WRITTEN RESPONSES TO RICHARD COMMISSION CONSULTATIONS

TOTAL REPRESENTATION (TR)

A New Electoral System for Representative Democracy

A Nathan
John Stuart Mill warned strongly against "the tyranny of the majority." Roger Scruton in his latest book England - an Elegy observes at Chapter 8: "Nothing is better known about the English than the fact that they developed over the centuries a unique political system, and then planted it around the globe. Yet the nature of this system is widely misunderstood. The reason for this, I believe, is that the commentators have misidentified the fundamental principle on which the English constitution rested.  Almost all popular historians and political analysts see the English system as an experiment in parliamentary democracy. In fact, however, the key notion was not democracy but representation, and it was as a means to represent the interest of the English people that we should understand the institutions of Parliament.
Mr Scruton of course echoes the historic cry of "No Taxation without Representation"
This misunderstanding has had a damaging influence in almost all those countries of a non-English tradition that have adopted the Westminster model. Unfortunately this same misunderstanding has extended recently even to this country as a result of theoretical and abstract indulgence by those who advocate Proportional Representation "PR" as the preferred route to a more democratic political framework.
And more importantly the inclusion in our society recently of new ethnic and religious groups and the emergence of an international environmentalist movement makes it ,imperative to adjust our constitutional framework to the new realities. Our present Constituency 1st past the post system is not able to address the new social realities. The clamour for a change is made more urgent through the breakdown of the balance of two "parties alternating in government as a result of the breakthrough of the Liberal Democrats as a credible third force in recent General Elections. A popular third party may paradoxically precipitate an unrepresentative landslide victory under "1st past the post". The Thatcher dominance in three parliaments and the recent landslide victories of New Labour can be examined in this light.
A complete change as advocated by the Liberal Democrats to Proportional Representation 'PR" is neither possible in the present climate nor indeed desirable. A combination of PR and Constituency systems may prove to be far more appealing to the vast majority of the population provided it is simple and easy to operate. Such combination can be achieved by adopting the "TR" - or Total Representational Electoral System, which is proposed in this paper.
Total Representation "TR" is based on the premise that every single vote cast in Elections has to end up with representation in Parliament whether directly or indirectly. Its purpose is to avoid the defect of the 1st past the post system whereby votes cast for the successful candidate are represented in Parliament while all the rest of the votes i.e. those cast for the unsuccessful candidates (which may very well be more than 50 per cent of the total) are not represented. "PR" on the other hand allows representation to all votes cast but creates small political parties and splinter groups resulting in weak coalition governments where factional rather than national interests take over, as is the case for instance today in Israel. By combining the positive elements of both systems (PR and 1st past the post) "TR" provide the solution.
In order to implement TR, Parliaments should have two classes of MPs who are equal in every way save for the manner by which they are elected. One class would be the Constituency MPs "CNIPs" who would be elected on a constituency, 1st past the post basis as is the case today in the UK The other class, Party MPs "PMPs" would be elected by pooling all the votes cast for the unsuccessful candidates in the constituencies and dividing them proportionally amongst the Parties, who would have announced before the Election their Lists of all their Constituencies candidates in order of priority.
For TR to succeed in its objective, the ratio between the number of Constituency MPs "CNIPs" and the Party MPs "PNIPs" is crucial. This ratio should be around 80/20 in favour of the CMPs in order to achieve the objective of "TR". This numerical ratio ensures the representational strength of the CMPs and therefore, to a degree, stable governments. The 20 per cent PMPs on the other hand would ensure the existence of a built-in Opposition in Parliament backed by representation. This would be the case even if one Party were to win all the constituencies. This built-in opposition based on real Representative Democracy, should help to counter to some extent the aforementioned "tyranny of the majority."
