polupolu
Lib Dem
Liberal (Democrat). Socially Liberal, Economically Keynesian.
Posts: 1,261 
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Post by polupolu on May 14, 2022 9:37:18 GMT
I'm not in favour of STV and Malta is unusual as a two party system and STV. I think we would have more parties under any proportional system Yes, obviously to be proportional in any way, you need to have some multi-member constituencies (and top-up regions in AMS are the latter) and in general the larger you make those, the greater the number of parties. I think one of the things that separates STV from list systems is that it's best within a narrow band, 5 to 7 members is generally regarded as the optimum. List is usually best for anything from 5 upwards. Just to be clear: STV is not designed to be a proportional system. If you think about it, Proportionality is a party-centric concept, where voters are assumed to be tied to one party. In practice voters don't think like that or behave like that (if they did you would not get any split wards in a multi-vote system). I have witnessed electors in preferential voting elections make all sorts of weird choices. If you like, think of STV as voter-centric. In a 5-elected area, 5/6ths of votes have their preferences come into play.
Also STV does not automatically mean multiple parties elected. Again, in an area electing 5 a party must be able to muster about 16% of the vote to get a representative and 7 would mean 12%+, a higher barrier than many list-voting systems demand (though this is less onerous if a party is strong in a limited number of geographic areas - which is not unreasonable).
One other small point. The argument is sometimes made that Liberals/Lib Dems are in favour because it would increase their representation. I have sometimes tried to analyse it and, of course, it is highly dependent on voter preference behaviour, consituency boundaries, and under/over nomination by parties, but as far as I can work out it would actually make very little difference to the number of Lib Dem MPs until you reach something like 20% to 25% first preference votes. Where it would certainly make a difference would be local elections. That is because local pockets of support translate somewhat more proportionately - whereas Westminster areas would simply be too big for that to have much of an effect.
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Post by johnloony on May 14, 2022 18:11:26 GMT
Just to be clear: STV is not designed to be a proportional system.
Yes it is. It is not necessarily party-proportional, but it is proportional according to whatever criteria are chosen by the voters. In other words, each elected representative represents the same proportion of voters. Indeed, when the Electoral Reform Society was first founded, it was called the Proportional Representation Society - and STV was regarded as being the same as PR (that was in the early 19th century, before modern political parties had developed and before list systems had been thought of). |
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Post by johnloony on May 14, 2022 18:19:12 GMT
Why were there so many uncontested seats in the Scottish local elections under an STV system? In addition there were an awful lot of contests where there were say 5 candidates with 4 of them being major party candidates and 1 from a minor party and the result was an easy win for the former. Average number of candidates per ward was only just over 2. Because parties didn’t nominate loads of extra candidates that weren’t needed. As a general rule of thumb, in an STV election, each party tends to nominate 1 more candidate than the number of seats they expect to win.* This allows for the possibility that the party might get more support than expected, and wins more seats than expected, but does not clutter up the ballot paper with too many candidates. The danger in the opposite direction is that if too many candidates are nominated, votes for the party are more likely to leak away to other parties because the voters have not put all their top preferences for the same party in a monolithic way. There have been some STV elections in which a party has had more votes than the quota, but they have not ended up with a seat, because the votes for all their candidates did not transfer to each other. * This is in contrast with SNTV, which they used to use in Japan: each party nominates the same number of candidates as they expect to win, without allowing for extra. |
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Post by No Offence Alan on May 14, 2022 20:00:05 GMT
Why were there so many uncontested seats in the Scottish local elections under an STV system? In addition there were an awful lot of contests where there were say 5 candidates with 4 of them being major party candidates and 1 from a minor party and the result was an easy win for the former. Average number of candidates per ward was only just over 2. Because parties didn’t nominate loads of extra candidates that weren’t needed. As a general rule of thumb, in an STV election, each party tends to nominate 1 more candidate than the number of seats they expect to win.* This allows for the possibility that the party might get more support than expected, and wins more seats than expected, but does not clutter up the ballot paper with too many candidates. The danger in the opposite direction is that if too many candidates are nominated, votes for the party are more likely to leak away to other parties because the voters have not put all their top preferences for the same party in a monolithic way. There have been some STV elections in which a party has had more votes than the quota, but they have not ended up with a seat, because the votes for all their candidates did not transfer to each other. * This is in contrast with SNTV, which they used to use in Japan: each party nominates the same number of candidates as they expect to win, without allowing for extra. There is also the point be made that, from experience in Scotland, parties tend to under-nominate to avoid squabbling between their own candidates. |
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Post by No Offence Alan on May 14, 2022 20:07:53 GMT
Why were there so many uncontested seats in the Scottish local elections under an STV system? In addition there were an awful lot of contests where there were say 5 candidates with 4 of them being major party candidates and 1 from a minor party and the result was an easy win for the former. Average number of candidates per ward was only just over 2. I think you mean candidates per seat was just over two. 355 wards, 1223 seats, 2548 candidates. |
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Post by timrollpickering on May 14, 2022 21:37:03 GMT
Am I alone in thinking that this thread is just about the best pro-FPTP propaganda I've ever seen? I remember many years ago on this forum I explained how the surpluses work in Northern Ireland and multiple Lib Dems replied saying they'd just gone off STV. |
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Post by johnloony on May 14, 2022 23:17:43 GMT
Am I alone in thinking that this thread is just about the best pro-FPTP propaganda I've ever seen? I remember many years ago on this forum I explained how the surpluses work in Northern Ireland and multiple Lib Dems replied saying they'd just gone off STV. What did they think they had been supporting for all the decades before that? |
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xenon
Forum Regular
Posts: 426
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Post by xenon on May 15, 2022 11:31:56 GMT
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Post by observer on May 25, 2022 9:57:55 GMT
Parties would be encouraged to split. Not always a bad thing.
