Proportional Representation

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Proportional Representation
PR tries to make the votes cast match the
seats won?
HOW?
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Three Systems
National or Regional List System
Additional Member System
Single Transferable Vote
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List System
Imagine a Parliament with 100 MPs exactly
Imagine theres a General Election and the result
is
Which mean that the parties would get the numbers
of MPs as follows
40 of the voters vote LAB
40 MPs
30 of the voters vote CON
30 MPs
20 of the voters vote LIB-DEM
20 MPs
10 of the voters vote SNP
10 MPs
This system is truly proportional
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List System
This might be an imaginary Labour Party list
40 vote 40 out of 100 MPs. The first 40 on
the Labour list get elected
But who actually gets elected as MPs?
and the rest are out!
Each party produces a list of candidates..
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List System
This might be an imaginary Labour Party list
40 vote 40 out of 100 MPs. The first 40 on
the Labour list get elected
But who actually gets elected as MPs?
and the rest are out!
Each party produces a list of candidates..
Very proportional BUT
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Party chooses candidate order, not public
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Difficult for public to get rid of unwanted
politicians
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Democracy???
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The Additional Member System (AMS)
Tries to combine the best of FPTP and the List
System
Were going to look first at the system used in
Germany, called the ADDITIONAL LIST SYSTEM
More than one version of AMS
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AMS The Additional List System in action
Imagine this time the parliament has 200 MPs.
We want half of them (100) to be elected by FPTP
but the end result still to be proportional.
Everyone gets TWO votes, one for a local MP, and
one for the preferred party.
One vote is for a FIRST PAST THE POST
constituency MP
The second vote is for a LIST MP elected by PR
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AMS The Additional List System in action
This is the imaginary result
First Past the Post vote
2nd (Party List) vote
Lab 55 seats
Lab 40
Con 30
Con 40 seats
Lib-Dem 20
Lib-Dem 5 seats
SNP 10
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AMS The Additional List System in action
With PR, our 200 seats should end up
We have elected 100 constituency MPs
The percentage of the party vote was
So we need to top up with list MPs
Constituency
Total
vote
LIST MPs
Lab 55 seats
Lab 40
80 MPs
25 MPs
Con 40 seats
Con 30
60 MPs
20 MPs
Lib-Dem 5 seats
Lib-Dem 20
40 MPs
35 MPs
SNP 10
20 MPs
SNP 0 seats
20 MPs
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AMS The Additional List System in action
With PR, our 200 seats should end up
We have elected 100 constituency MPs
The percentage of the party vote was
So we need to top up with list MPs
Everyone has at least has a constituency MP v
Constituency
Total
vote
LIST MPs
System is truly proportional v BUT
Lab 55 seats
Lab 40
80 MPs
25 MPs
List MPs still chosen by party, not electorate X
Con 40 seats
Con 30
60 MPs
20 MPs
Still same old PR problems - too much power for
minor parties and so on X
Lib-Dem 5 seats
Lib-Dem 20
40 MPs
35 MPs
Could be a bit more confusing for voters? X
SNP 10
20 MPs
SNP 0 seats
20 MPs
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