13 Responses to “Votes for List MPs”

1. Psycho Milt (710) Says:
   December 11th, 2011 at 3:08 pm

   Which tells us nothing beyond how many voters in a particular electorate were supporters of the party the MP was standing for – and only to a very, very much lesser extent, of the individual concerned. It’s about as useful as looking at electorate MPs in terms of how much of the party vote their party got.

2. earok (3) Says:
   December 11th, 2011 at 3:08 pm

   What I’m interested to know is how Parliament would look if the lists were made up only of people who contested but failed to win electorates, sorted by the number of votes they got in their electorates in descending order (and, in the case that they won more seats via the party vote than electorates they contested, then the regular list is used)

3. IHStewart (298) Says:
   December 11th, 2011 at 3:23 pm

   Ele at Home Paddock blogged today about the difference in status between electorate and list seats amongst other things

   http://homepaddock.wordpress.com/2011/12/11/tweaking-mmp-wont-be-easy/#comments

   And I am mindful of Cameron Slater’s “scum list MP tag ” but to use the example I made at Home Paddock

   ” Would anyone suggest the Michael Woodhouse has been rejected by the electorate ?. Phil Goff should have had the Dunedin party vote in the bank only to discover Michael had been quietly depositing it in John Keys account.”

   MP’s that are rejected by electorates is a frequent criticism of MMP and list MP’s but those that have delivered good results on the party vote certainly can’t be regarded as scum list MP’s and that comparison might be a better way to judge the electoral success or failure of a list MP.

4. IHStewart (298) Says:
   December 11th, 2011 at 3:39 pm

   Psycho Milt I can see merit in this that you might have overlooked.

   ” It’s about as useful as looking at electorate MPs in terms of how much of the party vote their party got. ”

   If an MP’s personal vote collapses or they are running in a marginal seat a look at the party vote in their seat might well determin if they remain the selected candidate at the next election. Well useful for National my crowd just leave selections for the unions to do and I haven’t a clue what the Greens do.

5. Nichlemn (56) Says:
   December 11th, 2011 at 3:43 pm

   I mostly agree with Psycho Milt and Home Paddock.

   In spite of the fact that the electorate vote is supposed to be about “voting for the best person”, there’s still a high correlation with the party vote. Yes, some MPs can win electorates that lean to the opposite party (see Nelson, Waimakariri until this election) but there are many seats in which the weaker party’s candidate will never win no matter how weak the incumbent is (see Mangere, 2005).

   And stopping candidates from standing for the List and an electorate (or some variant thereof) will just cause ambitious politicians worried about being defeated in their electorate to hop to the safety of the List before they get a chance to be defeated.

6. Psycho Milt (710) Says:
   December 11th, 2011 at 3:59 pm

   Yes, it’s not rocket science. If Clayton Cosgrove had been standing in Epsom he wouldn’t be at the top of this list, and if Paul Goldsmith had stood in a South Auckland electorate he wouldn’t be looking too flash either. Basically, it tells us jack shit about their “right” to a parliamentary seat.

7. IHStewart (298) Says:
   December 11th, 2011 at 5:45 pm

   Yeah but how about Dunedin South ? I am banned at Red Alert so can’t ask the question there. In fact I suspect asking the question there got me banned.

   If a sitting MP takes a huge hit on their majority in the electorate vote and the party vote goes down big time then maybe an assement should be done. Again I go to Ele at Home Paddock.

   http://homepaddock.wordpress.com/2011/11/27/provinces-still-blue-minus-one-updated/#comments

   Ele pointed it out and I think she is spot on.

8. JamesS (352) Says:
   December 11th, 2011 at 6:54 pm

   Funny to think that 20 names on that list – 1 in 6 MPs – contested an electorate and lost their deposits! ha ha When folk were given the opportunity to vote for them nobody actually did.

   It reminds me of one of the hysterical screamers for proportional representation from the past – Neil Morrison, Social Credit MP for Pakuranga between 1984 and 1987.
   Morrison made several speeches in the House on the topic of a proportional voting system, saying how large swathes of electors were disenfranchised by first past the post and lamenting the unfairness of it all.

   What Neil Morrison never pointed out was that Neil Morrison received the smallest percentage of the votes of ANY winning candidate/MP elected between 1854 and 1993. In other words he spent 3 years representing Pakuranga despite virtually no one in Pakuranga having voted for him.

