Electing a Government by the current system of voting (First
Past The Post) has worked reasonably well in many jurisdictions for
many years and has, in the main, provided results that are
acceptable to the majority of voters. Occaisionally there is a
result that (for various reasons such as voter distribution) elects
a Government that did not get the majority of the votes. Such
results appear to be the driving force behind the demand for
Electoral Reform. A simple solution to this problem follows:
-
Hold an election on a particular date using the current
system.
-
Require all voters to present their Voter Information Card at
the polling station in their Electoral Distrit for Validation.
-
Declare the results.
If a candidate in an Electoral District has a clear majority over
all others (better than 50% of the votes cast) that candidate is
declared elected.
-
Where in an Electoral District there is no candidate with a
clear majority the two candidates with the most votes would be
required to face the the same voters a week later whilst the rest
would be dropped from the ballot.
-
Only those voters with validated Voter Information Cards would
be eligible to vote in the second
ballot.
-
Declare the results.
-
The candidate with the majority of votes in the second ballot
would be declared elected. In the event of a tied vote something as
simple as the toss of a coin could be used to determine the
winner.
Under this system the elected government would always be
a majority government having received a majority of the votes
cast.
There would be some problems arising from the adoption of this
system (such as the cost of setting up the runoff polling stations,
absentees at the second ballot, etc.) but not so many as there
would be in setting up a system involving some form of Proportional
Representation
Voters would always have a candidate known to them in their
Electoral District. Systems using a form of Proportional
Representation would have to have for allocation to seats a list of
prospective members. What simple method exists to
choose that list?
|
levelCMS