[EM] corrctions to older psts re IRV public election data

[James Gilmour]

> Warren Smith Sent: Saturday, November 12, 2005 2:36 AM
> Arguably STV multiwinner electiosn are still of interest for 
> single-winner purposes since the FIRST winner is a 
> single-winner IRV winner.

Anything is arguable, but I don't think this statement is correct.  An IRV winner has a "quota" of 50% + 1, whereas the
first stage winners in most STV-PR elections will have only the relevant Droop quota.  Also, in STV-PR several
candidates can be elected at the first stage, and frequently are.  In the 2003 elections to the Northern Ireland
Assembly, two candidates (out of six winners) were elected with quotas of first preference votes in each of 6
constituencies and three candidates were so elected in each of 3 constituencies.


> Gilmour is correct (I am happy to now learn) that Ireland is now posting 
> full vote lists in some (all?) STV elections on the www. I 
> grabbed the Dublin country elections each with about 40K 
> voters.  It will be interesting to examine them.

Ireland has posted the full ballots only for the three constituencies that used electronic voting machines.  All the
other constituencies used conventional paper ballots that were sorted and counted manually.  When STV-PR is introduced
for Local Authority elections in Scotland in 2007 it is planned that the paper ballots will be scanned and processed
electronically.  The legislation is being drafted at present, but there will be a campaign for full disclosure if that
is not included.

James Gilmour