History of Voting in New Zealand - Switch To MMP

Switch To MMP

Apart from a brief period from 1908 to 1913, when elections used runoff voting, New Zealand used the first-past-the-post electoral system until 1996. Gradually, single-member electorates replaced multi-member electorates in urban areas, and single-member first-past-the-post electorates became the norm for most of the twentieth century.

Towards the end of the twentieth century, however, voter dissatisfaction with the political process increased. In particular, the 1978 election and the 1981 election both delivered outcomes that many deemed unsatisfactory; the opposition Labour Party won the highest number of votes, but Robert Muldoon's governing National Party won more seats. This sort of perceived anomaly occurred as a direct result of the first-past-the-post electoral system. Subsequently, voter discontent grew even greater when many citizens perceived both Labour and National to have broken their election promises by implementing the policies of "Rogernomics". This left many people wanting to support alternative parties, but the electoral system made it difficult for smaller parties to realistically compete with either of the two large ones — for example, the Social Credit Party had gained 21% of the vote in 1981, but received only two seats.

In response to public anger, the Labour Party established a Royal Commission on the Electoral System, which delivered its results in 1986. Both Labour and National had expected the Commission to propose only minor reforms, but instead it recommended the Mixed Member Proportional (MMP) system already used in Germany. Neither Labour nor National supported this idea, and National chose to embarrass Labour by pointing out their lack of enthusiasm for their own Commission's report. National, attempting to seize the upper ground, promised a referendum on the matter. Labour, unwilling to see itself outdone, promised the same. In this manner, both parties committed to a holding a referendum on a policy that neither supported.

When National won the next election, it agreed (under pressure from voters) to hold the promised referendum. The first, indicative referendum was held on 19 September 1992, and asked voters whether to keep the FPP system or change to a different system, and if there was a majority to change, which system out of four (including MMP) would they prefer. The referendum returned with an 84.7 percent vote in favour of change and 70.3 percent in favour of MMP. A second binding referendum was subsequently held alongside the 1993 general election on 6 November 1993, with voters choosing whether to keep FPP or change to MMP. The referendum was returned with 53.9 percent in favour of changing to MMP.

The first MMP election took place in 1996. Disproportionality as measured by the Gallagher Index has fallen sharply, from an average of 11.10% in the period between 1946 and 1993 to just 1.11% in 2005.

A second referendum on the voting system was held in conjunction with the 2011 general election on 26 November 2011, asking voters whether to keep MMP or to change to another system, and which out of four systems would they prefer if there was a vote for change. The referendum was returned with 57.8 percent in favour of keeping MMP, and apart from one third of the votes in the second question being informal, FPP was the preferred alternative system with 46.7 percent.