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danieldwilliamAfter each Scottish General Election I like to play around with some counter-factuals and see how some conceivable changes in voting pattern, turn-out, constituency wins would impact the overall result. Largely this involves dividing some large numbers by some small numbers in a spreadsheet.
Round 1 of this analysis will look at the following questions, which either occurred to me or were prompted by questions from someone.
(If you have a question you'd like me to look at please feel free. If you'd like a copy of the excel spreadsheet that I've built so far, you are welcome to it. )
Raw data comes from Ballot Box Scotland - who deserve some emotional and financial support from anyone interested in Scottish politics.
1) What would happen if Independent Green Voice votes transferred to the Scottish Green Party?
2) What would happen if Alba votes transferred to the SNP?
3) What would happen if Alba votes transferred to the Scottish Green Party? On top of the Independent Green Voice transfer?
4) What would happen if 10% or 20% of the votes transferred from the SNP to ALBA?
5) What would happen if 5% or 10% of the votes transferred from the SNP to the Scottish Green Party?
1) What would happen if Independent Green Voice votes transferred to the Scottish Green Party?
9,192 people voted for a party called Independent Green Voice. There is some question about whether Independent Green Voice are actually a green party.
They seem to be made up of far-right politicians including some former BNP activists. I guess it's not inconceivable that the far-right could take an environmentalist position. Hitler was a vegetarian after all. They have been standing in elections since 2003 polling a thousand or so votes each time. They don't appear to have been set up for this election.
https://greenpolitics.fandom.com/wiki/Independent_Green_Voice
http://search.electoralcommission.org.uk/Registrations/PP293
Had those 9,192 votes been cast for the Scottish Green Party then the Scottish Green Party would have won two additional seats. One in South Scotland and one in Glasgow.
Given that Independent Green Voice have been operating for nearly two decades in Glasgow it is probably not a safe assumption that everyone who voted for them was duped.
2) What would happen if Alba votes transferred to the SNP?
44,913 people voted for Alba. Had all of those votes transferred to the SNP they would not have won any additional seats.
3) What would happen if Alba votes transferred to the Scottish Green Party? On top of the Independent Green Voice transfer?
Unsurprisingly, had the Alba votes transferred to the Scottish Green Party they would have won the same two additional seats in South Scotland and Glasgow. Even adding both factors together still only means those two additional seats.
The reason for this is the d'Hondt ratchet. D'hondt PR allocates the next seat in each round based on your number of votes divided by the number of seats you already have. (Votes / (Seats +1) So every time you win a seat it becomes significantly harder to win the next one. By way of illustration. The SNP won over a million regional list votes and only 2 regional seats on top of their 62 constituency seats. The Scottish Greens on 220k regional list votes picked up 8 seats. In North East Scotland the SNP on 147,910 list votes but 9 constituency seats start the d'Hondt allocation process with a score of 14,791 ((147,910 / (9+1)) and the Scottish Greens with 22,735 votes start on a score of 22,735 ( 22,735 / (0+1)). The Greens go on to win a seat in the 6th allocation round.
The Greens finish the election in 4th place but a distant 4th place, some 265 thousand votes behind 3rd place Labour.
Whist a relatively small number of votes just makes a difference in two regions the Scottish Greens had not won a second seat but were close, once those seats are won an extra few thousand votes in the regions they have already won two seats get divided away by d'Hondt pretty quickly.
4) What would happen if 10% or 20% of the votes transferred from the SNP to ALBA?
Had 10% of the total votes cast moved from the SNP to ALBA (SNP down from 1,094k by 271k to 823k, Alba up from 45k to 316k then Alba would have won 11 seats. 316k is a quite a lot more than the Scottish Greens vote tally which gained them 8 seats.
The SNP would lose 2 seats. The Scottish Greens would lose 2 seats. Labour 3 and the Conservatives 4. Net gain of pro-independence seats is 7.
Had 20% of the vote shifted Alba would have ended up on 20 seats, with the SNP down 2, Scottish Greens down 4, Conservatives down 8 and Labour down 6. Net pro-indy seats 14.
So the concept of the Alba strategy is sound. Perhaps the personnel involved need a closer look.
5) What would happen if 5% or 10% of the votes transferred from the SNP to the Scottish Green Party?
