How nice to have some good news
Published:
February 5, 2015 at 9:44pm
The court has ordered that the Nationalist Party be given another two seats in parliament, to properly reflect how people voted on two particular districts in the general election.
The government has said that it will appeal. But the Nationalist Party filed its case against the Electoral Commission and not against the government.
So I can’t see how Joseph Muscat (the prime minister) took that decision for the Electoral Commission, or thinks he has.
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http://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2015-02-05/local-news/Simon-Busuttil-urges-acceptance-of-court-decision-granting-two-more-seats-for-PN-6736130161
http://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2015-02-05/local-news/Constitutional-Court-orders-that-the-Nationalist-Party-be-given-two-additional-seats-in-parliament-6736130146
It’s a partial victory for democracy. Those two seats will be added, but not taken away from the opposing side. It doesn’t make sense. Citizens don’t vote twice.
The Nationalist Party should take the Electoral Commission to task on this one. If needs be through the courts again.
Slight problem. This legislature will be history by the time another judgment is handed down.
What irks me is that the helicopter riding modern day siren, the one with that most melodious of voices, will continue to undeservedly feast off the fat of the land.
Vanni, surely it can be handled as a matter of urgency?
Consider two implications of the given solution.
If three seats were involved instead of two, adding three seats would give 72, an even number. I believe the constitution specifies that the number of MPs has to be an odd number.
Edward Scicluna was elected from the 8th District as a result of the error. He was also elected from another district, He ceded his seat in the 8th District.
What would have happened if instead he had ceded the other seat and he would have had to resign as a result of this judgement?
Would he have remained without a seat?
Of course, instead of accepting this gracefully, Labour will try to drag out an appeal for as long as possible.
Why not institute a separate case to reduce government’s seats by 2? That way the PN increase will not be hindered…
@ tinnat
Surely you are aware that it is not in the Baron of Burmurrad’s interest to get his skates on.
The government should concentrate on the Monti pr disaster and leave the Constitutional Court do its job.
A government of pathetic peasants should not have any dallying with the highest court of the land.
To do so would be very risky indeed.
As long as the Constitutional Court is allowed to function unhindered that is.
I did not know that we have so many constitutional and mathematical geniuses who are all giving their version of why the court is wrong and clutching at all kinds of straws on newspaper comments boards.
Indeed. Victor Laiviera, Eddy Privitera, Joseph Brincat and co all believe they know what they’re saying.
As usual.
Pity is that government is ‘stamping its feet’. An appeal will be filed and another two years will go by in court. By the time of a final decision the next general elections will be nearly with us and those two MPs denied their seats during most of this legislature.
Indeed, they’re absolutely pathetic. And there’s no reasoning with them.
What was that about empty vessels again?
Maltese law allows a third party to enter an appeal against a decision, even if it isn’t actually a party to the suit.
The third party simply needs to show that it has been (negatively) affected by the outcome of the court judgement being impugned.
If that is the case then it is the Labour Party which should file the suit, and not the government. There is supposed to be a difference between them.
http://markanthonysammut.blogspot.com/2015/02/the-mathematical-proportionality-in-our.html
The judgement should not have given the PN an extra two seats but should have reduced the MLP number of seats by two.
Justyne Caruana and Edward Scicluna do NOT have the votes to be elected so they shouldn’t be Members of Parliament.
The way the sentence has turned out is that there will now be four Members of Parliament who shouldn’t be there for lack of votes, two from each party.
But because it’s two persons per party, there will be no complaints from either side.
Is it possible that the extra cost does not bother anyone?
There is approx €20k salary per MP per year. This comes to €80k pa, or €400,000 for a 5 year period. I assume the two MPs will be paid with retrospective effect.
Of course, all of us (or exactly those who declare and pay tax) will bear the cost.
So, instead of reducing two extra seat from the PL, PN will add 2 seats, so we keep everyone happy and we fork out from our taxes this extra €400k (excluding other perks). But no one is bothered on this matter, I am sure.
You’re wrong. Edward Scicluna was elected from both districts, one of them thanks to the 50 votes erroneously given to Michael Axiaq. He dropped one of them and Joe Debono Grech got elected.
So its Justyne Caruana and Joe Debono Grech who are not supposed to be MPs.
