What if Ireland had said yes to First past the post ?

Peregrinus

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118489699#Comment_118489699

The UK doesn't have a list system, but it does have a quote of "safe seats" where the MP is effectively chosen by party officials, and the parties uses their power to put manifestly unqualified and unsuitable people into Parliament. I'm generally not keen on systems that allow parties to choose more than a very few individuals to put into parliament, so that they have an incentive to use the system to put in people who will add some value.

Brussels Sprout

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118504175#Comment_118504175

No arguments from me there. I'm certainly not advocating for FPTP. It's an abominable system in my opinion. I was contrasting List systems with multi-seat PR-STV (i.e. the Irish system)

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118503319#Comment_118503319

That would be FPTP, but with perverse punishments for having split votes. Its a terrible idea.

standardg60

I think you're taking me up wrong there. What I'm referring to are people who are deemed elected simply by being the last person standing after every one below them has been eliminated and their votes transferred, even though they may not reach the quota.

rather than spending twenty years talking about building a metro, a government would have the political capital to actually get on and do it.

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118505591#Comment_118505591

Has nothing got to do with the type of electoral system. Absolutely stupid comment

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118505540#Comment_118505540

You're still creating an unequal system that punishes votes being split and benefits major parties (albeit sometimes its the big parties that get that last scrape in)

Peregrinus

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118505540#Comment_118505540

Doesn't matter. The remaning candidate is still more popular than any of the other unelected candidates, and there is no reason why the constituency should be punished by being under-represented in the Oireachtas.

The equaivalent rule under the FPTP system would be to refuse to elect a candidate who could not secure more than 50% of the vote. If the UK had such a rule, 329 out of 650 seats would be unfilled.

standardg60

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118509847#Comment_118509847

Conversely, it may be a genuine reflection on constituents view of who is fit to be put forward to represent them, Paul Murphy being a case in point.

For me there would be 3 benefits, existing parties would put far more effort into their constituencies, individuals more reflective of their constituents issues would be more encouraged to run, and constituents would be more inclined to get off their arses and vote if they saw they were being represented by only four td's instead of five.

Though maybe given turnout is usually about half the empty seat is truly reflective of a lot of peoples attitude to politics anyway

Peregrinus

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118509875#Comment_118509875

Mmm. Conventional republican theory is that citizens have not only a right but also a duty to exercise their share of political power for the common good. In electoral terms, this means that each constituency must be represented in Parliament; you can't opt out and elect not to be represented, or to be underrepresented, simply because some of the candidates on offer don't meet your exacting standards. If that's your issue, the proper response is to nominate more suitable candidates, rather than to try to get yourself disenfranchised.

Bear in mind that, under your rule, the people who decline to express a preference among the remaining candidates aren't just reducing their own representation; they are reducing the representation of the entire constituency, including those who did have, and did express, a preference. Why should they be given that right?

Basically, declining to express a preference between candidates is not a statement that "If it comes to it, I don't wish to be represented by any of these people; I would prefer to be unrepresented". Being unrepresented is not an option offered in elections in a republic. The statement you are making is "If it comes to it, I don't mind which of these people represents me; let someone else choose".

Podge_irl

constituents would be more inclined to get off their arses and vote if they saw they were being represented by only four td's instead of five.

The quota adjusts based on number of eligible ballots, not registered voters so this doesn't even make sense.

rock22

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118509847#Comment_118509847

In fact, the candidate elected without reaching the quota must be more popular than all the other unelected candidates added together.(otherwise there the lowest is eliminated and there is another count)

Not electing the last candidate because he does not reach the quota means there is a large amount of votes (though less than a quota) which have not elected any representative.

@Brussels Sprout said "The answer really is nothing much would have been different (for the first 90 years of the state anyway)".

I think that is due more to the legacy of the civil war than of the electoral system. For a long period of time, certainly up to the late 60s, early 70's, voting for the 'other side' irrespective of the abilities of the candidate would have been seen as treachery within the family - leading to likely ostracism ( perhaps, along with democracy, another practice we should have copied from the Athenians).

davetherave

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118505540#Comment_118505540

If you did that in the last General Election, we would be deficient 64 Td's. Longford-Westmeath would have one TD instead of 4.

Take Galway-East as an example. Names changed for simplicity It took the 7th count for someone to be elected.

The quota was 10,631. The first to be elected was Alan. He had 12,292. There were 1,661 valid transfers to the three remaining candidates.

• 900 went to Brian which brought him over the quota and thus he was elected.
• 274 went to Clare, leaving her on 9,658, 973 below the quota.
• 487 went to Daphne, leaving her on 10,022. That is 609 below the quota but she is above Clare.

On the next count you would have used Brians 259 excess, even if all of those were for Rabbitte it still wouldn't bring her over the quota. And even if all of those were for Clare, it still wouldn't move her total ahead of Daphnes total.

So what do you do then? The excess isn't enough to get someone past the quota or change the person in last place so you eliminate the last person and do their transfers, at that stage you only have one candidate left anyway.

Or using Kildare Souths numbers might be a better example. Alice got elected on the 7th Count. The quota was 11,816, and she ended up with 12,152. There were 336 valid transfers. At this stage there were three people fighting for two seats.

• Brian got 34 putting his total at 11,710. Below the quota but ahead of the other two
• Cathal got 247 putting his total at 10,940. Below the quota, below Brian but ahead of Denise
• Denise got 55 putting her total at 10,425. Below the quota, and below the other two.