Had 5% of the total vote cast ( 136k) swung from SNP to the Scottish Greens the Scottish Greens would have won 5 more seats, the SNP down 2, Conservatives down 3. Net pro-indy seats +3
For a 10% swing Scottish Greens up 11 seats to 19, SNP down 2, Conservatives down 4, Labour down 5, net pro-indy seats 9. Which is one more than the net pro-indy seats from a swing the ame the size from the SNP to Alba. At a 20% swing (Alba's target the Scottish Greens finish on 25 seats, all but 2 from the Conservatives and Labour, and also enough to be the second largest party.
Who would have thought that tactical voting for an established already existing party would prove more effective than setting up your own just weeks before the election? (Me,)
So that's round 1 of the election counter-factual analysis.
Round 2 when I get to it is going to look at the impact of some of the marginal constituency votes and how marginal some of the regional list seats are. As a teaser the d'Hondt ratchet is a pretty stern mistress and once you've won a seat or two it takes a lot of additional votes at the top end to produce even small swings at the bottom of round 7 or 8. So prepared to underwhealmed by a lot "and they were not really close at all in the end" type comments.
Round 1 of this analysis will look at the following questions, which either occurred to me or were prompted by questions from someone.
(If you have a question you'd like me to look at please feel free. If you'd like a copy of the excel spreadsheet that I've built so far, you are welcome to it. )
Raw data comes from Ballot Box Scotland - who deserve some emotional and financial support from anyone interested in Scottish politics.
1) What would happen if Independent Green Voice votes transferred to the Scottish Green Party?
2) What would happen if Alba votes transferred to the SNP?
3) What would happen if Alba votes transferred to the Scottish Green Party? On top of the Independent Green Voice transfer?
4) What would happen if 10% or 20% of the votes transferred from the SNP to ALBA?
5) What would happen if 5% or 10% of the votes transferred from the SNP to the Scottish Green Party?
1) What would happen if Independent Green Voice votes transferred to the Scottish Green Party?
9,192 people voted for a party called Independent Green Voice. There is some question about whether Independent Green Voice are actually a green party.
They seem to be made up of far-right politicians including some former BNP activists. I guess it's not inconceivable that the far-right could take an environmentalist position. Hitler was a vegetarian after all. They have been standing in elections since 2003 polling a thousand or so votes each time. They don't appear to have been set up for this election.
https://greenpolitics.fandom.com/wiki/Independent_Green_Voice
http://search.electoralcommission.org.uk/Registrations/PP293
Had those 9,192 votes been cast for the Scottish Green Party then the Scottish Green Party would have won two additional seats. One in South Scotland and one in Glasgow.
Given that Independent Green Voice have been operating for nearly two decades in Glasgow it is probably not a safe assumption that everyone who voted for them was duped.
2) What would happen if Alba votes transferred to the SNP?
44,913 people voted for Alba. Had all of those votes transferred to the SNP they would not have won any additional seats.
3) What would happen if Alba votes transferred to the Scottish Green Party? On top of the Independent Green Voice transfer?
Unsurprisingly, had the Alba votes transferred to the Scottish Green Party they would have won the same two additional seats in South Scotland and Glasgow. Even adding both factors together still only means those two additional seats.
The reason for this is the d'Hondt ratchet. D'hondt PR allocates the next seat in each round based on your number of votes divided by the number of seats you already have. (Votes / (Seats +1) So every time you win a seat it becomes significantly harder to win the next one. By way of illustration. The SNP won over a million regional list votes and only 2 regional seats on top of their 62 constituency seats. The Scottish Greens on 220k regional list votes picked up 8 seats. In North East Scotland the SNP on 147,910 list votes but 9 constituency seats start the d'Hondt allocation process with a score of 14,791 ((147,910 / (9+1)) and the Scottish Greens with 22,735 votes start on a score of 22,735 ( 22,735 / (0+1)). The Greens go on to win a seat in the 6th allocation round.
The Greens finish the election in 4th place but a distant 4th place, some 265 thousand votes behind 3rd place Labour.
Whist a relatively small number of votes just makes a difference in two regions the Scottish Greens had not won a second seat but were close, once those seats are won an extra few thousand votes in the regions they have already won two seats get divided away by d'Hondt pretty quickly.
