Overhang Seat - Dealing With Overhang Seats

Dealing With Overhang Seats

Overhang seats are dealt with in different ways by different systems. The three main methods are:

1. Allow the overhang — A party is allowed to keep any overhang seats it wins, but other parties are still awarded the same number of seats that they are entitled to. This means that a party with overhang seats has more seats than its entitlement. Other parties may be given additional list seats (sometimes called "balance seats") in order that they are not disadvantaged. This preserves the same ratio between parties as was established in the election. It also increases the size of the legislature, as overhang seats are added, and there may also be extra list seats added to counteract them. This system is used in the German Bundestag (without "balance seats"). The Parliament of New Zealand uses this system, and two extra list seats were added in the 2008 election. This system results is less proportional than full compensation, as the party with the overhang is still receiving a "bonus" above its proportional entitlement. The number of extra seats that may be created is sometimes limited to avoid an excessive increase in the size of the assembly, which approaches the second option.
2. Take the number of additional list seats off from the other parties' proportional entitlement — A party is allowed to keep any overhang seats it wins, and the corresponding number of list seats allocated to other parties is eliminated to maintain the number of assembly seats. This means that a party with overhang seats has more seats than its entitlement, and other parties have fewer. This approach is used in the Chamber of Deputies of Bolivia and the National Assembly of Lesotho, and was recently recommended by the Ontario Citizens' Assembly on Electoral Reform for adoption by the Legislative Assembly of Ontario. While for the first two additional list seats are simply denied to parties, in the last case a fairer procedure was proposed of subtracting the constituency seats won by parties with overhang seats from the total number of seats and recalculating the quota (the largest remainder method was also recommended) to proportionally redistribute the list seats to the other parties.
3. Non-awarding of overhang seats — A party is not allowed to keep any overhang seats it wins, with its number of seats actually being reduced until it fits the party's entitlement. This method raises the question of which constituency seats the party is not allowed to keep. After that is determined, it would then have to be decided who, if any, will represent these constituencies.
4. Fully compensatory — Similar to Option 1. However, this would have the additional impact of increasing the total seats in the legislature to allow the overhang, but other non-overhang parties will be compensated by receiving additional seats above their initial allocation to ensure full proportionality. These bonus seats serve to offset the "overhang bonus" described in Option 1.