Lutfur Rahman-type breakaways would be easier. I expect Labour would be severely damaged by PR
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Post by johnloony on May 25, 2022 10:34:51 GMT
Parties would be encouraged to split. Not always a bad thing. Lutfur Rahman-type breakaways would be easier. I expect Labour would be severely damaged by PR Such "splits" often (in the Republic of Ireland) manifest themselves in the form of deselected or expelled MPs standing (and winning) as independent candidates; sensible parties would also provide a range of different candidates within the same constituency - particularly if the parties themselves use STV to select candidates in the first place. |
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Post by bjornhattan on May 25, 2022 12:00:40 GMT
Parties would be encouraged to split. Not always a bad thing. Lutfur Rahman-type breakaways would be easier. I expect Labour would be severely damaged by PR Would they be easier? Such breakaways would struggle to win transfers and so would likely underperform, especially where their wins were due to a split opposition. I'll use the Isle of Dogs as an example. Under FPTP, there are three wards there and they elected five Aspire councillors, one Labour councillor, and one Conservative. Under STV, it is likely that there would be two wards (Blackwall and Cubitt Town could remain as is, Island Gardens and Canary Wharf would merge into a ward I'll call "Millwall"). In the former, both Aspire and Labour would almost certainly elect one councillor but wouldn't have the votes for a second (this third seat would likely go to either the Conservatives or the Lib Dems; the latter win if Green and Labour transfers strongly favour them). In the latter, Aspire might be able to get one candidate elected on first preferences but they would need a huge number of transfers to get a second councillor (instead Labour and the Conservatives would be elected fairly comfortably and then either the Lib Dems or the independent). So in the end, there would be two Aspire councillors, two Labour councillors, one or two Conservative councillors, between zero and two Lib Dem councillors, and possibly an independent councillor too. A party who were very popular with a third of the voters but very unpopular with the rest will struggle to get a large number of seats under STV - the wall of solid Aspire seats simply wouldn't exist. Of course, the other side to that is that Labour wouldn't have won the landside that they did in 2018; Aspire would have likely won several seats across the borough then. |
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Post by timrollpickering on May 25, 2022 12:33:33 GMT
Parties would be encouraged to split. Not always a bad thing. Lutfur Rahman-type breakaways would be easier. I expect Labour would be severely damaged by PR Such "splits" often (in the Republic of Ireland) manifest themselves in the form of deselected or expelled MPs standing (and winning) as independent candidates; sensible parties would also provide a range of different candidates within the same constituency - particularly if the parties themselves use STV to select candidates in the first place. Can you show an example in practice of a party actually doing this under STV? Because I'm struggling to think of any country that uses it (okay a short list) where the internal party direction is taken to the voters. "I'll stand up for the towns at this end of the constituency" is a more common range than ideological divides. |
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Post by timrollpickering on May 25, 2022 12:37:31 GMT
As a general rule of thumb, in an STV election, each party tends to nominate 1 more candidate than the number of seats they expect to win.* That is not remotely factual. It may be the theory and the pro-STV propaganda in places like Croydon where STV is not used for any meaningful elections, but where it is actually used, Parties are very reluctant to risk over nominating. More so than I think is remotely rational. It's happened a bit in both Irelands with parties nominating an additional candidate primarily to sweep up votes/boost their council profile but also when parties are over optimistic - the UUP collapse included quite a bit of nominating three candidates when on the defensive with two seats. But it doesn't happen in Tasmania or the Australian Capital Territory where parties nominate full slates (and unlike the upper house elections elsewhere there's never been any "above the line" voting for a whole ticket with one mark) and in Malta you can even get more candidates than seats available. I think too much of the STV theorising in this country is driven people looking at the Irish experience and Scottish parties struggling to adapt to it have often followed the strategy but it's not obvious to me that we would necessarily go down the Irish route with much larger STV constituencies. |
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Post by observer on May 25, 2022 13:51:42 GMT
