Additional Member System Employment Proposals For British

Variations of the AMS have different ways of determining how many party list representatives each party is entitled to. The main difference between systems is whether the constituency representatives are counted when list representatives are allocated to each party.

Parallel Voting is the more common variation among voting systems of the world, but MMP is the system described here. Small parties will generally win more seats under MMP than SUP.

1 Employment

The AMS is used to elect members to numerous representative bodies around the world.

It would be used for the proposed Regional Assemblies in EnglandRegional Assembly is a title which has universally been adopted by the English bodies established as regional chambers under the Regional Development Agencies Act 1998. Their original defined role was to channel regional opinions to the business-led Regio.

AMS is also used in BoliviaThe Republic of Bolivia is a landlocked country in western South America. It is bordered by Brazil in the north and east, Paraguay and Argentina in the south, and Chile and Peru in the west. History Main article: History of Bolivia Bolivia has long been i, HungaryThe Republic of Hungary is a landlocked country in Central Europe, bordered by Austria, Slovakia, Ukraine, Romania, Serbia, Croatia and Slovenia. It is known locally as the Country of the Magyars or Magyarorszag''. Magyar Koztarsasag ( In Detail) ( Full s, ItalyThe Italian Republic or Italy ( Italian: Italia is a country in the south of Europe, consisting mainly of a boot-shaped peninsula together with two large islands in the Mediterranean Sea: Sicily and Sardinia. To the north, where it borders France, Switzer, LesothoMmuso wa Lesotho Kingdom of Lesotho (In Detail) (Full size) National motto: Khotso, Pula, Nala(Peace, Rain, Prosperity Official language Sesotho, English Capital Maseru Capital's coordinates 29° 18' S, 27° 28' E Largest City Maseru Monarch HM The King of, MexicoThis article is about the country Mexico. For other meanings, see Mexico (disambiguation The United Mexican States or Mexico ( Spanish: Estados Unidos Mexicanos or Mexico regarding the use of the variant spelling Mejico see section The name below) is a co and Venezuela.

1.1 Proposals for British Elections

In 1976, the Hansard Society recommended that the Additional Member System be used for UK parliamentary elections, but instead of using closed party lists, it proposed that seats allocated by proportional representation instead be filled by each party's 'best losers'.

The British Labour Party stated in its 1997 manifesto that it would put the question of a proportional electoral system to the public in a referendum. The Independent Commission on the Voting System headed up by Lord Jenkins proposed a variant of AMS called AV+ in which most MPs would be chosen using the Alternative Vote in single-member constituencies, and the remainder seats of would be filled using open party lists. There was not a referendum before the 2001 election and the statement was not repeated.

2 Procedures

The voter makes two votes: one for a constituency representative and one for a party. In a lesser-used variant, which is used by some of the several States of Germany, both votes are combined into one, so that voting for a representative automatically means also voting for his party.

In each constituency, the representative is chosen using first-past-the-post (that is, the candidate with the most votes, by plurality, wins).

On the district or national level (i.e. above the constituency level), the total number of seats in the assembly are allocated to parties proportionally to the number of votes the party received in the party portion of the ballot. Subtracted from each party's allocation is the number of constituency seats that party won. The number of seats remaining allocated to that party are filled using the party's list. If a candidate is on the party list, but wins a constituency seat, they do not receive two seats; they are instead crossed off the party list and replaced with the next candidate down.

2.1 Overhang Seats

Because a party can gain less seats by the party vote than needed to justify the won constituency seats, overhang seats can occur. There are different ways of dealing with overhang seats. In the Scottish Parliament the number of overhang seats is taken from the number of proportional seats of the other parties, in Germany's Bundestag and the New Zealand House of Representatives the overhang seats remain.

2.2 Threshold

In order to be eligible for list seats in the New Zealand, German and various United Kingdom systems, a party must either earn at least 5% of the party vote or must win at least one constituency seat (three constituency seats in Germany). This is extremely important to the minor parties. A party which wins no constituency seats and fails to meet the 5% threshold faces oblivion. Having a leader with a safe constituency seat is a tremendous asset to a minor party in such a system as it ensures survival.

3 Potential for Tactical Voting

In terms of tactical voting, the first vote for the district representative is often much less important than the second party list vote in determining the overall result of an election; in other cases a party may be so certain of winning seats in the district election that it expects no extra seats in the proportional top-up. Some voters may therefore seek to get a double representation by voting tactically and splitting their votes, though this runs the risk of unintended consequences.

3.1 Decoy lists

Political parties can also abuse the system: in the 2001 Italian elections, the two main coalitions (the House of Freedoms and the Olive Tree) linked many of their constituency candidates to decoy lists (liste civetta) in the proportional parts, under the names Abolizione Scorporo and Paese Nuovo respectively, so that if they won constituencies then they would not reduce the number of proportional seats received by the coalitions. Between them, the two decoy lists won 360 of the 475 constituency seats, more than half of the 630 total number of seats, despite winning a combined total of less than 0.2% of the national proportional part of the vote. In the case of Forza Italia (part of the House of Freedoms), the tactic was so successful that it did not have enough candidates in the proportional part to receive as many seats as it in fact won, missing out on 12 seats.

4 See also

List of democracy and elections-related topics

Voting systems

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