Public Address | Cafe | Legal Beagle: Election '11 - Counter-Factual #1

tussock

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 18:33:43 +1300

3, 4, 5, 7, 9, ++2 are interesting as divisors, but it's a small gap between ACT having 1 overhang or 3 seats. Maybe that's the point, get one or the other, treat one-seat parties as independents unless they hold some wider support.

We'd have far more overhang this time.…

Graeme Edgeler

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 14:48:40 +1300

I presume that any such shenanigans are avoided through party affiliation of electorate candidates being formally determined at the point of nomination, so Banks would be an ‘ACT’ candidate even if he’d resigned from the party and joined National the day before the election. Just wanted to make completely sure…

NBH

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 13:56:57 +1300

Graeme, given all the discussion about the future of ACT, Banks being a natural fit for the Conservatives etc., I had a question about the point at which proportionality is fixed with regard to the threshold. Specifically, what would happen if Banks shifted affiliation to the Conservatives now? If entitlement…

Graeme Edgeler

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 12:44:44 +1300

Various countries use a 1.4 first divisor to chase away micro-parties without distorting proportionality, which would make it ~12600 for the first seat here, but still just 0.58%.

The Royal Commission recommended a modified Sainte-Laguë method with 3, 4, 5, 7, 9 ... etc. as the divisors.

tussock

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 12:24:13 +1300

NB all: people keep saying you need 1/120th to get a seat with no threshold, but that's not true.

The first seat is at roughly 1/240th the total, the rest at 1/120th each. First seat, ~9000 votes, second seat total ~27000, third seat ~45000, and so on (to bring the…

Sacha

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 09:39:05 +1300

a good honest party :)

Tom Semmens

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 09:14:51 +1300

A *WTF* party…

Want The Funding?

Sacha

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 09:14:01 +1300

A *WTF* party could secure significant votes from the empathetically apathetic.

Graeme Edgeler

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 08:49:10 +1300

If we abolish the threshold and I set up the Vote For Me (VFM) party and somehow get .085% of the vote and end up in Parliament, will I be fully funded as a party leader or just get the dosh of a single MP?

Fully funded, unless they change…

Tom Semmens

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 08:21:17 +1300

Here is a question. If we abolish the threshold and I set up the Vote For Me (VFM) party and somehow get .085% of the vote and end up in Parliament, will I be fully funded as a party leader or just get the dosh of a single MP?

Brent Jackson

Mon, 28 Nov 2011 17:23:17 +1300

Speaker is not allowed a casting vote, so they no longer cost the government a vote.

Kyle Matthews

Mon, 28 Nov 2011 15:57:13 +1300

Everyone has been talking about requiring 61 to form a government. 62 surely, given the overhang and the need for a speaker?

kiwicafe

Mon, 28 Nov 2011 14:10:23 +1300

1.000.000 did not vote, 1/3rd . . . now put that into all your equations. who didn't and why? all those who have moved to OZ, anyone with a brain or a passion would go further aka the US, where real talent is embraced big time. So why not put…

John Norman

Mon, 28 Nov 2011 13:56:23 +1300

Mic,

Yes, I get this "wasted" definition. Understanding the waste to be the party's. That said, the fact of actual votes being made & counted suggests to me also that to some extent they are swinging votes. Meaning thus another entity's loss of support.
As to – is it termed theshold?…

tussock

Mon, 28 Nov 2011 13:44:29 +1300

I wonder if we could allow post-vote coalitions to form to get people over the threshold. So ALCP could go Green to get them an extra MP, and maybe Mana too if it rounded them up to another one in total. Conservatives could go with National to drag in 3-2…

Sacha

Mon, 28 Nov 2011 08:48:37 +1300

You are arguing the level at which the threshold should be set. It's not restricted to either zero or 5%, but the level will be considered anyway in the upcoming review and was by the Royal Commission when NZ adopted the system.

Hans Versluys

Sun, 27 Nov 2011 21:17:06 +1300

"Put another way, a threshold is A Good Thing."
Not if you voted Conservative this election. If you did, then despite the party having won enough votes to earn 3 seats in the house, you instead get no representation.

Put another way, it means that not all votes are of…

mic weevil

Sun, 27 Nov 2011 15:37:08 +1300

"Put another way, a threshold is A Good Thing."

Not if you voted Conservative this election. If you did, then despite the party having won enough votes to earn 3 seats in the house, you instead get no representation.

I guess if you don't __"see a fixed relationship between proportionality…

Tinshed

Sun, 27 Nov 2011 14:50:22 +1300

Personally I don't see a fixed relationship between proportionality and effectiveness of a voting system, i.e. the greater the proportionality, the better the outcome, ad infinitum. Put another way, a threshold is A Good Thing.

mic weevil

Sun, 27 Nov 2011 14:17:59 +1300

Methinks waste = support loss.

Waste refers to votes for parties that failed to gain an electorate seat or pass the 5% threshold. ie. the 2.8% of the country who chose to vote for the conservative party can be said to have wasted votes – their votes do not win…

Hans Versluys

Sun, 27 Nov 2011 12:12:56 +1300

Certainly a much better result! And easier to understand: 0.8% of the party vote would get you a seat. We could do away with all that timewasting in electorate campaigning if NZ was one 120 seat electorate. (No separate Maori seats either, as a bonus!)

John Norman

Sun, 27 Nov 2011 11:53:23 +1300

newbie here..

such a result might rend indicatives ex mmp revision post-Election.?

I go with commenters' sentiment re "wasted votes". Presently unable determine use as so-called elites or simply the hubris of politicos needing dominance. Mebbe both—their relationship somewhat closer than they would hope shall be noticed.

Methinks waste =…

mic weevil

Sun, 27 Nov 2011 10:46:14 +1300

I think it would be great to remove the threshold. the very term "wasted votes" is anathema to a proper proportional system.

tussock

Sun, 27 Nov 2011 10:06:53 +1300

Changes things though, dunnit. Winston doesn't get the "save that wasted 4% this time" vote off Labour/Green. ALCP maybe gets more than it's 60% of a seat when it's not a wasted vote (they've had 2% in the past). More anti-sale (christian-)conservatives flee National to Colin's party knowing it's a…

Lew Stoddart

Sun, 27 Nov 2011 10:06:07 +1300

Not fond of this sort of analysis, since a threshold (or lack) changes voter behaviour. But what strikes me is how little difference there is from the actual result this time, compared to 2008. That's about NZF.

James Green

Sun, 27 Nov 2011 09:34:53 +1300

Nice analysis Graeme. I'd never really thought of ALC as getting enough votes for a seat before. Also, just to slightly continue a conversation we were engaged in elsewhere last week, you know Daniel Kahneman is pretty instrumental in the modern understanding of counterfactual?

Graeme Edgeler

Sun, 27 Nov 2011 07:17:16 +1300

not necessarily a better one?

Cartainly a more proportional one...

Tinshed

Sun, 27 Nov 2011 07:10:55 +1300

But not necessarily a better one?

Public Address

Sun, 27 Nov 2011 07:10:55 +1300

Discussion from blog post.