In summary, to implement TR the country would be divided into electoral constituencies, as is the case in the UK today. Candidates would be fielded within the constituencies either as party nominees or as independents. The votes cast for the successful 1st past the post candidates would gain their representation through the newly elected CMPs. The votes cast for all the unsuccessful candidates in all the constituencies would be pooled together and distributed proportionally amongst the unsuccessful candidates to elect the PMPs of the various Parties (Lists) that have fielded or sponsored them as candidates in the constituencies Therefore all MPs (CNIPs and PMPs) would have started as candidates in the constituencies.
The merits of TR are manifestly clear and simple to operate: voters vote for one single candidate in the constituency. And above all, it makes up for the basic deficiency of a pure constituency system (such as the UK system) whereby votes of the failed candidates are not really represented and in fact wasted and disenfranchised causing apathy amongst sections of the voting public. Were a system like this adopted years ago for example in Israel it might have created the necessary strong government needed in every stage of its peace process with the surrounding Arabs.
TR as outlined above can be adapted and modified for any country but especially to emerging democracies or old democracies with changed circumstances. I have prepared brief proposals on the practical applications of TR to the prevailing political circumstances at present both in the UK and Israel. These are the two countries I know well and whose political developments I have been closely watching and following for the last fifty years. It is especially interesting to examine these two applications as they would be coming from the opposite directions the one moving from Constituency Representation to TR in the UK, the other from PR to TR in Israel.

TR as Applied to the Reform of the House of Lords.

Much as the system of Total Representation "TIC' may sound attractive, the political climate in the UK today is such that it is wishful thinking to expect either the Political Parties or public opinion to rush to adopt it for changes in the House of Commons. However following the recent flurry of discussions about the future of the House of Lords, this may prove to be an opportune juncture to apply these principles. The following is an attempt to push forward this debate.
A case can be made for the adaptation of TR for an entirely elected House of Lords made of say 200 members. Half of them would be elected at the time of the General Election (call them "Party Lords) and the other half by direct election to be held say every six years (call them "Regional Lords").
Boundaries would be drawn to produce 100 regional constituencies, which would elect the Regional Lords on a lst past the post method. Their behaviour and bias naturally would reflect their regional allegiance in a manner similar to American Senators. Their fixed longer term of say 6 years (or two years after the General Elections when called) would ensure continuity when the other half i.e. the Party Lords would be elected at the time of the General Election to the House of Commons, as explained below. By elections would be held when vacancies occur amongst the Regional Lords.
The other 100 Lords (Party Lords) would be elected as a by-product of the General Election to the House of Commons. Commons MPs would be elected directly in exactly the same way that is followed today. The successful MP is the one who gains absolute majority of the votes in each constituency. Thus the voters who constitute these majorities will have gained their representation in the House of Commons. The voters that are not directly represented are those who voted for the unsuccessful candidates. It is the lack of accounting for these votes and the consequent absence of their representation in parliament that lies at the heart of the electorate's disillusion with the Westminster type of democracy. The proposed TR system is calculated to rectify this defect, stimulating a direct interest from every voter who would feel his/her vote counts.
The election of the Party Lords would work as follows. Each House of Commons constituency candidate who offers himself or herself up for election should belong to a Party or a List. Each List would form an alliance with one other List before the date of the Election to pass any votes, which are not utilised by-one List to its allied List. Each of these Lists would have to offer the names of all their candidates in an order of priority up to say 120 names. For example, the Liberal-Democrat party would put Charles Kennedy as No 1 on the list and XYZ as number 120. The Foxhunting list would put Mr Red Coat as their No 1. and Mr. Hornblower as No 10 being the last one of the List because they only chose to contest a small number of constituencies, say 15 in total.
The successful constituency candidates will gain their places in the House of Commons by using the number of votes, which are cast for them and constitute their majority. The votes cast for the unsuccessful House of Commons candidates would then be added together and allocated to the different Party Lists. The total number of these votes would be divided by 100 and the product number X would be the number needed to elect a Party Lord. Each List would claim as many such Xs as they have secured and the balance would be given to the List, which it had previously allied itself with. Each List would have to obtain altogether at least 5 per cent of the total unsuccessful votes to qualify, otherwise it would have to cede its votes to its allied List.