The only way to get more transfers or excesses is to eliminate the lowest candidate and do their transfers, so you remove Denise and then it doesn't matter where her preferences go, you have two people for two spots. Or do you say that only Alice exceeded the quota only she gets elected and Kildare South has one TD instead of three?

standardg60

Doh! I'd forgotten of course that when there's only two candidates left they don't bother transferring the lower person's votes.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118502829#Comment_118502829

We end up with complete morans anyway

A 6 - 7 seater will/should give a wider range of views (from far right to far left) and end this perpetual thing of having 2 - 3 main parties,all offering same thing

Peregrinus

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118516119#Comment_118516119

Not necessarily.

Taking the 1932 general election - I picked it at random - we see that there were five 7-seat constituencies, three 8-seat constituencies and one 9-seat constituency. And yet the top three parties (FF/CnaG/Lab) came out of that election with, between them, 89% of the seats. The top two parties had 84% of the seats. One other party (Farmers Party) is represented. Independents get 9% of the seats.

Contrast the result of the 2020 election - no 7, 8 or 9-seat constituencies. But the top three parties (SF/FF/FG) get only 67% of the seats; the top two parties only 46%. Six other parties (Green/Lab/SD/PBP/Aontú/I4C) are represented. Independents get 12% of the seats.

Capt'n Midnight

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118516119#Comment_118516119

No. The more seats the less votes are needed for the last seat. What happens is that a candidate with very low first preferences that survives the first round of elimination can end up getting elected.

The way you balance the views is by spreading around the 5 seaters. Here we have a constituency commission to do that.

Wiki says that in the past we had between 3 and 9 seaters.

In the UK's totally different system Nigel Farage got elected as an MEP in a 10 seater. Under normal FPTP in the speakers constituency where none of the main political parties stool he still finished behind a dolphin.

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118509875#Comment_118509875

A higher turnout would likely lead to even more fragmentation of the vote and more empty seats under your system

Brussels Sprout

I think the likely outcome about having more TDs per constituency depends on whether the constituencies are expanding to cover more area (thereby maintaining a similar number of total TDs to now) or you're maintaining the current boundaries but electing more TDs from them - thereby vastly increasing the number of TDs.

If it's the former then you'll likely end up with similar enough representation in the Dail as TDs just gravitate to their new larger constituencies depending on where their local turf ends up.

If it's the latter, since the barrier to getting elected is now lower, then you'd likely see some fringe candidates/extremists getting elected.

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118527058#Comment_118527058

You can't realistically do the latter as each TD has to represent between 20-30,000 constituents constitutionally. Which is probably too low a number these days.

Brussels Sprout

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118527419#Comment_118527419

Yes, it goes without saying that anything like that would require a referendum.

AllForIt

I just don't get this 'preference' idea.

On a low resolution level would you say I'd prefer a right wing TD and if not my second preference would be a Left Wing TD.

One either has a view and to my mind there is no such things as having an alternative view, that comes in second place.

I'd rather not vote at all if my views were not represented by any of the candidates.

I would be happy to let the biggest majority run things, if not an overall majority.

If it turns out okay then perhaps I'd need to rethink my views, if not then I was right to begin with.

My problem with PR is that the system seems to be inspired to give views equal weight, irrespective of how many people hold those views. Which is a very kind of Leftist idea, that all views need to be included and represented, minority views especially.

And this is how we end up with the Greens in government, despite the fact 97.2% of the populace did not vote for them.

Peregrinus

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118533497#Comment_118533497

Couple of points.

First, you're not required to express a preference you haven't got. If, after you have voted 1, 2, 3 for the three candidates fielded by the "Free Icecream for AllForIt" party, you have no preference as between the remaining candidates, you are free to leave all the other spaces blank. But if you feel that, if your vote is not going to be effective to elect the "Free Icecream for AllForIt" party, you'd like it to elect the "Cheap Icecream for AllForIt" party, then you continue your preferences for that party. The key point to grasp is that you have only one vote and it will be effective for only one candidate; you are numbering the candidates in the order in which you would like it to be effective for them, and you leave out all the candidates for whom you would not like it to be effective.

As for the system being designed to give equal weight to all views, it is in fact intentionally designed to give - as nearly as practicable - equal weight to all votes. That will result in a diversity of views being represented if voters hold a diversity of views, which they usually do. But it doesn't result in all views being given equal weight; they are weighted according to how much support they have, which to a democrat seems like a no-brainer.

You may consider it outrageous that the Greens should be in government, despite 97.2% of the populace not having voted for them. But if your "happy to let the biggest vote-getter run things" rule were applied, SF would not only be in government; they would be exclusively in government, despite 75.5% of the population not having voted for them. We'd have a government made up of representatives who secured 24.5% of the vote, as opposed to the present reality, a government made up of representatives who secured 50.2% of the vote. Preferring the latter isn't "leftist"; it's centrist and democratic.

Brussels Sprout

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118533497#Comment_118533497

As Peregrinus said, it has nothing to do with holding all views equally. I'm actually not even sure what that means to be honest. PR-STV apportions the seats roughly in line with their respective popularities amongst the electorate. What could be more democratic than that?

First Pass the Post is the real abomination. It completely distorts the vote, massively rewarding large parties and completely crushing smaller parties. Point in case is the UK general election of 2015:

• In Scotland, the SNP got 50.0% of the votes cast but ended up with 94.9% of the seats
• In England, UKIP got 14.1% of the votes cast and ended up with 0.2% of the seats

Now leave aside whatever personal feelings you have for those 2 parties and ask yourself is it a fair system where the SNP had three times as much of the vote share in their country as UKIP did in theirs but ended up with 475 times as much of the seat share?

Ballycommon Mast

Again a lot of people don't seem to understand that you can just vote no 1 to your preferred candidate, put your ballot paper in the box and leave without going 2,3,4... Has CSPE class failed ?