   Because he was not a Labour or National MP the MMP fanatics do not see anything wrong with that (afterall ‘unfair voting systems’ only apply to the National party, and anyway – people in Pakuranga are ‘rich pricks’ exploiting workers and the poor)

9. Sonny Blount (1,518) Says:
   December 11th, 2011 at 8:21 pm

   The biggest distortion to the list is that electorate races don’t matter so no one seriously contests them. Political careers are now made by cosying up to Key and Goff, there is no longer a place for a prospective MP to make a name for themselves by winning or coming close in a tight contest because those contests are now fought at half pace. Why waste the time and the money when the party vote is much more valuable.

   Labour and Nationals front benches are untouchable until the party lists are ranked by the electorate vote rather than the party.

   And preferential voting is required to allow candidates to be seriously challenged by candidates at similar ends of the political spectrum.

10. IHStewart (298) Says:
    December 11th, 2011 at 8:29 pm

    James S let me know next time you interact with reality

11. PaulL (4,542) Says:
    December 11th, 2011 at 10:30 pm

    @Sonny Blount: two paths to fame. One is to get hold of a safe-ish electorate seat, and make it safe. Be the best electorate MP they can imagine. Means you don’t have to toe the party line, and therefore get some freedom. Alternative is to be part of the party machine, align yourself to the party’s principles, do what the party wants. This gets you a good list placing.

    To my mind, both have merits. When I vote for a local electorate MP, I expect them to listen to the electorate and to represent the people in it. I’m not all that keen on pork barrelling though, so they shouldn’t do this to a fault. When I vote for a party, and for the platform that party stood on, I expect them to damn well implement it. That means the people who get in on the party vote absolutely toeing the party line. Although we are a representative democracy, the reality is I’m voting for the party and the party platform, not for a bunch of people on the list, most of whom I’ve not heard of, to turn up in parliament and exercise their conscience.

    @JamesS. Didn’t you get banned? Must have been close. When you say virtually noone voted for Neil Morrison, what you really mean is at least one third, right? Assuming here there were three strong candidates, and he came through the middle, he’d have gotten at least a third. Not an absolute majority, no, but very different than virtually nobody. FPP didn’t allow you to be elected with virtually no votes.

12. Sonny Blount (1,518) Says:
    December 12th, 2011 at 9:13 am

    PaulL.

    The primary function of democracy is to remove people from power. MMP gives the core people who will wield that power lifetime access to it, as the front bench cronies of each party do not need to get voted in, they are in reality just waiting for the other lot to get voted out with the assurance of access to that power every 6-9 years.

    A political party is not one policy or one person. How things are conducted with the Ministry of Health can be very different to the Ministry of Education for example. Under the current MMP list situation, MPs are accountable to Key or Goff and not the public. Regardless of what conservatives think, Nick Smith is going nowhere.

    I think we are seeing the inevitable stagnation of talent that Party ranked lists ensure play out into longer terms for each government. Labour’s current problems come from the public not having a direct effect on the introduction or removal of talent at their top. Politics requires an ability to communicate ideas and win electoral runs to earn and defend the power to implement those ideas, we now have a system where MPs haven’t had to win hard fought contests to get by (because they don’t matter, electorate races no longer have a life or death edge to their contest), so I believe we are getting weaker advocates as MPs.

    A party needs competent MPs, electoral ranked lists will give better MPs than party ranked lists.
    The primary function of democracy is to remove people from power.

13. leftyliberal (370) Says:
    December 12th, 2011 at 11:01 am

    @Sonny Blount: You appear confused – Nick Smith won Nelson with a handsome majority of 7088. Further, of the Labour and National top 10 on the list, 7 from each were elected in electorates. I’m sure there’s plenty of the electorate winners you don’t think should be there, yet you can do nothing about it whatsoever as you don’t live in their electorate.

    Agreed with your point that parties need competent MPs, however electoral ranked lists will simply mean that those the party wishes to keep around will end up in either safe or swing seats (as regardless of which way it swings the top 2 candidates will get in). The greens seem to do reasonably well with their list by allowing their membership to vote on it, whereas Labour seem to be regarded as the worst due to the large union and head office influence. The electorate has highlighted this reasonably effectively though.

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