These new Party Lords gained by each List would be allocated by priority to those candidates who appear in a numerical order on that List. For example Charles Kennedy would be allocated the first available seat if he failed to secure a seat through the constituency i.e. if he failed to be 1st past the post in his constituency and so on. On the other hand, an independent Martin Bell would gain his seat as an Independent Constituency Member of the Commons but if he failed to secure the constituency his votes would pass onto any pre-allied list of his choice. (Mathematically this would happen to all one name Lists.) The Liberal-Democrats under this system might gain proportionally a bigger number of Party Lords if for example they came a poor third after Labour and the Conservatives since their votes, having failed to secure constituency seats in the House Of Commons, would all count towards their list of Party Lords.
By-elections would continue to take place under the present system for Constituency MPs but without utilising unsuccessful votes in between Parliaments for electing Party Lords. Similarly by-elections would be held for Regional Lords in case of death or resignation. On the other hand when a List Seat of a Party Lord becomes vacant through death or resignation, the next unsuccessful available person on the same original List automatically would accede to the vacant seat without a by-election taking place.
This system redresses the balance especially when one party in the Commons secures a huge majority, as is the case today with New Labour. The Party Lords of the minority parties (say, today the Conservatives and Liberal-Democrats) would have an added representative weight in the Revising Chamber when ignored in the House of Commons. These Party Lords will act in much the same way as traditional backbenchers or at least as backbenchers used to behave before the Party Whips took over.
The system also gives voice to ethnic, religious and other groups in our new multiracial and pluralistic society. The Party Lords of ethnic or religious background would have secured their places indirectly as a result of the General Election for the House of Commons. Candidates in the General Election, who offer themselves up in the different constituencies, have to think carefully before over emphasising their factional or ethnic interest in order to gain the support of a majority in those constituencies. Similarly Regional Lords have to canvass all the voters of their Regions. Thus National or consensus programmes rather than ethnic sectional or factional policies will prevail drawing sentiments towards national integrated interests rather than emphasising and encouraging sectional strife.
Implied in the above-proposed reform of the House of Lords is the absence of the Law Lords who if such reform is carried through could find their places more comfortably in a new Upper or Supreme Court. In any case a clear and visible separation of the Legislative and the Judiciary may prove to be commendable. On the other side Religious Lords or Bishops would not fit happily in elected Parliaments ex-officio. Their places in an elected House of Lords would look strange and out of place. The country at large may feel more comfortable to see religious leaders confining their contributions and moral authority to the Houses of the Lord.
Alternatively both categories could be retained in the new House of Lords and would be appointed in the way they are appointed today more by way of an interim stage rather than a long-term objective.
PROPOSAL FOR A NEW ELECTORAL SYSTEM FOR ISRAEL
BACKGROUND
The present system is out of sync with the realities of the social and political life of the country. When conceived and introduced it fitted the social framework of the time. It is now utterly out of date. Everybody says so, but owing to a variety of reasons and vested interests, its reform is pushed aside. However the delay is becoming manifestly harmful to the future stability of Israel and the ability of its government to function in the best national interest. Even more importantly it paralyses every effort or initiative to bring about peace with the Palestinians. To that end a strong and stable government is needed, backed by a stable majority in the Knesset and not resting on fluid coalitions of self serving factional small parties within it. The root of the problem lies in the present Proportional Representation System (PR).