4) What would happen if 10% or 20% of the votes transferred from the SNP to ALBA?
Had 10% of the total votes cast moved from the SNP to ALBA (SNP down from 1,094k by 271k to 823k, Alba up from 45k to 316k then Alba would have won 11 seats. 316k is a quite a lot more than the Scottish Greens vote tally which gained them 8 seats.
The SNP would lose 2 seats. The Scottish Greens would lose 2 seats. Labour 3 and the Conservatives 4. Net gain of pro-independence seats is 7.
Had 20% of the vote shifted Alba would have ended up on 20 seats, with the SNP down 2, Scottish Greens down 4, Conservatives down 8 and Labour down 6. Net pro-indy seats 14.
So the concept of the Alba strategy is sound. Perhaps the personnel involved need a closer look.
5) What would happen if 5% or 10% of the votes transferred from the SNP to the Scottish Green Party?
Had 5% of the total vote cast ( 136k) swung from SNP to the Scottish Greens the Scottish Greens would have won 5 more seats, the SNP down 2, Conservatives down 3. Net pro-indy seats +3
For a 10% swing Scottish Greens up 11 seats to 19, SNP down 2, Conservatives down 4, Labour down 5, net pro-indy seats 9. Which is one more than the net pro-indy seats from a swing the ame the size from the SNP to Alba. At a 20% swing (Alba's target the Scottish Greens finish on 25 seats, all but 2 from the Conservatives and Labour, and also enough to be the second largest party.
Who would have thought that tactical voting for an established already existing party would prove more effective than setting up your own just weeks before the election? (Me,)
So that's round 1 of the election counter-factual analysis.
Round 2 when I get to it is going to look at the impact of some of the marginal constituency votes and how marginal some of the regional list seats are. As a teaser the d'Hondt ratchet is a pretty stern mistress and once you've won a seat or two it takes a lot of additional votes at the top end to produce even small swings at the bottom of round 7 or 8. So prepared to underwhealmed by a lot "and they were not really close at all in the end" type comments.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-12 10:15 am (UTC)Yes, I think fundamentally Alba were trying to operate as a decoy list party. You could argue there were some substantive differences on the main policy issue of the timing of the next referendum but as they were explicitly seeking List votes to max out the Yes majority in Holyrood it's not a very strong argument.
I think their lack of success is probably driven by 1) they are a new, small party and then 2) Alex Salmond is well dodgey 3) Sturgeon signalling a move towards a more Plan B position than she had previously articulated rather than concerns about gaming the system.
Agreed on the both votes SNP as prudent belt and braces approach. Also, the SNP don't want to be leveraged in to allowing the Greens too much policy freedom as the SNP coalition is much broader than the SGP's. They would mostly like to deliver beige social democracy without scaring the horses. Mostly.
I think you are correct about using AV for the constituency votes. I like AV+ as a system - nearly as much as STV. There is some evidence of Unionist tactical voting. I think it is safe for Labour and Lib Dem voters to switch a little to the Conservatives because they expect to get an SNP government anyway (doing beige social democracy) and have regional vote to make sure their party gets some seats anyway. I don't think a voting system should encourage voter to shrug their shoulders and say "this'll do."
I think in rural area with large constituencies what you will get in practice is de facto MSP for smaller geographical areas inside the larger one. But I think these problems are unavoidable. Orkney, the smallest seat by population has a population of 22 thousand, one quarter the size of the largest constituencies, and one third the size of the average constituency. Highlands and Islands as a region has about two thirds the population of the average region.
Given that only about 1 person in ten lives in properly rural Scotland I'm not sure how much we ought to bend our electoral system out of shape to accommodate rural voters. If you take the six geographically largest constituencies (Caithness, Sutherland and Ross, Skye, Lochaber and Badenock, Argyle and Bute, Na h-Eileanan an Iar, Orkney and Shetland as one STV constituency, that's pushing on for a third of the land area of Scotland but only 5% of the population. I'm not sure there is a solution that works well for rural Scotland that also works well for the country as a whole.
I don't like STV with 4 or fewer seats. I don't think it gains much of the benefits of STV over AV.