in English local elections
since 2000
London Mayor - result
• Boris Johnson 971,931 first preference votes
• Ken Livingstone’s 889,918,
• neither reached the 50% mark, second preference
votes were taken into account.
• The Labour candidate won (more second pref) 102,355
to his rival’s 82,880, but it was not enough to put him
in front.
• In a further poor result for the Liberal Democrats, the
party’s candidate Brian Paddick was beaten into third
place by the Jenny Jones of the Greens. Paddick won
91,774 votes to Jones’s 98,913. Independent Siobhan
Benita was fifth with 83,914.
Alternative Vote (AV)
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Lib Dems compromised to get the agreement
Referendum 5 May 2011
Referendum on AV had been in Labour 2010 manifesto
Preferential not proportional
All candidates ranked in order
When all votes cast if one candidate has won over 50% elected
If not candidate with the fewer first preference is eliminated and his
or her are redistributed
Last candidate eliminated
Eventually candidate with more than 50% wins
More than 50% produces legitimacy
Least unpopular wins
Elector’s first choice not counted
AV cont
• Still has single member constituency
• Shouldn’t produce extremist parties
• Result of this system would be the election of many
candidates who were not the first choice of most of the
electorate
• Leading to least common denominator of the
electorate
• Nick Clegg in the past had called it a ‘miserable little
compromise’ but this was before the coalition
government
• Political parties still retain power to chose candidates
AV result
• 19.1m people voted in the second UK-wide
referendum in history - a higher than expected
turnout of 41%.
• The final result put the Yes vote at 32.1% and
the No vote at 67.9%.
AV (vote on national issues)
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eyg_f7nTYo (Mandelson interview)
Proportional Representation
• In systems of proportional representation, every party
provides a list of candidates for selection on a regional or
national basis.
• These lists may be open or closed: an open list means
electors have the ability to indicate some preference over
which of the candidates they choose from the party list; a
closed list means electors must vote for the party as a
whole and the list is presented to them as a fait accompli.
• Each party standing for election wins seats in accordance
with the proportion of votes it receives.
A closed list system is used for European parliamentary
elections.
Cameron campaigning against AV
Clegg for AV
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jAWmKgI
Oqv8
• http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/avreferendum/8332801/AV-referendum-its-aonce-in-a-generation-opportunity-says-NickClegg.html
Electoral Reform Society
• http://www.google.co.uk/#hl=en&sugexp=les
%3B&gs_rn=2&gs_ri=hp&cp=14&gs_id=1i&xh
r=t&q=electoral+reform+society&es_nrs=true
&pf=p&tbo=d&sclient=psyab&oq=electoral+refo&gs_l=&pbx=1&bav=on.
2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_qf.&bvm=bv.42080656,d.d2k
&fp=6348424fbb5b8e3b&biw=1280&bih=657
Question
• Essential public for journalists, Morrison Ch 4
• Don’t Take No For An Answer, Baston & Ritchie
Ch 9
• The Coalition and the Constitution, Bogdanor,
Ch 5
• With the defeat of the AV referendum is that
the end for the reform of how UK votes in
Westminster elections?