On the face of it the System looks great; Democracy at its best where every vote counts. In practice it breeds small parties based on narrow sectional interests that tend to take precedence on national issues. Ben-Gurion together with some eminent supporters (Moshe Dayan, Shimon Peres, Yitshak Navon and others) tried and failed to change over to a Constituency based system. Once rejected by the country at large it was very difficult to revive its fortunes. An attempt was then made to give the government an added strength through the direct election of the Prime Minister giving the office a sort of French presidential like status. This too proved to be unworkable as it obviously clashed with the sovereign authority of the Knesset. So this patching up is dropped now therefore going back to square one of pure PR which is clearly harming the objective of a government needing to take decisive measures at home and speaking with one voice abroad. In recent years the Knesset was dominated by two major parties more or less balanced in strength in the House and in the country. These are Labour and Likkud. On and off they made up the rump of precarious coalitions. National interest apart it is in the interest of both these Parties to introduce the new proposed system which barring violent future social changes in the country might from their point of view guarantee them continued existence as alternative parties of government representing two wider ideological movements. It is in their power to pilot the successful introduction of this system in the Knesset. If adopted it might eventually force many of the small factional Parties to align themselves with Likkud or Labour leaving only those medium-size Parties with full national programs with aspiration to replace one or the other. The new system does not eliminate the possibility of coalition governments altogether but inherently it minimises such possibility occurring.
The movement to the proposed new electoral system "TR" must be accompanied by a joint campaign of the two big parties to explain to the supporters of the smaller Parties or political factions and of course to the country at large that the system is democratic and fair. The door must clearly be explained and seen to look open at least for medium size parties to grow into major parties in the future by having their voices clearly and continuously heard through representation in the Knesset, which the new system allows. And last but by no means least the new system has also to be constructed to meet the specific challenge of a population made of disparate Jewish religious and cultural segments living together with a sizeable Arab minority.
MAIN FEATURES OF THE PROPOSED SYSTEM OF TOTAL REPRESENTATION "TR"
The basic principle of this system of Total Representation (TR) is based on the premise that every single vote cast in the Knesset election has to end up with representation in the Knesset whether directly or indirectly. Its purpose is to avoid the defects of the Constituency 1 st past the post system whereby (as e.g. in the UK) votes cast for the successful candidate would be represented in the Knesset while all the rest of the votes (which may very well be more than 50 per cent of the total) are not represented. At the same time it also avoids the defects of the PR system which results in small parties and week coalitions.
In summary this proposed system of Total Representation (TR) is based on the following principles:
1.  It is simple to operate. Voters vote for one single candidate in their respective constituencies.
2.  It preserves some elements of the present Proportional Representation System "PR" and endeavours to combine it with a Constituency 1 st Past the Post principle.
3.  It seeks to integrate the Arab voters into the body politic of the country through inter dependence to a degree on Jewish votes in certain constituencies and vice versa.
4.  Through its operation it helps to relegate sectional interests to national interests and it draws politics towards the centre away from extremism.
5. And above all it makes up for the basic deficiency of a pure constituency system (such as the UK system) whereby votes cast for unsuccessful candidates are not represented and in fact disenfranchised causing apathy and a feeling of helplessness amongst sections of the voting public.
How this TR System adapted for Israel would in practice operate.
According to this system, the same number of 120 Members of the Knesset is maintained. However it can equally and efficiently apply for any desired revision of the total number. Out of the 120 members, 100 will be designated as Constituency Members (CMK) and 20 are designated as Party Members (PMK). This ratio of 100 to 20 can only be slightly varied in order to be effective. CMKs are elected directly by simple majority one in each of the 100 constituencies in the same way for example as the British MPs are elected i.e. by 1st past the post. PMK's are elected by pooling all the votes cast for the unsuccessful candidates in those same 100 constituencies added together and distributed amongst the parties on proportional basis. The system can easily operate as follows:
Boundaries would have to be drawn to divide the country into 100 constituencies that would elect 100 CMKs. Their behaviour and bias will naturally reflect their regional allegiance not unlike the case with American Senators or Congressmen. The Commission, which will draw these boundaries, has to attempt where possible in certain constituencies to encompass both Arab and Jewish groupings where they neighbour each other. This task is probably the most difficult part of the initiation of this system and has to be entrusted to persons of the highest reputation and integrity e.g
Senior Judges.
