There is a lot of confusion about how the voting system works and MSPs
are allocated in the Scottish Parliament, particularly because of the regional
list. The purpose of this article is not to tell you who to vote for, but just
to explain how the Additional Member System works in allocating seats to MSPs
in the Scottish Parliament. Another issue this will clear up that is thrown
about that says to maximize the number of Independence supporting MSPs, you have
to vote SNP twice. When you understand how the Additional Member System works
and allocates MSPs you will see that this is not the case at all.
In the Scottish Parliament there are 129 MSPs. 73 MSPs represent
constituencies elected by First Past the Post. The other 56 MSPs are elected
from regional lists. Each geographical region combines between 8 and 10
consistencies and elected 7 MSPs using a method of proportional representation.
The Additional Member System combines two voting systems in Scottish Parliament
elections. This is not a first and second preferences vote like local council
elections, it is 2 votes.
The 73 constituency MSPs elections are pretty straight forward, exactly
like UK General Elections it is done using the First Past the Post method.
First Past the Post means the person with the most votes wins the seat
regardless of what percentage or how many votes they received. Second or third
place gets you nothing here.
The other 56 MSPs are where it gets a little complicated. Here is uses
the D’Hondt method of proportional representation to allocate seats, this is
designed to make the seats allocated match more closely to the percentage of
votes received. This is exactly the same system we use to elect our MEPs to the
European Parliament. However there is a twist in the way it is done in the
Scottish elections. To explain how this works, it is best to use an example so I
will use the Scottish region from the 2014 European elections to show how the
D’Hondt system works and then use a region from the last Scottish election to
show the twist.
Key features to having a List is that unlike constituencies, you are not
voting for a person unless they are running as an Independent, you are voting
for a party. The parties have selected an order for their candidates, and the
seats will be allocated in this order. First the party with the most total
votes is allocated a seat, in this case, it was the SNP with 389,503. Then
their total votes are divided by the number of seats they have +1, so 2 in this
case, leaving them with 194,751.5 (the number in brackets). The highest number
of votes is now Labour with 348,219, so they are given 1 seat and their vote is
divided by 2, leaving them with 174,109.5. Hopefully you can start to see how
it works now. Each time a party is given a seat, their vote is divided by the
number of seats they already have +1. This makes it increasingly difficult to
win more and more seats and gives parties with less votes more of a chance of
getting some representatives. In this case SNP won 2 seats, Labour also won 2,
the Conservatives won 1 seat and UKIP won the last seat.
I would recommend you watch this short video of Jeremy Vine explaining
how the D’Hondt method works and uses an example from the European elections
with some nice visuals.
Hopefully you now have a good understanding of the D’Hondt system. Now
back to Scotland, let’s take a look at the North East Scotland region from 2011
to show how the twist works.
The SNP won more the 3 times the votes Labour did but only got 1 seat.
The Tories even got 2 seats but only had 14.1% compared to SNPs 52.7%. What’s
going on here? Well here is the kicker, before seats are allocated on the
regional list, your vote is divided by how many seats you already have, from
the constituencies in the region +1. There are 10 constituencies in this
region, SNP won all 10. This means that their 140,749 votes were divided by
10+1, so 11, before any seats were even allocated. This is the Additional
Member System at work, this is the system designed to punish you on the
regional list if you do well in constituencies. So every list vote given in
this region for the SNP is an 11th of a vote. While every other
party in this case did not win any constituencies and therefore, a vote for
them was worth more.
This is how it works and this is why votes for the SNP on the list in
2016 will not maximize the independence vote if that is your intent, but will weaken
it, especially as polls currently have them winning almost every single
constituency in the country.
By Bryan Quinn