"During elections each of these votes for their Member of Parliament (MP), and whichever candidate from whichever party gets the most votes is the winner."
So, does each district have a Lord and a Common? Or do some have one and some have others? I thought the Lords weren't even elected?
"The Government is then formed by the party which has the largest number of MPs."
Define "Government". I mean, the Parliament is part of the government, isn't it?
"They want the House of Commons to be apportioned according to the percentage of the electoral votes each party received nationwide."
So, is this sort of an "at-large" representation? People wouldn't vote for a representative for their specific area, but they would just cast a vote for a party? If 50% of the country voted for Party X, then 315 Xs would be assigned seats? If 30% voted for Party Y, then 189 Ys would be assigned seats?
Registered: Mar 1999
| IP: Logged
quote:So, does each district have a Lord and a Common? Or do some have one and some have others? I thought the Lords weren't even elected?
No, the Lords have nothing whatosever to do with the proces that fills the Commons. In there, originally, you have the hereditary Peers (peers created at some point in the past, but who have the right of dynastic succession); Life Peers (peers created in their own lifetime, but whose peerage dies with them - these are the most common types of new peer created, the most recently-created hereditary peer I can recall was Harold MacMillan, PM in the 1960s); and the Law Lords (Hutton of the recent whitewash being one of them). Lords are generally Lord of somewhere, I think of their own choosing - e.g., Lord Jeffrey Archer of Weston-super-Mare!
I don't know if there were any rules restricting the number of members of the House of Lords, either.
quote:Define "Government". I mean, the Parliament is part of the government, isn't it?
Again, no. I supose what we call the Government, you'd call the Administration. The Government are the poeple who actually do stuff, having been asked by the Queen to form a Government. It is "Her Majesty's Government," according to the traditions. The rest of Parliament is effectively there to act as a check on the Government; think of it as though your President was in fact the House Majority Leader, and the President was more of a symbolic Head of State the way the Queen is. I think!
quote:So, is this sort of an "at-large" representation? People wouldn't vote for a representative for their specific area, but they would just cast a vote for a party? If 50% of the country voted for Party X, then 315 Xs would be assigned seats? If 30% voted for Party Y, then 189 Ys would be assigned seats?
There are so many different models of PR theory that could be applied to the Commons, I can't keep track. I've no idea what happens in the case of other countries which use PR, either. But the scenario you're describing is what they propose to do in the Lords at any rate. These MSCs wouldn't be tied to a particular area (although I guess the parties would find it encumbent on themselves to try to get people from all areas to occupy seats).
posted
Yes. The lib dems want it because there is a feeling that voting for the lib dems is a "wasted vote". People have the tories, love the lib dems, but will vote labour in their area purely because they want to keep the tories out, and are worried that if the vote ends up being split between the lib dems and labour, then the tories would have enough overall to get in. Liverpool is one such area. They hate the tories with a passion (because of evil Maggie), but they all vote labour rather than any other party, just to prevent the tories from winning.
It has been argued that if proportional representation was bought in, a large number of peeople would switch to Lib Dem, purely because it would no longer be a "wasted vote".
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
Registered: Mar 1999
| IP: Logged
Cartman
just made by the Presbyterian Church
Member # 256
posted
quote:So, is this sort of an "at-large" representation? People wouldn't vote for a representative for their specific area, but they would just cast a vote for a party? If 50% of the country voted for Party X, then 315 Xs would be assigned seats? If 30% voted for Party Y, then 189 Ys would be assigned seats?
Well, that's how it works over here, only there are just 150 seats up for grabs and nine parties spread out across the political spectrum all vying vor them, which in practice often means coalitions have to be formed that aren't at all representative of the outcome of an election.
-------------------- ".mirrorS arE morE fuN thaN televisioN" - TEH PNIK FLAMIGNO
Registered: Nov 1999
| IP: Logged
posted
OK. So how then are seats assigned to individual party members to represent their party's percentage? Is there any link between seats and geographical areas? Do you vote for people, or parties?
"I supose what we call the Government, you'd call the Administration. The Government are the poeple who actually do stuff, having been asked by the Queen to form a Government."
So, in other words, the "Government" is like our President (= Prime Minister) and Cabinet (= other ministers: defense, silly walks, etc.). Except that, in your case, the ministers are chosen by the Parliament, while our Cabinet is chosen by the President.
Registered: Mar 1999
| IP: Logged
posted
Essentially. Except the Ministers are all MPs, and are chosen by the Prime Minister. Plus, not all Ministers are in the Cabinet, and there are several ministers who are actually from the House of Lords. I'm not sure how or why, but I assume it's so that when a Bill reaches the stage when it comes before the Lords, there's a Government representative to read it to the Lords and debate in its favour.
