Elections to the Second Scottish Parliament, 2003.

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Elections to the Second Scottish Parliament, 2003.

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Introduction
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Rejection of First Past the Post by the Scottish
Constitutional Convention

• Objectives
• Proportional Representation
• Gender Balance
• Ethnic Minority Representation

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Why the Additional Member System? (AMS)

• Labour wanted All-Party Support
• AMS was Labours Preferred Alternative
• Liberals Prepared to accept AMS as a compromise

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Additional Member Systems (AMS)

• Consists of two elements
• 1. First Past the Post
• 2. Proportional Representation

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AMS has a number of variations

• In some cases the two elements are not linked
• The proportion of AM to FPTP seats vary
• The AM s may be distributed at a National or
  Sub-National level
• The elector may have one or two votes

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• N.B. Two Vote AMS is not unambiguously a system
  of proportional representation

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AMS Scottish Style
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Features of the Scheme

• 73 FPTP Seats (Westminster Seats, but Orkney and
  Shetland divided)
• 8 Regional Constituencies each returning 7
  Additional Members
• Bias towards the FPTP elements (Labour)

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Voting

• Each elector has two votes
• One for the FPTP seat
• One for a Regional party list

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The Voter Does Not Have to Vote for the Same
Party with both of His/Her Votes
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Allocation of Regional Additional Members

• The regional list (2nd) votes across all the FPTP
  constituencies in a region are added up
• Each partys 2nd votes are then divided by the
  number of FPTP seats already won 1 (DHondt
  Quota)

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Allocation of AMs continued

• After the division the First AM is allocated to
  the party whose divided vote is highest
• The 2nd AM is allocated by dividing the 2nd Votes
  by seats already won, including the 1st
  Additional Member.
• The process continues until all seven AMs have
  been allocated

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The Allocation of Regional List MSPs in the North
East(see handout)
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How the SSP and Greens Won Seats in Glasgow
(see handout)
Tommy Sheridan
Rosie Kane
Patrick Harvie
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What if the 2nd Vote Labour Voters in
Glasgow had cast their regional list vote for the
Greens?
Dr. Eleanor Scott Leader of the Greens
(Highland List)
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• Instead of 1 Conservative AM, 1 Liberal Democrat
  AM, 2 SNP AMs, 2 SSP AMs, and 1 Green AM
• There would have been 1 SSP AM, 1 SNP AM, and 5
  Green AMs

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Overall Result of the Scottish Parliamentary
Election 2003(see handout)
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2003
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2003 Summary
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Working of the system in 2003

• Turnout 50.4 (58.7 in 1999) a second order
  election
• The system was broadly proportional respecting
  Conservative, Liberal Democrat and SNP
  representation
• The Labour Party was over-represented by around
  5-8 seats (favoured by the 7356 balance)

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Working of the System continued

• The Conservatives and SNP MSPs were mostly
  returned from the regional lists
• The Labour MSPs were overwhelmingly returned by
  First Past the Post

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Working of the system continued

• The way the votes were counted affected the
  outcome
• Labour would not have won AMs had they been
  aggregated at national rather than regional
  level.
• In the North East Labours loss of Aberdeen North
  and Dundee East offset by 2 list seats

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Working of the system continued

• The Liberals held the balance of power in the
  parliament
• More parties contested the regional lists than
  FPTP constituencies
• All four main parties won fewer regional list
  than FPTP votes, esp. LibDems

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Working of the system continued

• Ticket-Splitting
• Minor parties gained representation through the
  regional lists (SSP and Greens)
• Ticket-Splitting particularly evident in Lothian
• Was Ticket-Splitting Tactical?

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Working of the system continued singletons/
independents
FPTP Falkirk West Dennis Canavan (Falkirk
West) Strathkelvin Bearsden Jean Turner (Save
Stobhill Hospital Party). List LothianMargo
MacDonald (Independent) CentralJohn Swinburne
(Scottish Senior Citizens United Party)
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Working of the system continued

• High level of female representation, esp. Labour
  and SSP.

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Critique

• More proportional, but gerrymandered in favour of
  Labour
• Balance between FPTP AMS seats
• Allocation of seats by Region rather than
  Scotland as a whole
• Less harmed by fragmentation on 2nd vote than SNP
  and the Conservatives
• Imbalance within parties between Constituency and
  Additional Member MSPs

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Critique continuedVulnerability of AMS to
distortion

• It is possible under AMS for parties receiving
  constituency votes to receive zero list votes
• For AMS to work as a system of PR aggregate
  support for the parties must be more or less the
  same on the First and Second Vote

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• Therefore, it must be in the interest of parties
  and supporters of the main parties, particularly,
  to win both constituency and list seats

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..but in Scotland

• All Labour second votes outside Highland and
  North East were wasted
• Rational for Labour voters to cast their second
  votes for a party other than the SNP

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• As voters and parties understand the system
  ticket-splitting could increase to the
  disadvantage of the SNP (especially)
• There is, therefore, a question mark against the
  suitability of AMS in the Scottish context.

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