A new form of Additional-Member System is put forward, referred to as Territorial AMS, in which all or nearly all MPs of a party are "constituency" MPs, and few or none of them are elected from the top-up list. It is argued that this system, of all forms of PR, gives the best "constituency link", maximising the opportunity of each MP to maintain contact with his or her constituents.
Of
all forms of PR, the system is probably the closest to the present system of
First-Past-the-Post in single-member constituencies, and could therefore be
adopted in the UK with the minimum of change. The only change would be that a
candidate, instead of standing in one constituency,
would stand in a "territory" consisting of an indefinite number of
them. A party would then gets seats in proportion to the total number of votes
which its candidates had obtained.
It
is also claimed that, at least in its "strong-party" version, the
system would strengthen the incentive of each MP to serve his or her
constituents, and would increase the coherence and integration of each party.
TERRITORIAL
AMS AND LIST PR
For the next election to the European Parliament, the government intends to use a regional list system of PR. The drawback of this system is the enormous size of the constituencies to be used--if there were nine of them, each electing nine or ten MEPs, each would contain about five million electors. Clearly, with this system, there could not be a close relationship between the MEPs and their constituents.
What
then can be regarded as the optimum size of constituency for a party, the size
which maximises the opportunity of each of its MEPs to maintain contact with
his or her constituents? For a party with forty MEPs, the optimum-sized
constituency will be one which contains one-fortieth of those who voted for the party, for a party with ten
MEPs, it will be one which contains one-tenth of those who voted for the party, and so on. Thus to
optimise, the size of the constituency should be variable, being smaller for
large parties, and larger for small parties.
But
although this might be a theoretically optimal solution to the problem, can it
be implemented in practice? Surprisingly, it is if anything easier to implement
than the conventional systems. The way to put it into practice can be explained
as follows. A party will normally be able to make a fairly accurate prediction
of the proportion of votes it is going to get in an election, and therefore,
under PR, it can fairly accurately estimate its number of seats. Thus if the
party is given the opportunity of creating its own constituencies, it will create them of about the optimal size.
To
avoid confusion with the conventional constituencies, let us refer to these
variable-size party-created constituencies, as "territories". In
order to allow the parties to create these territories, the country is divided
into electoral areas called "tracts", there being at least as many
tracts as there are seats to be filled, or preferably, several times more. For
the Euro elections, the most convenient tracts will be the Westminster
constituencies, which have already been created. (Incidentally, tracts do not need
to be equal in their numbers of electors, so no boundary revision will be
needed.)
A
party places its candidates in territories, one candidate per territory. A
territory is a cluster of adjacent tracts, as many as the party chooses to
include in it. The only restriction is that territories of the same party may not overlap each other. A substantial deposit is
required for each territory, which is forfeited if its candidate is not
elected. This is likely to deter the party from creating more territories than
the number of seats it expects to get.
As
well as its territorial candidates, one per territory, the party runs a
national list of additional candidates, who
are placed in order on the list. Candidates are elected from the top of the
list to fill any seats the party gets in excess of its number of territories,
or to fill vacancies which occur during the legislative term due to death or
retirement.
There
is a separate ballot paper for each tract, which carries the name of each
candidate standing in the tract, together with the name of his or her party.
The candidates are placed on the ballot paper in order of the number of
electors in their respective territories, the candidate with fewest electors
being placed at the top. Thus the largest parties will be at the top, and the
smallest at the bottom, so that even if there are many parties, most voters
will be able to find the candidate they want to vote for without difficulty.
The elector votes for one candidate, with a simple "X". (Thus the
ballot paper, and the method of voting, is exactly the same as in the present
system.)
A
party receives seats in proportion to the nation-wide total of the votes which
its candidates have obtained. (It would be possible to use a representation
threshold, giving no seats to a party with less than some fixed percentage of
the national vote. However, there seems no justification for this in elections
to the European Parliament, which does not form a government.) If ever the
party has created more territories than the seats which it ultimately obtains
(which it is unlikely to do, given the deposits which it would lose if it did),
then those of its candidates are elected whose percentages of the votes in their
respective territories are the highest. Then in each territory where its
candidate is not elected, the party assigns each tract of that territory to one
of its elected candidates, as an additional responsibility, so as to ensure
that the the party's territorial MEPs cover all the tracts. If on the other
hand the party obtains more seats
than the number of territories it has created, then the excess seats are filled
by the candidates at the top of its national list.
TERRITORIAL
AMS AND ORDINARY AMS
This new form of PR is given the name the Territorial Additional-Member System, on account of the lists of additional candidates which it uses, if necessary, to top up each party's territorial seats. However, it is very different from the conventional Additional-Member System. Under the latter system, some fixed proportion of the MPs, one-half or perhaps one-third, are elected from the top-up list, and do not have constituencies. Also the constituencies of any one party cover only part of the country, from about half of the country, in the case of a large party, down to none of it, in the case of the smaller parties. In contrast, under Territorial AMS, only a small proportion of the MPs of a party, perhaps none of them, will be elected off the top-up list, and all or nearly all of them will have territories. Further, the territories of the MPs of a party, even a small one, will cover the whole country. Thus whichever party you vote for, you will be represented in the parliament by the candidate for whom you have voted. This seems an advantage over ordinary AMS, where perhaps most people will be represented in their constituencies by an MP for whom they have not voted, and to whom they might be strongly opposed.
TERRITORIAL
AMS FOR WESTMINSTER
Territorial AMS could also be used for the Westminster election. The "tracts" which would be used could be either the Westminster constituencies, or the local government constituencies. Thus for example, if Westminster constituencies were used as tracts, a party which expected to get 30% of the seats, would create territories some consisting of three tracts, and some consisting of four tracts, so that it created the right number of territories.
