How to get more women in the House, explained

Only nine women MPs were elected on their own steam or through a casual election in 2017: the situation has not changed much in 70 years but a proposed legal reform could see an additional 12 women take up a parliamentary seat.

It insists the mechanism is a “corrective exercise” that adds seats in parliament to enable a better balance between men and women, rather than reserve a specific number of seats.

The popular vote will still be reflected as it is today with the mechanism only adding on to the final result.

Whether what is being proposed could be labelled a quota is a moot point but the current electoral system already incorporates a corrective mechanism to ensure strict proportionality between seats and first count votes.

The proposal builds on this aspect without getting into the merits of reforming the electoral system. Knowing how the electoral system works is crucial to understand the mechanism.

In 2017, only nine women were elected to Parliament

How many MPs do we elect?

The electoral process is geared to elect five MPs from each of the 13 districts, for a total of 65. But once the election result is out and all 65 MPs are known, other measures kick in that could increase the number of elected MPs.

What happens after the election result is out?

If only two political parties are elected in Parliament, the Electoral Commission works out a mathematical formula to determine whether the parties need to be awarded extra seats to ensure stricter proportionality between votes obtained at first count and seats in the House.

Were any extra seats awarded in the 2017 election?

Yes. In the 2017 election the PL won 37 seats and the PN 28. To achieve proportionality, the PN was awarded two extra seats. These went to the two highest polling candidates left hanging at the last count. Carm Mifsud Bonnici on the fourth district and Frederick Azzopardi on the thirteenth district were elected in this way.

What happens next?

Candidates that were elected from two districts decide which seat to give up and casual elections are held to elect other MPs from the same party in their stead. In the 2017 election, five PN and seven PL MPs were elected in this way.

At the end of the electoral process, how many women MPs were elected in 2017?

Nine women candidates made it to Parliament. The PL elected four women and the PN five.

The proposed gender corrective mechanism will kick in after the normal vote counting process is concluded

The gender corrective mechanism

What is this new mechanism?

This is a method to ensure that parliament gets a more balanced share of women and men. The mechanism will kick in if parliamentary representation of any of the two genders falls below 40%. As things have stood for the past seven decades, this will apply to women but it does not exclude being applied to men if the balance shifts the other way.

How will it work?

The mechanism will only kick in after the normal electoral process, including the casual elections for vacated seats, is over. At that stage, the Electoral Commission will determine which gender has representation below 40%. The mechanism will add extra seats to achieve better balance.

How many seats will be added?

The proposal is to limit this to a maximum of 12 extra seats that will go to the under-represented gender. In the 2017 election, all the 12 seats would have to be filled to achieve better balance between men and women.

Will this mechanism apply if there are three political parties in parliament?

No. It only applies if two political parties are represented in the House. This is similar to the existing proportionality mechanism that applies only if two parties are elected to parliament.

In 2017, the Democratic Party elected two MPs. Does this mean the mechanism would not apply to that election?

Although the PD elected two MPs, its candidates contested on the same list as the Nationalist Party. This means that for electoral purposes, only candidates from two political parties are currently represented in Parliament. So, yes, the gender mechanism would still apply to the 2017 election result.

What is being proposed to increase the number of women?

A gender corrective mechanism will kick in after the casual elections are over to increase the number of MPs from the under-represented gender.

Does this mean that a party’s parliamentary majority could be reduced because of the extra seats?

No. The number of extra seats will be apportioned equally between the two political parties. This means that in the 2017 election, the PL and PN would each get six more seats to their current tally. The difference between the government and Opposition will remain a seven-seat majority.

How will these extra seats be filled up?

The proposal suggests three stages that would occur one after the other, depending on how many extra seats are left to be filled. At the first stage, which is the simplest, the unelected women candidates left hanging at the end of the vote counting process will be elected. This is similar to the process that awards the parties extra seats to achieve proportionality.

What happens if not enough women are left hanging to fill the extra seats?

Next, the Electoral Commission will look at the unelected male candidates left standing at the last count and organise a casual election using their votes. Only women candidates from the same party on the same district of the male candidate will be able to contest the casual election. The votes of the unelected male candidate are opened and distributed according to the preference indicated by the voter. After all casual elections are held, the Electoral Commission ranks the women according to the votes obtained and declares those with the highest number elect.

What if these casual elections still do not yield enough women MPs?

The proposal suggests a third step. The votes of MPs elected to the House through the normal casual elections will be used to organise another casual election on the respective districts. Again, only unelected women candidates would be able to contest.

And if all three steps are not enough to fill in the extra seats, will these remain vacant?

No. The proposal suggests co-option as a measure of last resort. Co-option is already contemplated in our electoral process in certain instances. PN leader Adrian Delia was elected to parliament through co-option, as was Joseph Muscat in 2008 when he became Labour leader.

Does this mean that a woman who obtained just 50 votes in the first count could end up being an MP?

