CDC mulls change to vote system

Constitution drafters are looking at compiling all losing votes to decide the makeup and number of party-list seats in parliament. (POSTGraphics)

The Constitution Drafting Committee (CDC) is considering a proposal for a new voting system to ensure votes "have a meaning" and are not wasted.

Under the proposal, the votes gained by candidates who lose in the constituency system will be used to calculate the number of party-list seats of each political party nationwide.

The CDC considered a study Monday from a subcommittee led by Prapun Naigowit, calling for a new voting system.

The subcommittee suggested that MPs be elected directly by the public and the election system should not be complex.

An election system should assign "meaning'' to votes so they don't go to waste, the study suggested.

In previous elections under the first-past-the-post voting system, votes for candidates who lost were thrown away.

In many cases, the combined votes of the losers from various parties in a constituency exceeded those cast for the winner.

Other suggestions in the study are that the public should be encouraged to go to the polls and that an election system should be suited to the circumstances of Thai society while complying with universal practices.

The CDC agreed that a new voting system and vote calculation should be easy to understand.

The CDC hopes the new voting system will be a departure from the much-criticised German-style voting system, the mixed member proportional representation (MMP), proposed by the previous CDC led by Borwornsak Uwanno.

During the meeting, a CDC member noted that the 2011 general election saw a turnout of 36 million voters.

But the combined votes of all winning candidates came to 19 million, whereas the votes of failed candidates, combined with spoiled ballots and no-votes, were a staggering 17 million.

"The 17 million votes lost their meaning. People came out to vote for nothing," the CDC member said.

The CDC member proposed that in the new voting system, the votes of candidates who fail in the constituency voting system nationwide be used to calculate the number of party-list seats of each party nationwide.

This will allow voters to cast their vote only once for both the single-constituency candidate and the party.

A constituency candidate who gets the most votes will become an MP while the failed candidates still have a chance of being party-list MPs, the CDC member said.

However, under the proposed system, small parties may not get a party-list MP if the votes they received from the single-constituency poll are not enough to earn them a place on the party list. 

The CDC member also said that the ratio between the constituency MPs and party-list MPs is expected to be 3:1, which is no different from the voting system used in 2007.

Other CDC members also suggested that constituency candidates should be registered as party-list candidates at the same time.

If they lose in the constituency voting, they still have a chance of becoming party-list MPs. 

CDC chairman Meechai Ruchupan asked the subcommittee led by Mr Prapun to consider a suitable proportion of constituency MPs and party-list MPs.

Source: http://www.bangkokpost.com/news/politics/744008/cdc-mulls-change-to-vote-system