Additional-member system
In practice, the proportionality of AMS depends on the number of additional ("top-up") seats and the votes cast in a specific election.
Because the system generally favours the largest party and those parties/candidate that are strong in a particular region, the total result of the constituency (FPP) elections can be very disproportional.
AMS is used by some as another term to mean the broadly same type of system called mixed-member proportional representation (MMP) in New Zealand.
[citation needed] As the term additional member system is used here, AMS is unlike some MMP systems more true to their name, because it does not compensate for the disproportionate results caused by a party taking so many district seats that the fixed number of top-up seats cannot compensate.
In 'true' MMP systems, leveling seats (extra additional members) are filled in such a way as to ensure parties have proportional representation, but not in the AMS as used in the UK.
The Arbuthnott Commission recommended that Scotland change to a model where the voter can vote for a specific regional candidate as well (called an open list), but this has not been implemented.
To produce more proportional results without increasing the number of seats in the chamber, reforms might include changing the way district members are elected.
So-called "decoy lists" are a trick to unhinge the compensation mechanisms contained into the proportional part of the AMS, so to de facto establish a parallel voting system.
[11] Although a theoretical possibility,[8] decoy lists are not used in Scotland, Wales, or other places using AMS in the UK, where most voters vote for candidates from parties with long-standing names.
[citation needed] In contrast, in the 2007 Welsh Assembly election, Forward Wales had its candidates (including sitting leader John Marek) stand as independents, to attempt to gain list seats they would not be entitled to if Forward Wales candidates were elected to constituencies in the given region.
In the 2021 Scottish Parliament election, former SNP leader, Alex Salmond announced his leadership of the newly formed Alba Party, with the stated aim of winning list seats for pro-independence candidates.
At the party's public launch, Salmond quoted polling suggesting the SNP would receive a million votes in the forthcoming election but win no regional seats.
He said that having Alba candidates on the regional lists would end the "wasted votes", and the number of independence supporting MSPs could reach 90 or more.
[12] The AMS is used in some elections in the United Kingdom In 1976, the Hansard Society recommended that a mixed electoral system in a form different from the German be used for UK parliamentary elections, but instead of using closed party lists, it proposed that seats be filled by the "best runner-up" basis used by the German state of Baden-Württemberg, where the compensatory seats are filled by the party's defeated candidates who were the "best near-winner" in each of the state's four regions.
This would have involved the use of the Alternative Vote for electing members from single-member constituencies, and regional open party lists.
However, contrary to the Labour Party's earlier manifesto promises, no referendum was held before the 2001 general election and the statement was not repeated.
[citation needed] To deal with the misunderstanding between "first" and "second" votes, the ballot for the 2007 Scottish Parliament election was changed as recommended by the Arbuthnott Commission.