CMKs would be elected directly in exactly the same manner as e.g. that followed today in the general election for the House of Commons in the UK. Under this `first past the post' system, invariably either a substantial minority or indeed in many constituencies, a majority of the electorate are arguably disenfranchised through having voted for one of the losing candidates. It is the lack of accounting for these votes and the consequent absence of direct representation that lies at the heart of the electorate's disillusion with the Westminster type of democracy. The proposed TR system is calculated to rectify this defect, stimulating a direct interest from every voter who would feel his/her vote counts. This new system is calculated to rectify this defect and fosters a direct genuine interest for every voter while at the same time answering the call for fairness through a partial proportional representation operated automatically on the same ballot paper and used to elect Party Members of the Knesset. "PMKs"
These PMKs (i.e. Party Members of the Knesset) will be elected in the following way. Every party that fields constituency candidates in the General Election to the Knesset will arrange them in a List of preference of the same candidates for the PMKs. Each of these Lists woul form a declared alliance with one other List before the date of the Election to pass any votes, which are not utilised by one List, being surplus, to its allied List. Each of these Lists have to put up names of all their candidates for PMKs in a similar fashion to the one that is followed under the proportional regime today in an order of priority up to 100 names. For example, the Likkud may choose to put Ariel Sharon as No 1 on their list and Mr XYZ as number 100. Labour might put Amram Mitzna as their No 1 and so on. Both of them would also have been nominated as candidates to represent constituencies. All names appearing on the Pasty Lists must be those who are the declared candidates of the 100 constituencies in order of priority.
The successful constituency candidates would gain their places in the Knesset as CMKs having been chosen by simple majorities of the votes cast for them in their respective constituencies. These votes thus cast are represented by these CMKs in the Knesset. . All votes cast for failed Constituency Candidates end up with no direct representation. The TR system allows them their right to be represented in the Knesset indirectly. It is these votes cast for unsuccessful candidates in the constituencies that should be added together and allocated to the different Party Lists. The total number of these votes will be divided into 20 and the product number `X' would be the number required to elect a PMK. Each List's total votes would then be divided by the product number and any surplus votes on one list would be reallocated to the List with which it had previously allied itself with or vice versa. The transfer is made to the list with the higher surplus of the two allied lists. Each list must obtain altogether at least say 5 per cent of all the votes cast for the unsuccessful candidates in the constituencies to qualify, otherwise it has to cede its votes to its allied List. This requirement is in fact a mathematical requirement since 5 per cent of 20 is one. This procedure is familiar and in fact followed in the existing PR system as operated today in Israel.
The new Party Knesset Members (PMKs) gained by each List will be allocated by priority to each Party's published List. For example, the Likkud would allocate its first seat thus gained to Ariel Sharon if he had failed to gain his seat in his constituency and so on and so forth. Under this system in the way it operates the big parties will have the lion's share of CMKs but a smaller share of PMKs, which would go to the smaller parties to give them representation in the Knesset. It is this balancing which results from the combination of Proportional and Constituency Systems, which while supports a more stable government does not sacrifice the absolute right of the citizen to democratic representation.
By-elections will take place under this system for Constituency CMKs but without utilising failed votes in between Parliaments for electing Party PMKs. Such by-elections absent today in Israel will gauge the mood of the country in between general elections. On the other hand when a PMK seat falls vacant through death or resignation, the next unsuccessful available person on the same List will automatically accede to the vacant seat without a by-election taking place in the same way followed today under the present system.
This TR System redresses the balance especially if one Party in the Knesset secures a huge majority in the general election, as is the case for example today in the UK House of Commons. In such situations the PMKs will provide an added weight to the opposition.
The system also gives voice to ethnic, religious and other groups especially the Arab minority. However those ethnic, religious or Arab MKs ( CMKs and PMKs) would have secured their places directly or indirectly as a result of the General Election for the Knesset having been fielded through parties or pressure groups in the constituencies. Candidates in both categories who put themselves up for election in the different constituencies, would reflect carefully and hence refrain from over-emphasising their factional interest when canvassing in order to gain the support of all the voters in the constituencies. Thus National programmes rather than factional policies will prevail drawing sentiments towards national integrated interests rather than emphasising and encouraging sectional strife.