The MMP guide

Undecided about the electoral system vote? Listener political columnist Jane Clifton steps through the MMP minefield.

Why MMP should stay by Sir Geoffrey Palmer

The mixed-member-proportional system (MMP), introduced for parliamentary elections in 1996, has proved the most important constitutional change New Zealand has made in the past century.

The reason is MMP has changed the distribution of public power. It has tamed the power of the executive government. And if MMP is voted down, we will be back to unbridled power.

We need checks and balances against too much power being concentrated in too few hands in the Cabinet. Under the first-past-the-post system, governments could change any law at any time as long as the caucus agreed. The main restraint was public opinion affecting prospects at the next election. It was a system of elective dictatorship. But things have become too complex for such simplicities now.

MMP broke down the domination of the two-party system. Seven political parties are currently represented, and power has to be shared more than it used to be. There has to be more discussion and negotiation before major policies can be adopted. This has reduced the power of the executive but not to the point of rendering it ineffective. The Cabinet can still govern and does.

MMP makes it less likely that the main party in the government will have a majority in the House. It has to go hunting for support. Confidence and supply agreements have routinely been negotiated between the Government and its support parties.

The effect of MMP on the legislative process has been profound. Ryan Malone, a leading researcher on the topic, has identified what has changed: “The ability of governments to advance their legislative programmes within their desired time frames is dependent on the favourable outcome of inter-party negotiations.” This provides an opportunity for sober second thought that was previously absent.

MMP has revitalised the Parliament, which is no longer predominantly a collection of ageing white males. And it has produced a much more diverse House of Representatives in terms of gender and ethnicity.

The Royal Commission on the Electoral System, chaired by Sir John Wallace, recommended a move to MMP. The report the commission delivered in 1986 is internationally recognised as the finest consideration of the subject produced in any country with a Westminster-style Parliament. The recommendations were designed to make the electoral system fair.

One criticism of MMP is it allows into Parliament list members who have not been elected directly by the people but have been chosen by political parties. Well, hello. Parties have dominated our representation in Parliament for more than a hundred years.

Under first past the post, the prospect of being elected without a party endorsement was remote. Parties are necessary to enable any modern system of democratic government to work.

The essential feature of any electoral system is it should be democratic. The royal commission pointed out that “democracy is the fundamental principle of our constitution”. MMP is the most democratic of the electoral systems on offer in next month’s referendum. It ensures more than any other system that representation in Parliament most closely reflects the preferences of the New Zealand voters.

In the debate so far, the most widely promoted alternative to MMP is supplementary member. The trouble with supplementary member is it is not a proportional system: 30 out of 120 seats would be allocated proportionally but the total number of seats won by a party would probably be out of proportion to its share of votes. In other words, it will be easier for the Cabinet to dominate the Parliament. Constitutionally, that is what we should be trying to avoid.

There is little to be said in favour of the abandoned first-past-the-post system – unless one is in favour of elective dictatorship. Preferential voting softens the winner-takes-all approach of first past the post but preserves its essence.
Single transferable vote involves multi-member constituencies, with voters ranking candidates in order of preference. It is used in Australian Senate elections. But it is complex, and details would have to be worked through. The royal commission rejected it for good reasons.

There is one feature of the MMP system that should be modified: that if an electorate MP wins a seat but the party fails to cross the threshold of 5%, that party has representation up to the percentage it polled nationwide.
This unsatisfactory situation leads to manipulative political behaviour to secure representation that the threshold is designed to deny. As Sir John Wallace suggested in 2002, we should “abolish the provision under which the threshold is waived for a party that wins a constituency seat”.

Sir Geoffrey Palmer is a constitutional lawyer and former Labour Prime Minister.

Why MMP should go by Roger Kerr

I would care less about the adverse economic consequences of our mixed member proportional (MMP) voting system if they reflected the genuine democratic preferences of New Zealanders. But they are unlikely to do so because of the constitutional and political weaknesses of MMP.

The main argument advanced in favour of MMP is it provides for wider representation of a diverse community than first past the post (FPP). This is the outcome the Royal Commission on the Electoral System intended. But it’s a poor argument. Although the gender and ethnic diversity of MPs have increased since MMP was introduced, greater diversity would have occurred anyway. The increasing participation of women in many occupations illustrates the broader trend.

Another claimed advantage of MMP is it permits political parties to bring into Parliament highly qualified people who might be put off by the need to contest an electoral seat under FPP. A handful of MPs elected in the past five elections could arguably come within this category – for instance, Christopher Finlayson, Stephen Franks and Tim Groser.

The opposite outcome, however, is the norm. People who have no special talents or who are overwhelmingly rejected in contests for electoral seats are elected to Parliament as list members. Alamein Kopu is a good example.

This arises partly because MMP concentrates power in the hands of central party hierarchies that draw up the party lists. Electors have no direct influence on the selection at least 50 MPs. These list members often have too little to do.

Simplicity is an important criterion for electoral systems. MMP scores poorly on this count. The Electoral Commission says only 46% of voters surveyed at the last election found MMP either easy or very easy to understand. The equivalent finding for non-voters was just 35%.

The commission’s surveys since 1995 show between 31% and 79% of voters correctly identify which of the two votes is more important in deciding the number of MPs each party will have. In Germany, a significant proportion of voters do not understand this fundamental feature despite 60 years’ experience with MMP.

Confusion over MMP is not limited to voters. Just nine days before the 2011 byelection for the Te Tai Tokerau seat, Mana’s Hone Harawira was asked on Radio Live, “What point would people achieve by voting for [Labour’s Kelvin Davis] and putting a Labour candidate back in?” Harawira replied, “If nobody voted for Kelvin, he would still get in anyway because … he’s quite high on the list so he’s going to get in.” The interviewer did not challenge or correct Harawira’s mistaken view of how MMP works in a byelection.

Voters who do understand MMP, or trust someone who does, may be encouraged to vote strategically rather than for the party or candidate they would most like to represent them. Another disadvantage is that MMP institutionalises promise-breaking in post-election negotiations. In 2008 National promised to remove the Maori seats. This commitment was abandoned immediately after the election when National entered into a confidence and supply agreement with the Maori Party.

Plus, fragile minority governments are much more common under MMP and small parties wield disproportionate influence. This compromises the quality of decision making.

Australian journalist Janet Albrecht­sen recognised these problems with MMP when she observed: “Forget democratic principles of voters knowing what they voted for and politicians being accountable for their promises. Post-election horse-trading between minor parties and minority governments will mean election promises count for nought.”

Political philosopher Karl Popper concluded the ability of the electorate to throw out a government it dislikes is the key issue in evaluating voting systems. This almost always happens under FPP or similar systems, but it does not often occur under MMP or other proportional voting systems. In the lead-up to the 1996 election, most people – including many New Zealand First voters – expected that party to enter into a coalition with Labour. But after the election it gave National three more years in power.

MMP and single transferable vote (STV) are proportional systems. They suffer from the major disadvantages noted above. FPP and preferential voting (PV) are non-proportional majoritarian electoral systems. Supplementary member (SM) is also a non-proportional system, although the 30 supplementary members would be elected on a somewhat similar basis to MMP.

MMP and possibly STV require a larger Parliament than FPP, PV or SM. A 1999 referendum indicated overwhelming support for a 99-seat Parliament. Despite this, next month’s referendum is to be conducted assuming there will be 120 seats under all options.

Roger Kerr is the executive director of the New Zealand Business Roundtable.

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