For
Westminster, either a representation threshold should be used, to prevent the
proliferation of parties, or (in my view preferably) the seats of each party
should be determined by the rules of Approval PR (see separate paper
"Approval PR: An electoral system proposed for the UK").
If
Territorial AMS is to be used for Westminster, it would seem to be advisable to
use the "strong-party" version of it, which can be explained as
follows.
This
version of the system differs from that described above, in that it extends to
the internal working of each party, about some aspects of which it makes the
following minimal requirements. Before an election, if the party already has
elected MPs whom are seeking re-election, then they decide the number of
territories the party is to create, and the way the country is to be divided to
form them, the final plan of territories being approved by them by majority
vote in secret ballot. Local parties are formed, one for each territory,
presumably by combining the already existing constituency parties contained in
the territory. Each territory party then nominates two candidates to the party
list. However, in the first and also in subsequent elections, anyone who has
been an MP of the party in the term just ending, automatically becomes a
candidate on the list, even if not nominated by a territory party. Thus the
party's list will have a number of candidates which is at least twice its
number of territories.
The
list of candidates is then placed in order, by vote of the candidates on
that list, in secret ballot. This is
done by successive applications of the Alternative Vote procedure, as follows.
The
voting is preferential, that is, a candidate votes by writing "1" for
a first preference, "2" for a second preference, and so on, for as
many candidates as he or she wishes. One candidate is then selected for the first
place on the list, as follows. The votes are first allocated each to its
highest-preferred candidate. The candidate with fewest votes is excluded, and
his or her votes are transferred, each vote going to its next preference, if
one is expressed. This process of exclusion and transfer is repeated, until one
candidate has more votes than all other candidates together, and is selected
for the first place on the list.
To
select a candidate for the second place on the list, the same procedure is
followed, using the same ballot papers, but ignoring the presence on these
ballot papers of the previously chosen candidate. And so on, until all the
candidates have been placed in order on the list.
The
allocation of a party's candidates to its territories, is then carried out as
follows. A party may, if its candidates so decide (by majority vote in secret
ballot), run its leading members, those placed at the top of its list, as non-territorial
candidates, so that when elected they
will be free of the responsibility for a territory. The other candidates are as
far as possible allocated to the territories which nominated them. Thus going
down the list, for as many candidates as the party has territories, each
candidate is allocated to that territory, the territory party of which
nominated him or her, provided that (1) that territory has not already been
allocated a candidate, and (2) the candidate was in fact nominated by a
territory party. Then if there are any of these candidates who have not been
given a territory, they are allocated to the territories which have not been
given a candidate, this being done by decision of the candidates on the party
list, as approved by majority vote in secret ballot.
(Thus
under this scheme, in any party, the candidates to go on to the party list are
selected by its local parties, and the candidates of the list are placed in the
order in which they are to be elected, not by the party leader or by the party bureaucracy, but by
the candidates of the list themselves. It
should also be noted that with this scheme, it is possible for an MP who has
not been re-nominated by his or her territory party, nevertheless to be placed
high on the party list by the other MPs of the party, so that the MP gets a
territory, and is re-elected. Conversely, an MP might be re-nominated by the
territory party, but still be placed by the other MPs of the party so low down
on the party list that he or she gets no territory and is very unlikely to get
a seat.)
If
the party obtains at least as many seats as its number of territories plus the number of its leading members (if any) standing
as top-of-the-list non-territorial candidates, then its seats are given to
those of its candidates who are at the top of its list. Thus all of its
candidates with territories will be elected, and perhaps some more candidates
without territories, further down the list.
If
the party obtains fewer seats than
its number of territories plus the
number of top-of-the-list non-territorial candidates, then some of its
candidates with territories will not be elected. The ones who are not elected
will be those with the lowest percentages of votes (these being percentages of
the all-party total of votes in the respective territories).
If
a party has vacancies during the course of the legislative term, due to the
death or retirement of its MPs, then these are filled by those of the
non-elected candidates without territory who are placed highest on the party's
list.
What
then are the effects of this "strong-party" version of Territorial
AMS? Under this scheme, the central party bureaucracy or the party leadership
plays little or no part in the formation of a party's list. In any party, (1)
the candidates to go on to the party list in addition to the party's MPs, are
selected by its local parties, and (2) the candidates of the list are placed in
the order in which they are to be elected, by the candidates of the list
themselves.
Under
Territorial AMS, an MP will in general have a safe seat, provided he or she
retains the confidence of the other MPs of the party. As under other forms of
PR, there is likely to be little change in a party's seats from election to
election, and those few MPs whose seats are at risk, will be those placed
lowest on the party's list by the other candidates in the party.
At
the same time, despite the safety of their seats, the MPs will have a strong
incentive to serve the electors of their respective territories, an incentive
perhaps as strong as that of MPs in marginal constituencies under
First-Past-the-Post. The reason is that all MPs will be fully aware that they
will face, before the next election, a secret ballot by the other MPs and
candidates of their party, which will determine their place on the party list.
Any MPs who are thought to have neglected the electors of their territories, or
who in the last election got unduly low percentages of votes, are likely to get
a low preference from their colleagues, and so get placed low down on the party
list, where they will be given no territory and are very unlikely to be
re-elected.
For similar reasons, each MP of a party will have a strong incentive to cooperate with the rest of the party team, and the party will be less liable to splits and factions. Thus Territorial AMS can be expected to promote more unified and effective parties, ones in which the MPs cooperate as a coherent team, while yet being highly responsive to the electors who have voted for them.
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