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PROPORTIONAL
REPRESENTATION SOCIETY OF AUSTRALIA |
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Tel. +613 9589
1802 |
Tel. +614 2917
6725 |
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2012-10-31 |
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Parity: It is Important the number of
places to be filled at a PR election is an odd
number Click
on a blue hyperlink of interest. |
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TOTAL NUMBER OF SEATS |
APPROXIMATE QUOTA FOR FILLING OF
EACH SEAT |
BARE ABSOLUTE MAJORITY OF SEATS |
NO. OF SEATS ONE BELOW AN
ABSOLUTE MAJORITY |
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Number of
Seats |
Minimum
Vote to Entitle
a Grouping to a Bare Absolute Majority of Seats |
Number of
Seats |
Minimum
Vote to Entitle a Grouping to Seats One Below an
Absolute Majority |
Maximum
Vote that Could Give a Grouping Just One Seat Below
an Absolute Majority |
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2 |
33.33% |
2 |
66.6% + 2
votes |
1 |
33.3% + 1 vote |
66.6% - 1
vote |
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3 |
25.00% |
2 |
50.0% + 2 votes |
1 |
25.0% + 1
vote |
50.0% - 1 vote
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4 |
20.00% |
3 |
60.0% + 3
votes |
2 |
40.0% + 2
votes |
60.0% - 2
votes |
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5 |
16.67% |
3 |
50.0% + 3
votes |
2 |
33.3% + 2
votes |
50.0% - 2
votes |
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6 |
14.29% |
4 |
57.1% + 4
votes |
3 |
42.9% + 3
votes |
57.1% - 3
votes |
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7 |
12.50% |
4 |
50.0% + 4
votes |
3 |
37.5% + 3
votes |
50.0% - 3
votes |
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8 |
11.11% |
5 |
55.5% + 5
votes |
4 |
44.4% + 4
votes |
55.5% - 4
votes |
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9 |
10.00% |
5 |
50.0% + 5
votes |
4 |
40.0% + 4
votes |
50.0% - 4 votes |
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10 |
9.09% |
6 |
54.5% + 6
votes |
5 |
45.5% + 5
votes |
54.5% - 5
votes |
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11 |
8.33% |
6 |
50.0% + 6
votes |
5 |
41.7% + 5
votes |
50.0% - 5
votes |
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12 |
7.69% |
7 |
53.8% + 7
votes |
6 |
46.2% + 6
votes |
53.8% - 6
votes |
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13 |
7.14% |
7 |
50.0% + 7 votes |
6 |
42.9% + 6
votes |
50.0% - 6
votes |
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14 |
6.67% |
8 |
53.3% + 8
votes |
7 |
46.7% + 7
votes |
53.3% - 7
votes |
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15 |
6.25% |
8 |
50.0% + 8 votes |
7 |
43.8% + 7
votes |
50.0% - 7
votes |
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16 |
5.88% |
9 |
52.9% + 9
votes |
8 |
47.1% + 8
votes |
52.9% - 8
votes |
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17 |
5.56% |
9 |
50.0% + 9 votes |
8 |
44.4% + 8
votes |
50.0% - 8
votes |
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An
Odd Number of Places is Needed -
Not an Even Number: The advantage of setting an odd number
of places to be filled at a proportional
representation election is that an absolute majority
of votes for a given grouping of candidates -
however slight - produces an absolute majority of
seats for that grouping, whereas with an even
number of places, an absolute majority of
votes for a grouping does not, unless it is high
enough, produce an absolute majority of seats for
that grouping. |
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Groupings: A grouping can be a formally organized
political party, or it can be a group of like-minded
candidates that have no formal or organized
connection, but are perceived by the voters and
commentators as being sufficiently similar in their
past voting record if they are standing for
re-election or in their promises if they are new
candidates. A number of complete and utter
independents can also be listed as a grouping in
that capacity, in distinction to candidates that are
more easily categorized. Groupings, not always
recognized, exist at elections in all but
unsophisticated and the least organized bodies. |
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An
Even Number of Places Fails to
Ensure a Majority Predominates: If the absolute majority is not large
enough to produce an absolute majority of an even
number of seats, the
grouping gaining such an absolute majority of votes
will only gain half the number of seats available,
and the grouping, or groupings, that together gain
only a minority of the seats, will gain the other
half of the seats, which is less than satisfactory.
It can also lead to stalemates.
An early official awareness of the unfairly created stalemate problem
appeared in Section 6 of Tasmania's Report
on General Election 1912. Examples of
entrenchment to avoid an even number of places are: ·
Section 4
(1) (a) of the Proportional
Representation (Hare-Clark) Entrenchment Act
1994 of the Australian Capital
Territory entrenches the requirement that an odd
number of members of the Legislative Assembly shall
be elected from each electorate, and ·
Section
16.2.5 of the Constitution
of the Republic of Ireland requires
the use of the system of proportional representation
using the single transferable vote, and Section
16.2.6 requires that no constituency shall elect
fewer than three members, which at least avoids the
worst case of an odd number, where only 2 members
are to be elected. Definitive Report on the
Problem: The late
Dr George Howatt's 1958
classic thirty-page report
to the Parliament of Tasmania on the
defects of the original six-member electoral
districts used in Tasmania's Hare-Clark system
was a superb analysis of the problem, and its key
recommendation was implemented when, before the 1959
Assembly elections, each of the five six-member
Assembly electoral districts was changed to a
seven-member district. Tasmanian Assembly districts
were changed
to five-member districts before the
1998 elections. Municipal Councils: Municipalities with one or more electoral
districts having an even number of seats can, with
Victoria's change to proportional representation for
such districts, demonstrate the problem there, and
Victoria's ad hoc restructuring of electoral
districts can institute this problem, if the need
for an odd number to be elected is not understood.
See also Proportional
Representation for Municipal Councils.
Origin of the Senate Problem: The
table below illustrates the problem with even
numbers of places to be filled. See paragraph, in A
Brief History of PR, on how having and even number
of places to be filled has affected
Senate outcomes since the number of
senators to be elected in each State at a periodic
election was first set at an even number, from 1984. The
Federal Parliament should have recognized the
significance of that Tasmanian finding, although it
did take Tasmania over fifty years to decide to
resolve the problem. See a paragraph reporting the confession
by Dr Richard Klugman,
the Inaugural Chairman, in 1983, of the Federal
Parliament's Joint Select Committee on Electoral
Matters, at the end of an account of the
50thAnniversary Celebration of the Senate's Use of
PR. The
likely persistence of there being two senators for
each of Australia’s internal territories is a result
of the deliberate “stalemate” effect of such an
arrangement where representation is provided, but it
is likely that such representation will not result
in any net effect on the balance of the overall
Senate vote, except in a particular Territory, in
the unlikely circumstance that a given grouping of
candidates receives more than 66.6% of the vote. Prevent this problem by ensuring that the
number to be elected by proportional representation
is an ODD NUMBER. * * * * * * * |
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