30 QUOTA IN PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION, II., 



R.S. TAS. 



choices on the same papers if there are no candidates avail- 

 able with second or subsequent choices. (^*) 



In the case supposed in § 68, neither A, B, or G are 

 available, and JJs> votes would be divided between K 

 and F. 



If E and F were still lowest on the poll, one of them 

 would be excluded, and his votes (including those he had 

 obtained from D) would go to F , who would have all the 

 first choices given to D, E , and himself. Thus no votes 

 would be lost, and the party, if the total of the first choices 

 polled for D, E, F entitled it to another seat, would get 

 the seat. 



Let us suppose, then, that we have rules which pro- 

 vide for the transfer of a vote so long as there is an vinex- 

 cluded candidate, whether with a first choice or a subse- 

 quent choice, marked on the same paper. (^^) With such 

 rules no votes are lost by a party, and it will be found 

 that the argument in regard to the single transferable 

 vote contained in §§ 6-21 is applicable. Either the Hare 

 quota or the Droop quota will give representation approxi- 

 mately proportional, and the Droop quota will be prefer- 

 able to the Hare quota. 



(*•) There is an objpcti'Mi to such a rule, liowever, at all events in pre- 

 elections. One of the reasons for preferring the multiple transferable vote 

 to the single transferable vote in an election such as the pre-election of the 

 candidates of a party is that with the single vote a section as small as the 

 quota (one-seventh), and possibly out of sympathy with the rest of the 

 party, may return a candidate who will stand for the party as a whole ; 

 whereas with the multiple vote, the quota (if there are three first choices) 

 is three-sevenths, and the rules are intended to prevent the return of any 

 candidate with less than a quota of supporters. If D, E, F are the candi- 

 dates of a small section, and if i>'s votes go to E, and ^'s to F, F has as 

 many votes as if each voter of the section had given him three first choices, 

 and so a section as small as one-seventh is enabled to return a candidate. 



C^) A set of rules providing for all possible cases would be rather 

 complicated. The scrutiny, too, would be difficult. Mr. J. H. Humphreys 

 (Minutes of Evidence taken hefore the Boyal Commission, on Systems of 

 Election, Stationery Office, Lcmdon, 1910, Cd. 5352, at p. 40) has pointed 

 out that counting of votes is more laborious when there are several votes on 

 a paper than \«hen there is only one. " Whenever the ballot-paper (as in the 

 Belgian syst«m and with the single transferable vote) represents but one 

 vote only, the process of counting consists of snorting papers according to 

 the votes given, and then in counting the heaps of papers so formed. 

 Whenever there is more than one vote recorded upon a ballot-paper it be- 

 comes necessary to extract the particulars of each vote upon recording 

 sheets." With the multii)le transferable vote and fractional transfers, 

 fractional values add a further complication. These difficulties are avoided 

 in the I-aunceston Voting System of the Labour Party in Tasmania, in 

 which no choice can have a fractional value. 