Parties would be encouraged to split. Not always a bad thing. Lutfur Rahman-type breakaways would be easier. I expect Labour would be severely damaged by PR Would they be easier? Such breakaways would struggle to win transfers and so would likely underperform, especially where their wins were due to a split opposition. I'll use the Isle of Dogs as an example. Under FPTP, there are three wards there and they elected five Aspire councillors, one Labour councillor, and one Conservative. Under STV, it is likely that there would be two wards (Blackwall and Cubitt Town could remain as is, Island Gardens and Canary Wharf would merge into a ward I'll call "Millwall"). In the former, both Aspire and Labour would almost certainly elect one councillor but wouldn't have the votes for a second (this third seat would likely go to either the Conservatives or the Lib Dems; the latter win if Green and Labour transfers strongly favour them). In the latter, Aspire might be able to get one candidate elected on first preferences but they would need a huge number of transfers to get a second councillor (instead Labour and the Conservatives would be elected fairly comfortably and then either the Lib Dems or the independent). So in the end, there would be two Aspire councillors, two Labour councillors, one or two Conservative councillors, between zero and two Lib Dem councillors, and possibly an independent councillor too. A party who were very popular with a third of the voters but very unpopular with the rest will struggle to get a large number of seats under STV - the wall of solid Aspire seats simply wouldn't exist. Of course, the other side to that is that Labour wouldn't have won the landside that they did in 2018; Aspire would have likely won several seats across the borough then. I'm thinking of places like Burnley, Blackburn, Bradford etc etc. Muslims...let's be honest...stick with Labour as a means to political influence. If they could strike out on their own they would be tempted to do so. If that happened, PR would permanently end Labour's chances of ever getting to power |
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Post by Merseymike on May 25, 2022 14:07:07 GMT
I am not in favour of STV. However, a proportional system would prevent anyone from governing alone without 50% of the vote. I think that would apply to both Labour and Conservative, who would be likely to split. Thus government would be more likely to consist of more than one party.
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Post by islington on May 25, 2022 15:11:29 GMT
I am not in favour of STV. However, a proportional system would prevent anyone from governing alone without 50% of the vote. I think that would apply to both Labour and Conservative, who would be likely to split. Thus government would be more likely to consist of more than one party. Mike, you keep saying this but in practice it isn't true. Spain 2011: People's Party 186 seats out of 350 on 44.6% of the vote Scotland 2011: SNP 69/129 on 45.4% constituency vote and 44.0% regional vote Turkey 2015: AKP 317/550 on 49.5% of the vote This list could be extended substantially. In the real world, so-called proportional systems do not guarantee the feature you suggest. |
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Post by Merseymike on May 25, 2022 15:26:52 GMT
I am not in favour of STV. However, a proportional system would prevent anyone from governing alone without 50% of the vote. I think that would apply to both Labour and Conservative, who would be likely to split. Thus government would be more likely to consist of more than one party. Mike, you keep saying this but in practice it isn't true. Spain 2011: People's Party 186 seats out of 350 on 44.6% of the vote Scotland 2011: SNP 69/129 on 45.4% constituency vote and 44.0% regional vote Turkey 2015: AKP 317/550 on 49.5% of the vote This list could be extended substantially. In the real world, so-called proportional systems do not guarantee the feature you suggest. Depends on the details of the system but in any case all are considerably better than FPTP, notably in 2005 and 2019 where results greatly enhanced the seat total of the leading party. Not to mention the virtual impossibility of proper representation for smaller parties. Perhaps you could list all of the examples which do not coincide with your outliers and display coalitions of parties who did not win 50% of the vote. You'll be a while!! |
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on May 25, 2022 15:38:37 GMT
See also "there are no safe seats under a proportional system"; "it means every vote is represented"; "you can't manipulate the results by changing the boundaries"
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Post by johnloony on May 25, 2022 17:18:03 GMT
sensible parties would also provide a range of different candidates within the same constituency . again, that does not happen, except in the vivid imagination of proponents of STV It would happen as an inevitable feature of the system (not a bug), *if* the parties selected their candidates by STV in the first place. Where the theory falls down is that the publicity for the parties would emphasise the unity of the candidates rather than their differences. As stated elsewhere, the cleavage in the voters’ minds would focus more on locality ( candidate A coming from village X) or incumbency/ novice, rather than ideological differences. It may be worth reminding that I stopped being a “proponent of STV” when I left the ERS in 2015. |
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