Cartman
just made by the Presbyterian Church
Member # 256
posted
"So how then are seats assigned to individual party members to represent their party's percentage?"
First, the total number of votes is divided by the number of seats (which is fixed). The resulting figure is the election divisor. Then the number of votes each party has gathered is split by that divisor to determine how many Second Chamber seats that party can occupy.
Now, during the national (Second Chamber) elections every party also supplies its own candidates for the position of MP, people cast votes for them based on whom they'd most like as their representatives, and then they slug it out amongst themselves to disburse the seats. B)
"Is there any link between seats and geographical areas?"
No, not anymore. There are twelve provinces that hold elections every two years (they in turn elect the First Chamber), but the coloration of a province almost never reflects the final composition of the Second Chamber, because the country is organized in 19 election zones of equal population size to ensure proper regional diffusion.
posted
It'll all be so much easier to understand once you're a U.S. territory.
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged
Cartman
just made by the Presbyterian Church
Member # 256
posted
Sometimes I think we already are.
Registered: Nov 1999
| IP: Logged
quote:Originally posted by Lee: Essentially. Except the Ministers are all MPs, and are chosen by the Prime Minister. Plus, not all Ministers are in the Cabinet, and there are several ministers who are actually from the House of Lords. I'm not sure how or why, but I assume it's so that when a Bill reaches the stage when it comes before the Lords, there's a Government representative to read it to the Lords and debate in its favour.
Ministers traditionally have to be "members of Parliament" in the literal sense - i.e. members of one of the two Houses. (This isn't a legal requirement, though, and it would be entirely legally (if not politically) possible to have a Minister who was neither a Lord nor an MP.) In fact, the second most important member of the Cabinet, the Lord Chancellor, is always a Lord. It's always useful for the Government to have Ministers in both Houses, because a Bill has to be passed by both of them, and it's always good to have important people arguing for you at both stages of the debate.
For the record, I'm in favour of the House of Lords being how it was before 1999 - roughly half hereditary peers and half life peers. I think a wholly appointed House is an absolutely awful idea, and a wholly elected one would remove the whole point of the House of Lords - to be a more permanent check on the House of Commons, not subject to the yearly shifts in national political opinion. If it were elected, the Lords would be constantly worrying about the next election, just like the Commons, and would make the decisions they thought would be popular rather than those they thought were right. There's also the political issue - if they are elected, they'll be elected as members of a political party, and will feel obliged to tow the party line on every issue, regardless of their own opinions, which can't be a good thing.
To be honest, I'm not surprised Tony Blair wants to change the House of Lords - before 1999 it was an independent body that judged prospective legislation on its merits rather than political considerations, and now it's going to end up either wholly appointed by him with the people he knows will support him or elected with members who will be open to the same kind of political blackmail as MPs.
Registered: Jan 2003
| IP: Logged
posted
Well, first of all, I'd sooner have a second chamber that we have some say in choosing, rather than an elitist group whose thinking is often based on the century before last; secondly, you think past Governments haven't tried to fill the place with their supporters? Look at how many ex-ministers from the last Conservative government were made life peers! Even Archer, and they all knew he was a crook!
quote:Originally posted by Lee: Well, first of all, I'd sooner have a second chamber that we have some say in choosing, rather than an elitist group whose thinking is often based on the century before last;
Actually, if you watch the proceedings of the House of Lords, they are a lot more concerned with the people than the House of Commons is. The Commons tend to vote based on what their party wants, whereas the Lords are concerned mostly with the bigger picture. To take a recent example, by far the biggest objections to the new anti-terrorist laws came from the Lords - the Commons just caved in to the Government's "we need to lock everyone up or we're all going to die!" threats, while the Lords objected that civil rights would be infringed in hundreds of ways. Similarly, the new Top-Up Fees legislation, which the people generally don't want, will most likely be rejected by the Lords, while the Commons, the ones who actually made manifesto pledges not to introduce the fees, let it through.
quote:Originally posted by Lee: secondly, you think past Governments haven't tried to fill the place with their supporters? Look at how many ex-ministers from the last Conservative government were made life peers! Even Archer, and they all knew he was a crook!
It's a lot harder to fill the House of Lords with supporters when there are 700 people whose seat there is hereditary and will be taken by their heir, not your appointee, when they die.
Registered: Jan 2003
| IP: Logged
posted
Of course, in a world that made that least bit of sense, it would be the hereditary leaders who do whatever the hell they want, because they don't have to worry about losing their jobs. The elected leaders would have to try their hardest to do what's right, because, otherwise, the people would vote them out.
Of course, when has an electorate ever considered a silly thing like fitness for leadership?
Registered: Mar 1999
| IP: Logged
Printer-friendly view of this topic
