Proportional Representation

'If, for the moment, we assume that everyone who voted for a particular party would vote the same way, Labour would take 63 out of the 129 seats proposed for the parliament - with 65 needed for an overall majority. The Lib Dems, who have long favoured proportional elections, would gain just five extra seats, taking them to 22. The SNP would make huge gains with 22 additional members boosting its presence to 28 and the Tories, wiped out at the general election, would begin their electoral revival by taking all their 22 seats from the additional members lists.' Peter MacMahon in the Scotsman, 23 rd July 1997.

Changes bring overall vote into proportion
by Peter MacMahon, Scottish Political Editor

From the electronic Scotsman on 23 rd July 1997

In the second of a series on the key devolution issues, Peter MacMahon looks at the consequences of a new electoral system for a Scottish parliament.

It is a bright autumn morning in 1999 and the main hall of Meadowbank Stadium in Edinburgh is a hive of activity. Eager young men and women, fashionably but respectably dressed, rush around with clipboards and calculators muttering into mobile phones.

Strained-looking men and women, a bit older than those with the clipboards and not quite so fashionably attired, peer anxiously at the figures and furrow their brows.

As a sober-suited figure ascends the platform a hush descends. He approaches the bank of microphones in front of an illuminated map of Scotland and self-consciously clears his throat.

"I, Sir William Kerr-Fraser, being the senior returning officer for the Scottish Parliamentary Elections Commission, do hereby declare the results to be as follows:

"The Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party, 26 seats; the Scottish Liberal Democrats, 17 seats; the Scottish Labour Party, 54 seats; The Scottish National Party, 25 seats, the Scottish Independents Alliance, seven seats. No other parties gained sufficient votes to qualify for seats."

The candidates, party officials, spin-doctors, civil servants and journalists remain silent, expecting Sir William to continue in the usual way of returning officers, but he does not. There is no declaration of victory for one candidate over the others.

Instead, Sir William, who has been chosen to oversee the elections because of his impeccable establishment credentials as a former permanent secretary in the Scottish Office and principal of Glasgow University, continues in a rather different vein.

"I, therefore, declare that these first elections to Scotland's first parliament for 300 years have been carried out in accordance to the Scotland Act as laid down by parliament.

"By the authority vested in me by Her Majesty the Queen, I now call upon the members of the Scottish parliament to convene at the earliest opportunity to establish a devolved government for Scotland."

The silence endures for what seems like an eternity. Then, barely audibly at first but with a growing intensity, a rumble of cheering, clapping, yelling, chanting and booing begins and rises to an overwhelming volume as Scotland's body politic gets months of pre-election tension off its chest.

Scotland thus elects its first parliament. Tears of joy and anger flow in equal abundance. The champagne corks pop. The journalists snap out of their paralysis as the interviews and analysis begin.

Celebrations continue for a while, but behind the scenes in quiet, smoke-free rooms, the serious business of forming a government is under way.

OK. Enough of the speculation. We are a long way from election day yet, but with the Government determined to use its 179 majority to push through devolution for Scotland, it is worth considering what the electoral consequences will be.

Amid accusations of climb-downs, sell-outs and compromise on the forthcoming white paper, it is remarkable that few have dared to suggest that the proposed electoral system for the Scottish parliament will be tampered with. It is a sign of the progress made by the Labour Party on constitutional reform that it is now more or less universally accepted that the Scottish parliament will have a proportional voting system.

Even the Scottish Liberal Democrats - who regard the commitment to get rid of first-past-the-post system as their major achievement in the years of toil in the Constitutional Convention with Labour - believe that the general election pledge to introduce an additional member election system will be honoured.

So how will it work and what are the likely electoral consequences?

Under the convention plans, the Scottish electorate will vote for 73 constituency members of the Scottish parliament by first-past-the-post - corresponding to the old Westminster constituency boundaries, but with a separate seat for Orkney and Shetland.

On top of that there will be, if the convention plan is followed, 56 additional members - seven from each of the present European parliamentary constituencies in Scotland.

So voters will have a new experience in the polling booth. Firstly, they will face the conventional ballot paper where they pick the candidate of their choice. Second, there will be a series of party lists, one of which they will be asked to endorse. The political parties will have drawn up lists of candidates in order of priority for these.

Who will be the likely beneficiaries of this system? It appears likely that it will be the SNP and the Tories.

Calculations done independently by the Lib Dems and John Curtice, a specialist in politics at Strathclyde University, show that if the 1997 election results were repeated under the new system in the election for the Scottish parliament, Labour would come close to outright victory.

If, for the moment, we assume that everyone who voted for a particular party would vote the same way, Labour would take 63 out of the 129 seats proposed for the parliament - with 65 needed for an overall majority.

The Lib Dems, who have long favoured proportional elections, would gain just five extra seats, taking them to 22. The SNP would make huge gains with 22 additional members boosting its presence to 28 and the Tories, wiped out at the general election, would begin their electoral revival by taking all their 22 seats from the additional members lists.

This would deliver a result that was far closer to the proportion of votes cast than the first-past-the-post system. However, it should be pointed out that Labour was not entirely selfless in surrendering first-past-the-post.

Dr Curtice has calculated that if Labour did particularly badly under first-past-the-post, the SNP could win a majority of seats in a Scottish parliament with as little as 36 per cent of the votes. Given that the SNP would take this as a mandate to negotiate independence, a system which ensures that around 47 per cent of the vote must be won to give an overall majority suits Labour very well.

With a general convergence of policy between Labour and the Lib Dems, the prospect of the convention partners forming a Scottish government would give only the most fundamentalist members of the two parties problems.

Another aspect of the system, which has been little debated, is that it gives the party machines control over who tops the lists for the second ballot paper, something which Labour in particular is likely to use to put favoured sons (and daughters) into the parliament.

Being liberal, the Lib Dems say their list will be voted for by party members.

Though the Labour and Lib Dem additional members will be limited, both parties will be able also to use the system to help to deliver their commitment to a larger proportion of women in the parliament.

The threshold for entry into the parliament will be somewhere above 6 per cent in individual European constituencies, but the new mechanism also holds out the possibility of other parties, say the Greens, independents or the Socialist Alliance, gaining parliamentary representation for the first time.

As with all elections, it is impossible to predict their outcome. If the electorate is sophisticated however, a PR system will allow tactical voting to continue to do so in the first-past-the-post section, but will give people a vote for their "true" party beliefs in the additional member section.

The system will allow SNP MSPs to be elected in the west central belt for the first time, with more Lib Dems in the east and Labour members in the Highlands. It might also encourage the emergence of a group of independents in the Highland area.

The Meadowbank scene depicted above is not, therefore, unrealistic.

If we assume that some of the gloss has worn off "new" Labour, it may do well enough to form the largest block in the parliament and negotiate a deal with the Lib Dems.

A new coalition home rule government will take power in Scotland as the millennium dawns. And a little bit of history will have been made.

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