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Hey you there! Under that rock. There’s a general election this year on November 26. The government is holding a referendum at the same time and it’s about our electoral system. All this stuff can get pretty confusing so Critic has decided to tackle the acronyms head on so you can go into that polling booth ready for some informed decision-making. We have even provided pretty animal-themed infographics to help along the way.
 
So, what is this referendum all about? 
The referendum will determine what electoral system we want to use to elect our parliament. The question you will be asked in November is in two parts:
 
Should New Zealand keep MMP? Yes/No
 
If New Zealand were to change to another voting system, which voting system would you choose? FPP/PV/STV/SM
 
If the majority vote to keep MMP, the government will hold an inquiry into the system and suggest ways it could be improved. If most people vote to get rid of MMP, another referendum will be held in 2014 to choose between MMP and whichever alternative system gets the most support. In other words, it will be a while before anything, if anything, changes.
 
That’s a lot of acronyms…
Yes it certainly is. Here’s a quick guide:            
MMP – Mixed Member Proportional
FPP – First Past the Post
  PV – Preferential Vote
 STV – Single Transferable Vote
 SM – Supplementary Member
 
 
That was no help
Agreed. We promised infographics and we shall deliver infographics. Firstly, it is important to know there are pros and cons to each system; no electoral system is perfect. While a pro/con list would make this altogether much easier, unfortunately it all rather depends on what you think a voting system should achieve. For example, do you think coalition governments are better/worse, more stable/less stable than single-party majority governments? Do you think minor parties should have more/less power? Is a 5% threshold too high/too low? Do you think list MPs are a waste of space? Do you think we should revert back to a Greek-style direct democracy where there are no MPs and instead all the citizens vote on legislation themselves, but only if you’re a rich white male? Unfortunately the latter is not an option in this particular referendum.
 
To make the following explanations free of political bias (and comply with the electoral finance act), we have created some fictional animal themed political parties.
 
 
MMP
This is the system we currently have so hopefully it’s familiar. But for those who didn’t pay any attention in Year 10 social studies, here’s a recap.
 
You have two votes. One for a party. One for an electorate.
Parties get into parliament either by winning an electorate seat, or getting more than five percent of the party vote. The party vote determines the make up of parliament; a party that gets 20% of the party vote will get 20% of the seats in parliament.
 
Ballot Paper: Tick two
The Jungle Party wins 45% of the party vote; they get 45% of the seats. This is not enough to form a majority. Luckily, the Forest Party received 10% of the party vote and as they share a mutual interest in trees, the two parties form a coalition.
 
In your electorate, Lion from the Savannah Party usually wins most of the electorate votes, but you are a loyal supporter of the Forest Party. You vote ‘Wolf’ for your electorate vote and ‘Forest’ for your party vote. Although Lion wins your electorate, the Forest Party are still represented in parliament thanks to your party vote.
 
In another electorate, Scorpion from the Desert Party has a lot of support. Nationwide, the Desert Party are hugely unpopular. Scorpion wins a seat, and so the Desert Party, who got 2% of the party vote, win 2% of the seats in parliament.
 
The Ocean Party gets 4% of the party vote, but has no candidate with enough support in an electorate to win a seat. They get no seats in parliament.
 
 
FPP
This was the system used in New Zealand before 1996. It is still used in the UK and the USA.
 
You have one vote; an electorate vote. Candidates with the most votes in each electorate get a seat in parliament.
 
Ballot Paper: Tick one
The Jungle Party wins 70 seats out of 120. They can form a government alone and do not have to negotiate tree legislation with the Forest Party.
 
In your electorate, Lion gets the most votes and wins the seat in parliament. You voted for Wolf, but because the Forest Party didn’t have enough support in any one electorate to win a seat, there are no Forest Party MPs in Parliament. The Ocean Party is in the same position and also gets no seats in parliament. Although the Forest Party and the Ocean Party gained14% of the popular vote for them, they have no representation in parliament. In the following election, voters choose to vote for the Savannah or Jungle Parties instead and soon the Ocean Party’s support erodes entirely and they cease to exist. The Forest Party survives, but its support shrinks below 5%. Scorpion, however, still wins a seat.
 
PV
This system is used in Australia. (It’s also sometimes called ‘AV’ or ‘Alternative vote’; for those avid Guardian readers out there - is what all the kerfuffle in the UK was about this year.)
 