Correct.
Fine, so rather than add another two persons to parliament, Justyne Caruana and Joe Debono Grech should be removed. Can you imagine the amount of yelling that would happen were that the case? In the meantime, we pay.
So who defends the taxpayer? Who should sue the Electoral Commission for the damages the taxpayer has/is incurring because of its error?
Oh wait, it would be the taxpayer that would have to pay for the Electoral Commission’s error. So that faceless being, the taxpayer, ends up holding the can even though no fault of his own.
In that case there’s no actual loss then.
Am I missing something here? If two MPs were erroneously elected to the government side they should be removed and the two MPs who were actually voted in should be added to the Opposition benches, leaving the government with a majority of 5 instead of 9.
Adding 2 MPs to the opposition benches as the Courts have ordered leaves the government with a majority of 7 which does not reflect the people’s vote.
The remedy of two additional seats was suggested by MEP Therese Comodini Cachia, who was a lawyer for the PN in this case.
The Court accepted this suggestion as it is the least “harmful” option. Probably the court thought “the more the merrier” in our new Parliament building.
Aside from the fact that the PN took the electoral commission to court, shouldn’t it be the Labour Party to object (if it wishes to do so) rather than the government?
The government is formed as an outcome of the election, and the party in government is the party with most votes. It therefore makes no sense for the government to be able to object to the very process by which it is formed.
The case was also filed against the Attorney General and 3 Labour MPs.
It’s exactly what I thought when I heard the news quickly followed by Muscat’s Twitter message.
The law suit was lost by the Electoral Commission and if anybody is to appeal at all, it should be the Commission, which has admitted the mistakes and the Court asked for redress to be made within 30 days with the allocation of two more seats to the PN.
How can the Electoral Commission appeal when it has accepted that it was at fault?
If Muscat wants to defy the Court, it should be his Labour Party to open a new Court case to contest the remedial measure which the Court has ordered. This I believe should be clear even to laymen.
Shouldn’t the PL appeal, rather than the government (using taxpayer’s money)?
What’s the difference? As far as Labour is concerned, the twain have long met and melded together into ‘A Taghna Lkoll’.
Exactly.
You’re right Observer. I just posted the same argument.
Pardon me, for missing your comment.
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20150205/local/updated-government-rejects-pn-request-says-no-additional-parliamentary-seats-before-appeal.554920
“Dan l-ghaliex Buttigieg kellha tigi eletta di sua sponte, u ghaliex il-partit rikorrenti bil-mekkanizmu Kostituzzjonali u l-iskeda tlettax tal-Kapitolu 354, kellu jikseb tlett siggijiet addizzjonali, waqt li jitnaqqas siggu minn naha tal- Partit Laburista, bir-rizultat distakk ta sebgha (7) siggijiet bejn il-partiti”
The court acknowledges mistake in District VIII only. (no mention is made of District XIII )
As per Regulation 23 of the General Elections (sorting of Ballot Papers, Casual Elections and Co-opting) Regulations 1991
http://www.justiceservices.gov.mt/DownloadDocument.aspx?app=lom&itemid=8824 pgs 80-86
The general election result :
PL – 38 seats – 167533 votes – 4408 votes per seat
PN – 27 seats – 132426 votes – 4904 votes per seat
to work out the necessary proportionality of seats :
PN should be given 132426 / 4408 = 30.04 seats
Since number of seats should be odd the fraction in 30.04 should be increased to 31 seats giving the end result as
PL – 38 seats , PN – 31 seats (7 seat difference )
Court decided to keep PL’s present 39 seats and give PN two extra seats thus totalling 32 seats (7 seat difference )
I am under the impression that in Malta we vote for the candidate not the party. If that is so, the remedy should be that the two illegally elected candidates are replaced by the two candidates that should have been elected. No other solution will reflect the will of the voters in the respective districts.
“The government has said that it will appeal.”
Strictly speaking, the government does not have anything to do with this case, it’s the PARTY in government which is an interested party in the case.
The party is not the government and the government is not the Electoral Commission.
The attitude that the leader of the governing party has unbridled powers must stop. Respectable people would have resigned en masse from the Electoral Commission when they heard such statements.