Yes. But this is a reality of our electoral system, irrespective of the gender mechanism. It is not abnormal to have a candidate who obtains a few votes on the first count but still ends up in parliament after inheriting votes in subsequent counts. It is also not abnormal to have a high-scoring candidate on the first count, who fails to get elected because he does not inherit enough votes.

The mechanism would have seen 12 more women being elected to Parliament in the 2017 election

Women and the 2017 election

The following three steps would have kicked in only after the normal process up to the casual elections to fill vacated seats was complete. Given the gender imbalance, 12 extra seats would be added to parliament - six each for the two parties. The PD is not considered a third party for electoral purposes because its candidates contested on the PN list.

Step 1: The sixth female candidates left hanging at last count in every district would be declared elected by the Electoral Commission. The 2017 election outcome would have delivered two MPs in this way, one each for the PL and the PN. This leaves another five extra seats on either side to be filled.

District 1: Paula Mifsud Bonnici (PN) was left hanging with 2,749 votes.

District 12: Deborah Schembri (PL) was left hanging with 3,417 votes.

Step 2: Casual election with votes of unelected hanging male candidates in every district. The 2017 election would have delivered another six women MPs in this way – four for the PN and two for the PL.

District 2: Josie Muscat (PN) was left hanging with 2,493 votes. PN candidates Mary Bezzina and Doris Borg would be able to contest the casual election.

District 3:  Stephen Spiteri (PN) was left hanging with 2,684 votes. Spiteri was elected to parliament from another district but left hanging in the third.

PN candidates Amanda Abela, Mary Bezzina, Janice Chetcuti and Catherine Farrugia would be able to contest the casual election. Farrugia was a PD candidate on the PN list.

District 7: Antoine Borg (PN) was left hanging with 3,256 votes. PN candidates Monique Agius and Dounia Borg would be able to contest the casual election. Agius was a PD candidate on the PN list.

District 9: Edward Zammit Lewis (PL) was left hanging with 2,954 votes. Zammit Lewis was also left hanging on the eighth district but was subsequently elected in a casual election. PL candidate Nikita Zammit Alamango is the only Labour female candidate on the district and she would be definitely elected.

District 10: George Pullicino (PN) was left hanging with 2,622 votes. PN candidates Graziella Attard Previ, Roselyn Borg Knight, Anne Marie Muscat Fenech Adami and the late Evelyn Vella Brincat would be able to contest the casual election.

District 11: Chris Cardona (PL) was left hanging with 3,246 votes. PL candidates Rachel Tua and Fleur Vella would be able to contest the casual election. Deborah Schembri would have been elected in Step 1.

Step 3: Casual elections are held with the votes of MPs who made it to Parliament through a casual election in the normal process. Casual elections take place only where there are unelected female candidates from the same political party in the respective district.

After steps 1 and 2, the PN only needs one more seat to reach its six female MPs elected through the gender correction mechanism. The PL needs three more seats. Step 3 will deliver two PL female MPs, leaving the party one short. However, the PN would have four potential candidates for just one seat. At the end of the respective casual elections, the PN candidates are placed in rank order and the top of the list is elected MP.

District 4: Etienne Grech (PL) was elected with 2,020 votes in a casual election after Chris Fearne gave up his seat. The only PL woman candidate in the running would be Rita Sammut.

District 5: Stefan Zrinzo Azzopardi (PL) was elected with 2,102 votes in a casual election after Joseph Muscat gave up his seat. The only PL woman candidate in the running would be Rita Sammut.

District 7: Godfrey Farrugia (PN-PD) was elected with 1,975 votes in a casual election after Beppe Fenech Adami gave up his seat. PN candidates Monique Agius and Dounia Borg would be able to contest.

District 8: Edward Zammit Lewis (PL) was elected with 2,477 votes in a casual election after Edward Scicluna gave up his seat. The only PL candidate in the running would be Rachel Tua unless she would get elected in Step 2.

District 10: Karol Aquilina (PN) was elected with 2,014 votes in a casual election after Robert Arrigo gave up his seat. PN candidates Graziella Attard Previ, Roselyn Borg Knight, Anne Marie Muscat Fenech Adami and the late Evelyn Vella Brincat would be able to contest.

District 11: Ivan Bartolo (PN) and Maria Deguara (PN) were elected in casual elections with 2,317 and 2,302 votes respectively after Simon Busuttil and David Agius gave up their seats. PN candidates Simone Aquilina, Shirley Cauchi, Graziella Galea and Connie Scerri would be able to contest.

District 12: Clayton Bartolo (PL) was elected with 3,629 votes in a casual election after Evarist Bartolo gave up his seat. The only remaining PL female candidate able to contest would be Fleur Vella, who would definitely make it to parliament.

District 13: David Stellini (PN) was elected with 4,003 votes in a casual election after Marthese Portelli gave up her seat. PN candidate Maria Portelli would be the only one to contest this casual election.

Step 4: Co-option of women candidates by Parliament to reflect the number of missing seats for each party. In this case, Parliament would have to co-opt one PL female MP to reach the six-seat limit. No co-options would be necessary for the PN.