It did vote, also by a wide margin, in favor of making five the minimum district magnitude under STV.

Sen. Di Natale spoke of changes to the current Labor Party minority cabinet’s program that his party could claim credit for–putting a price on pollution, a new $10 billion investment in renewable energy, and free dental care for children–but also of the fear of the credit not being noted. “The key issue is knowing when not to compromise,” Dr Di Natale said. Moreover,

Maintaining your identity when there is a perception that you are part of the government is a huge challenge.

Such are the perils for small parties. However, based on polling in the run-up to this year’s Australian election, claiming credit for policy seems like the least of the Greens’ current concerns. Rather, they need to be more worried about keeping enough senators after the coming debacle for Labor to protect the few policy gains they’ve managed since 2010.

The story notes that Labour+NZF would be unlikely to be a majority, but they may hope they can just say to the Greens that they can either agree at least to abstain and allow a minority government to function, or be blamed for a fresh election.

Then again, maybe Labour and Greens will yet end up forging a joint program before the election, and this is all posturing. As also noted in the news item, the Greens have made no secret of wanting the Finance ministry, and Labour certainly has an interest in signaling that this would be non-negotiable.

Diaby won the Social Democratic Party’s internal vote to earn the third place on the party’s list in the state of Sachsen-Anhalt. The NYT states that he will be elected if “the Social Democrats can defend the three seats they won here four years ago”.

Not so fast. Here is where it is helpful to know something about Germany’s electoral system. 2009 was a very bad year for the SPD. It won no single-seat districts, but due to the compensatory PR, it won three seats, all from the party list. We are not told whether Daiby also has a district nomination (but I checked–see below). But without a district nomination, if the party performed better than in 2009, the SPD might win only or mostly district seats.

Between 2005 and 2009, the SPD in the state fell from around 32% of the party vote to 17%. In 2005 it managed 10 seats, but none of them from the party list.

Thus if the SPD recovers, being ranked in the top 3 on the list is not a guarantee.

However, from Diaby’s own website, it is evident that he has a district nomination–in constituency 72. A quick check of the data (in my files) shows that his party won that district narrowly in 2005, but lost it overwhelmingly in 2009. So he is on the bubble, it would seem. This will be a fun case study to watch!

The first, from Yisrael Beiteinu, would keep the current requirement for an absolute majority (61/120) to remove a government via a vote of no-confidence, but not allow such a motion even to be debated until signed by 61 MKs.

The second, from Yesh Atid, would require 65 votes to remove a government. (It is not clear what the minimum number of signers would be for the motion to go to the Knesset agenda.)

Both bills propose raising the electoral threshold to 4% (from 2%), and mandating a maximum size of the cabinet, including limits on deputies.

In support of the Yesh Atid bill, sponsor Ronen Hoffman says, “The adoption of the procedure means a government can only be overthrown once a realistic, serious alternative is in place.”

Actually, this could be accomplished without requiring more than 50%+1 votes. Why not a constructive vote of no-confidence, whereby a government can be removed only if a majority (61/120) of legislators votes affirmatively for an alternative prime minister (or full cabinet)?¹

If forced to choose between these two options, I would actually take the Yisrael Beiteinu one. However, while raising the minimum number of sponsors of a no-confidence motion seems sensible, raising it all the way to 50%+1 is unnecessary. I do not know what the highest currently used in any parliamentary democracy is, but I think more on the order of 25%.² Speaking of parliamentary systems, if it takes more than 50%+1 to remove a government, the system fails to meet the basic criterion of such a system: the accountability of government to parliament–the majority of parliament.

1. Israel adopted a weak form of constructive vote about a decade ago, but a motion must only name a candidate to be PM, not actually invest a new PM, as is the case with full constructive votes in Germany, Spain, and elsewhere.
2. The linked news item says that currently, “any faction” may propose a motion, which is debated. That’s too low a requirement!

For whatever it might be worth, I did point out in 2007 that its electoral system might not meet the test of being democratic.

Victor D’Hondt is a well-known pioneer of proportional representation, and his “D’Hondt-method” to distribute seats during elections is used all over the world. D’Hondt himself, who was professor at the University of Ghent, has largely been forgotten. That is a shame, as the ‘software’ needed to ensure proportional representation makes a strong contribution to enabling free and fair elections.

On May 30-31, 2013, the Belgian and Dutch political science associations hold their annual meeting for the first time in the historal city of Ghent, which is the home-town of Victor D’Hondt. The city of Ghent has a strong tradition of naming new street names to Ghent citizens who had a real social impact. On the occassion of this conference, we do ask the city of Ghent to take Victor D’Hondt into consideration in this regard, for his important contribution to ensuring free and fair elections throughout the world.

(And, note the spelling; perhaps we can put the controversy to rest.)

Dorries claimed having two logos on the ballot paper had been made possible by legislation passed by the coalition government, and seeking a Ukip endorsement was “something that I know MPs are looking forward and considering now”

I had missed any piece of the Conservative-LibDem coalition’s political reform program including this ballot provision. If Dorries is correct in her interpretation, does this imply that the coalition partners were trying to make it more feasible for their candidates to run jointly, back in the coalition’s rose-garden days?

The 100-member Convention strongly favors a mixed-member proportional (MMP) system, with 69% preferring it over other options. A “proportional list system”–not clear whether open or closed was specified–wins 29% support, and a paltry 3% would like FPTP. (And, yes, those numbers sum to more than 100.)

The news story does not offer information on preferences for keeping the current system vs. change, either in general or any specific replacement system. It does note that there will be a further round of deliberations next month on the exact model that the Convention will recommend.

Ireland is, of course, the main model we have of Single Transferable Vote (STV). MMP and STV are usually the two models most preferred by reform activists (at least in current FPTP jurisdictions) and by political science expert in electoral systems. It is very interesting to see an Irish process possibly leading to STV vs. MMP as choices for the country.