Malta 2013

[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.)

[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.)

[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.

[YL]

The first counts have now been completed everywhere.  Results look clear cut everywhere except districts 8 and 13: Labour gain fourth seats in districts 3, 4 and 5 and otherwise as you were.  In both 8 and 13 the Nationalists are narrowly ahead but not by enough to be entirely confident they'll get 3 seats.

[YL]

District 13 (Gozo) has nearly finished counting and it's now clearly going to remain 3 Nationalist 2 Labour; a few transfers have leaked but not enough to change the outcome.

District 8 has only had two counts, so it's too early to tell.  On the first count the Nationalists were ahead but didn't have three quotas, so AD transfers will be important there.

[YL]

District 13 (Gozo) has nearly finished counting and it's now clearly going to remain 3 Nationalist 2 Labour; a few transfers have leaked but not enough to change the outcome.

Oops, jumped to conclusions a bit quickly there: on the 10th count over 200 Nationalist votes didn't transfer, and Justyne Caruana (Labour) beat Fredrick Azzopardi (Nationalist) by 3966 to 3957 for the last seat.  So that district ended up 3-2 to Labour.

[YL]

District 8 after 12 counts:

Quota 3948

Carmona (L) 3948 elected
Fenech (N) 3948 elected
Fenech Adami (N) 3948 elected
Zammit (L) 2895
Scicluna (L) 2515
Debono (L) 2149
Buttigieg (N) 1613
Asciak (N) 1445
Castaldi (N) 905 to be eliminated

In total that's 11859 Nationalist votes (very marginally over three quotas) and 11507 Labour votes (2.91 quotas).  So the Nationalists look favourites for three, but after what happened in district 13 and with Labour's obviously better balancing of their candidates I don't think this can be called yet.

The last AD candidate was eliminated on the 12th count.  Of their 665 votes on count 11, 208 went Nationalist and 199 Labour.

Update: the 13th count reduced the Nationalist lead to 236 votes (11777-11531).  Asciak is next to be eliminated.

[YL]

District 12 has finished counting, and is 3 Nationalist, 2 Labour.

Apart from districts 8, 12 and 13, the others look like (NB some of them have other candidates still not eliminated, but none look to have a chance):

1 (13 counts): L 3.31 quotas, N 2.65.  3-2
2 (4 counts): L 4.23 quotas, N 1.68.  4-1
3 (13 counts): L 4.11 quotas, N 1.82.  4-1
4 (12 counts) L 4.00 quotas, N 1.95.  Looking like 4-1
5 (14 counts) L 4.03 quotas, N 1.91.  Presumably 4-1
6 (15 counts) L 3.56 quotas, N 2.39.  3-2
7 (8 counts) L 3.44 quotas, N 2.52.  3-2
9 (15 counts) L 2.57 quotas, N 3.19.  2-3
10 (18 counts) L 2.40 quotas, N 3.50. 2-3
11 (13 counts) L 2.71 quotas, N 3.27. 2-3

So assuming 2-3 in district 8, and with 2-3 in district 12 and 3-2 in district 13, the STV part of the election looks like Labour 38 (+4) Nationalists 27 (-4).

[YL]

You're going to have to edit that, but I doubt you'll mind.

In district 8, Asciak's elimination for count 14 left the situation as
Buttigieg (N) 3664
Zammit (L) 2991
Scicluna (L) 2543
Debono (L) 2155

So on count 15 Debono was eliminated.  16 votes went to Buttigieg, 894 to Zammit (elected easily) and 1145 to Scicluna, meaning Labour snatched the third seat by 8 votes.

Districts 4 and 5 both finished 4-1 as expected, so the final STV result is 39-26.  I'm not sure exactly what the rules are for the "fix", but what I've read suggests the Nationalists will get some extra seats from it, effectively compensating them for their incompetent transfer management.

[YL]

Can someone please explain to me this top-up procedure? I know that in 2008 the PN won the most first preferences and yet failed to win a majority of seats, and for that reason they were entitled to top-up seats to give them a single seat majority (35-34). I've read on some sources (okay, wikipedia, shoot me!) that PN are getting four extra seats to ensure proportionality. I was under the impression this only happened under the 2008 scenario, and not for the runner up. Can someone please explain this?

I've 39 for Labour, 26 for PN. Wikipedia claims 26-30 for PN, which does give them a fairly proportional seat share. I've just not read about this secondary top-up provision.

Here's a description.  Basically it sounds like a fudge.

The Nationalists are applying for recounts in both the close districts (8 and 13).  If one of these is successful, so that the STV result is 38-27, then according to the method described the Nationalists' entitlement of extra seats would be 3.04, which presumably rounds up to 4 (it can't be 3, as the total number of seats must be odd) giving 38-31.  If they're both successful, so that the STV result is 37-28, then the entitlement is 1.25, so presumably they'd get two seats, giving 37-30.

The system doesn't give AD any seats, even though doing the same calculation with their vote gives an entitlement of 1.28.

Update 13 March: the recount requests were turned down, so the final STV result is 39-26, with the four extra Nationalist seats giving 39-30.

[YL]

It's a legacy of the 1981 election when Labour won the most seats but the Nationalists polled more votes and promptly threw a hissy fit of epic proportions.

AIUI this is a recent (2007) extension; the previous version only corrected "wrong winner" results like the 1981 one, as happened in 2008.

It seems strange to me to use STV but then only look at first preference votes to do this, although it does seem that most of the oddities in Malta before this year haven't been caused by features of STV as opposed to other district-based systems.  And it seems that the rule still only applies under certain circumstances, which might well not apply if three parties won seats in the STV phase.