Malta 2013

[You kip if you want to...]

Prime Minister Gonzi's center-right government collapsed today when a rebel from his Nationalist Party voted against the budget. The government had a 1-seat majority over the center-left opposition Labour Party.

The last election took place in 2008:

Nationalist Party - 49.34%, 35 seats
Labour Party - 48.79%, 34 seats
Others - 1.87%

Malta uses a modified STV system returning 5 members from 13 districts. The Nationalist Party have governed Malta since 1987 for all but a 2-year gap in the 90s. Labour currently holds a mild edge in the polls with many voters undecided.

The election will take place on March 9th.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The first post-independence election that Dom Mintoff won't be around for.

[Kitteh]

So weird that Malta has elections under PR but one of the most stable two-party systems in the world.

[Insula Dei]

Malta will go to the polls on the 8th of March. In the current parliament the right-wing Nationalist Party and an affiliated independent hold 35 out of 69 seats. The social-democratic opposition Labour Party (which, paradoxically, appears to be more 'nationalist' than the government) holds 34 seats. Malta is virtually a perfect 2-party system, and elections seem  habitually to be decided by just a couple of thousands of votes out of an electorate of about 300,000.

It's been since 2008 that Malta held a General Election, but this one is still brought about by the government losing a budget vote. Polls seem quite untrustworthy to me, but they all seem to agree that the Labour Party (PL) is well ahead of the Nationalist Party. Labour's been in opposition since 1998.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maltese_general_election,_2013

[DC Al Fine]

Malta uses a weird STV system. It seems odd that they'd only have two parties.

[You kip if you want to...]

https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=166222.0

[Insula Dei]

https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=166222.0

Didn't see that, sorry.

Still, this does look like it should be a good little bit of clean fun.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Superglued together in the traditional manner.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Malta will go to the polls on the 8th of March. In the current parliament the right-wing Nationalist Party and an affiliated independent hold 35 out of 69 seats. The social-democratic opposition Labour Party (which, paradoxically, appears to be more 'nationalist' than the government) holds 34 seats.

The Nationalist name comes from a very different era in Maltese politics...

[YL]

Malta uses a weird STV system. It seems odd that they'd only have two parties.

Isn't it basically normal STV but with a "fix" to ensure that the party with the most first preferences nationally gets the most seats?  (Which seems to defeat the point of STV a bit, but there we go.)

[DC Al Fine]

Malta uses a weird STV system. It seems odd that they'd only have two parties.

Isn't it basically normal STV but with a "fix" to ensure that the party with the most first preferences nationally gets the most seats?  (Which seems to defeat the point of STV a bit, but there we go.)

I think so. It does seem strange that only 2 parties could win seats in any STV system eh?

[Insula Dei]

Malta will go to the polls on the 8th of March. In the current parliament the right-wing Nationalist Party and an affiliated independent hold 35 out of 69 seats. The social-democratic opposition Labour Party (which, paradoxically, appears to be more 'nationalist' than the government) holds 34 seats.

The Nationalist name comes from a very different era in Maltese politics...

1920s, right? Quite new to all this.

[YL]

Here's a map from Adam Carr's Psephos website of the 2008 results.



As can be seen, there are 13 districts, and each elects five MPs by STV.  In 2008, six districts broke 3-2 to the Nationalists, six 3-2 to Labour, and one 4-1 to Labour, giving 34-31 to Labour.  At this point the "fix" kicked in, because the Nationalists got more first preference votes overall, so they got given four extra seats to make the overall result 35-34 to them.

Looking at the district results the only district where STV gave a different result to d'Hondt applied to the first preference votes is district 7, where the Nationalists got 50.6% to Labour's 47.8%, but Labour got 3 seats to the Nationalists' 2.  (This suggests poor transfer management or a personal vote for one of the Nationalists' candidates, because they had three quotas.)  So it would already have been a "wrong winner" result -- Labour 33, Nationalists 32 -- with d'Hondt applied to the first preference votes by district.

[YL]

This is today, though it looks like results won't be available until tomorrow evening.  A poll published on Monday said Labour 40, Nationalists 28, Democratic Alternative (greens) 2.4.

One thing I notice about STV in Malta compared with in Scotland and Ireland is that the parties have lots of candidates, in many cases more than there are vacancies available.  I don't know whether this has always been the case, but I suppose with the "fix" mentioned previously it makes sense for a party to maximise first preference votes, which could be helped by having a lot of candidates.  (Whereas in Scotland and Ireland parties worry about leaking transfers.)

[minionofmidas]

Surprised at the cleanness of that geographic divide.

[freek]

This is today, though it looks like results won't be available until tomorrow evening.  A poll published on Monday said Labour 40, Nationalists 28, Democratic Alternative (greens) 2.4.

These numbers add up to 70%, it turns out that there were 2 other options:
"No answer" 25.8%
"Not voting" 3.5%

[ERvND]

Labour wins by 12, 55-43. AD at 1,8% with no seats.

[Hash]

This is a HUGE landslide for Labour, the biggest victory for any party since 1955 apparently (when Malta wasn't even independent).

[You kip if you want to...]

Always nice to see another center-left government come in, albeit a small one.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Labour wins by 12, 55-43. AD at 1,8% with no seats.

Wow.

[YL]

Labour are apparently expecting 4 seats each in districts 2, 3, 4 and 5, and to gain a third in district 8.  This would make for another neat looking map.

[Tender Branson]

Turnout: 93%

http://www.maltatoday.com.mt/en/newsdetails/news/elections2013/High-turnout-at-2pm-with-49-nationwide-20130309

This is very good, considering Malta has no mandatory voting.

[Hash]

Low by Maltese standards

[Antonio the Sixth]

Why such a big Labour victory? Was the incumbent government that unpopular?

Anyhow, that probably doesn't mean much but it's still nice to see. And the awesome turnout is awesome.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The big issue was energy prices, but there have also been corruption scandals and the Nationalists, frankly, look tired after 15 years in power.