You still have only one type of vote; an electorate vote. But this time, you get to rank the candidates in order of preference.
To win the seat a candidate needs more than half of the first choice votes. If no candidate gets half the votes, the candidate with the fewest ‘1’ votes is eliminated and their votes go to their second choice. This continues until someone has more than half the votes.
 
Ballot Paper: Rank in order of preference
 
Lion wins 45% of the electorate votes. So Camel, who is very unpopular in your electorate, came last and is eliminated. Most people who voted for Camel put Lion as their second choice. This puts Lion over 50% and he wins the seat.
 
You give Wolf your first vote and Gorilla your second vote. If you wished, you could have continued and allocated a third, fourth, fifth etc, but you feel suitable uninspired by the other candidates. The Forest Party doesn’t have any geographically concentrated support so they win no seats in parliament. Neither does the Ocean Party. In the next election these parties get very little support.
 
(This is where it gets confusing.) In Scorpion’s electorate, he gets 45% of the electorate votes. Under both MMP and FPP he would have won this seat. However, the candidate with the least votes in his electorate was Owl, of the Forest Party. All the Owl voters put the Jungle Party candidate as their second choice. The Jungle Party candidate got 40% of the first choice votes, and once Owl’s votes are redistributed, the Jungle candidate now has more than half the votes and Scorpion loses his seat.
 
STV
This system is used in Ireland and Malta. This is also the system used in local DCC elections.
 
Each electorate has more than one MP - between 3 and 7. Voters rank candidates in order of preference, OR they pick a party and then their votes are allocated to conform with that party’s order of preference published in advance.
 
Candidates are elected if they receive a ‘quota’ or a minimum number of first preference votes. If there are still seats left after all the ‘1’ votes have been counted, a two step process is used to determine the winners of the remaining seats. First: votes for elected candidates who have reached the quota are ‘transferred’ to their second preference. Candidates who now reach the quota are elected. Second: if there are still seats to fill, much like PV, the bottom candidate is eliminated and their votes are redistributed.
 
Ballot Paper: Rank in order of preference OR pick a party
The outcome is not dissimilar to that under MMP. Parliament reflects voter preferences reasonably proportionally. The Forest Party gets some seats, so does the Ocean Party. The Jungle Party gets the most seats but has to form a coalition with the Forest Party. Scorpion gets his seat too.
 
In the process of trying to figure out how to vote, you suffered a minor cerebral aneurysm.
 
SM
This is a semi-proportional voting system that is used currently in Japan, South Korea, Croatia and Georgia. It’s sometimes called a ‘parallel voting system’.
 
There are 120 seats in parliament. 90 of these are electorate seats; these are elected in an FPP winner-takes-all style. The remaining 30 seats are the supplementary seats which are allocated proportionally based on the party vote.
 
Ballot Paper: Tick two
The Jungle Party wins 50 out of 90 seats, and about 40% of the party votes, giving them another 18 seats. In total they get 68 out of 120 seats. They can rule alone.
 
You gave your two ticks to the Forest Party. Lion wins your electorate seat. The Forest Party wins no electorate seats and 10% of the party vote. But because the party vote only determines the supplementary seats, they only get 3 out of 120 seats.
 
The Ocean Party, with 4% of the party vote, gets 1 seat.
 
Scorpion wins his electorate seat, but the Desert Party gets no supplementary seats.
 
 
So, what have we learned?
Aside from how dull learning about electoral systems is?
 
We have learned that if you like proportional representation and all the diversity that it brings to parliament, don’t mind list MPs and think ticking is better than numbering, you should support the retention of MMP.
 
If you think one tick is enough, that majority governments are more stable, and that on the whole minor parties are have too much power these days, FPP is for you.
 
If you like the sound of FPP but think that it’s a bit unfair that a candidate could win a seat without the majority of the votes, then you should vote for PV.
 
If you like MMP but don’t like list seats and like writing filling out complicated forms; STV ftw.
And finally, if none of those are pleasing and you want a little bit of this, a little bit of that, SM will probably be your cup of tea. (Pardon the innuendo.)
 
Hopefully this cleared a few things up and come November 26 you will be able to strut into that polling booth fully informed, ready to conquer the acronyms.
 
If you find these explanations inadequate in any way, the electoral commission has made a series of explanatory videos featuring your favourite orange man. These can be found at referendum.org.nz.