Election systems

My notes on the mechanics of the different systems we use to elect our representatives in the UK were getting a bit out of date, so with a scan through the Electoral Reform Society website and the BBC election results I reworked the exemplars.

Two features of the ‘first past the post’ electoral system

• In SMSP, MPs are elected by constituents indicating their candidate preference once. The candidate with the largest number of votes is duly elected, e.g. Neil Gerrard, was elected in 2005 with a majority of 8,000.

• It is usually the case that the party with the largest number of seats forms the government, e.g. in 2005 Labour had a majority of 66 after they picked up 356 of the 646 seats throughout the UK.

The workings of the other electoral systems which are used in the UK

Party List

• Regional (party) list converts votes won into seats in accurate proportions. For elections to the European Parliament, UK voters cast a vote for regional candidates by voting once for their preferred party (the list is closed). In London, for example, the 2004 elections saw Labour and the Tories pick up around a quarter of the vote and they were each awarded with 3 of the available 9 nine seats.

Additional Member System

• With the additional member system, voters vote twice, once for their constituency representative, and once for regional representatives according to party – the ‘top up’ which creates proportionality, e.g. In the Scottish Parliament elections in 2007 Labour collected 9 of the 10 local seats in Glasgow, and since they only won around a third of the regional vote they picked up 0 of the 7 top up seats. Also used for the Welsh Senned, and London Assembly.

Supplementary Vote

• The supplementary vote is used in London mayor elections. If a candidate wins more than half of the first choice votes, then they are elected. If no
candidate wins over half of the first choice votes, then all but the top two candidates are eliminated and losers’ second preferences redistributed. In 2008, Johnson and Livingstone were the top two, with Johnson winning overall since he picked up 53% of the total first and second preference votes.

Single Transferable Vote

• In the single transferable vote, voters cast ballots in order of preference. If any candidate has enough votes to reach the quota, they are declared elected. Surplus votes are reallocated to remaining candidates until one reaches the quota. Thereafter candidates with the lowest number of votes are eliminated and their votes are transferred to the voters’ second preferences. Used in the Northern Ireland Assembly elections in 2007, the quota in North Belfast was around 6,000, and only one candidate (the DUP’s Michael Dodds) met it first time round.