Flashcards
Electoral Systems
Cards in this deck (18)
- 1FPTP-general and local council elections.AMS-Used for elections to welsh assembly and scottish parliament.
- 2Regional List-European Parliament.AMS-London Assembly and Supplementary system for London Major. STV-Northern Ireland Assembly.
- 3Plurality-Winner gets most votes, doesn't matter how many.Majoritarian-Winner gets most votes, but needs 50% +1.
- 4Proportional-Number of winners proportional to the number of votes received.Hybrid-system mixed, e.g Additional Member system, where plurality and proportional mixed.
- 5FPTP-one MP to 70,000 constituents. Links between MP's and consistents. Clear winners usually, only 2 minority govs. elected since WW2.However, often no. of seats won in parliament often bears no relationship to actual number of votes. 2001- Lab 62% seats for only 42% of the vote.
- 6Recent years-concerns about FPTP. Destroying accountability with govs with ++ majorities. Laws merely rubber stamped. Unfairness. Lib 17.2% vote 1997, 9% seats.Labour manifesto for referendum on voting system for HOC never kept. AMS and list system use in other elections sharpened appetite for reform.
- 7Jenkins report ignored, despite Blair saying well-argued, powerful.Known for party to loose popular vote and win a majority.
- 8Electoral rules allow bigger parties to spend up to £19.5 million if all 650 seats contested, not counting what each candidate can spend. Puts off smaller parties.Drop in voter turnout. Plus can cause skew, lib dems protest vote, force cons into 3rd place, weaking influence as party of opposition. If proportional, would mean more seats for smaller parties.Greater influence in Parliament.
- 9Majority systemsAlternative Vote (AV)-2011 referendum, used 2010 to elect Lab leader. Voter makes several choices in order of preference, anyone with 50% gets through. if not, second choice candidates with least 1st preference distributed, Goes on, eliminating candidates, with least votes, until 50 +1.
- 10Supplementary vote-1st and 2nd choice. Any candidate with 50% of vote through first preferences go through. If not only two with most first preferences go through. Second choices given out, those with most wins. Not ness 50%. London and local majors.Second Ballot-needs 50% of votes to get through. If no winner, top two go through to second ballot, where there is a second vote. Winner only has to get more votes than other in second ballot, then will have 50%.
- 11Proportional Systems-List systems, pure proprtionality. Voters choose from list drawn up by party.% of votes party gets worked out to match no. of seats given to party. Lists either open or closed.Open list-voters choose candidates want, closed list-choose party, candidates chosen by party. European 1999. Can be national or regional.
- 12Single Transferable vote-quota worked out to decide how many votes candidates need to get through. Candidates in order of preference.Nobody gets quota, bottom dropped and his or her second choice gets vote. Repeated until right number of votes for con.Often means large cons with several winning candidates,. Surplus votes given out to second choice. Droop formula No. of votes cast/ no. of seats +1. +1.2006 Scottish elections. Lib dems want.
- 13Mixed (hybrid systems)-used for Scottish parliament and Welsh Assembly 1999, greater London assembly 2000.Mixture of FPTP and list system.Each voter gets two votes. First is to vote con candidate through FPTP, candidate with most votes wins.Others seats allocated to regions from party lists, distributed to the parties according to % of votes won in first ballot.Idea to try to secure % of seats in accordance with overall % of vote for party.
- 14Could make big difference to overall result, where party may have not won so many seats through FPTP.1999-Scotland-AMS, 73 single member cons via FPTP and 56 additional members from party regional lists. Most in parliament do not wish for reform.
- 15The elctions for the european parliament reflect both the need to please thosw ho demanded electroal reform and desire to bring U.K in line with every other memebr of the E.U.Choice of party list may be to block candidacy of any socialist labour party members. Government lost seats. Made government wary of electoral reform, although comm. in parliament set task of investigating effects of new voting systems.
- 16If P.R used, 2005 cons less seats, gov form with Libs, meant stronger commutment to con, reform such as full P.R, stronger freedom of Information Act and consideration of written constitution.Hung Parliament.P.R would produce and indecisive government. New systems have hardly changed voter allegiance. Lib dems only won 22% of vote n 2005 and 57 seats in 2010.
- 17Labour-since 1997 considered many systems, different systems for different jobs. Changes been less good for Labour. No electoral reform in national and local elections.Traditional supporters of FPTP until recently. Recently similar to FPTP with support evenly and thinly across country, a situation not conductive to success under FPTP. Trad line softened as gov elusive. Dropped since 2010. List system E.U 36 seats in 1999.
- 18Lib Dems most keen, often suffered under FPTP. Disappointing tally of seats compared to vote received. P.R mean that considered as opposition. 2005, 142 seats if used. Voice for minorities. Accords with E.U states and voice of miniorities.Blank.
Information
- Description
- Flashcards on Electoral Systems, created by george.steam on 27/05/2015.
- Created by
- george.steam
- Views
- 0
- Rating