Rather than explaining all the In's and outs, pro's and con's of each different system....why not just tell the NZ public which one will result in less MP's in parliament, and/or no List MP's.

That'll get the votes, even if they don't know what they are voting for, they'll just remember 'less MP's with this one'

We have had MMP for 16yrs and most people still don't understand it, what chance have they of learing the others if more complicated.

I do agree that FPP is not the way to go.

Looks as if the referenda are rigged in favor of the status quo.

When we got to vote on ditching FPP the vote went FPP or something else. If else, then choice between alternatives.

That was fair enough.

Now we have- Ditch MMP or not (choose alternative). IF ditch then vote between MMP and a the favoured alternative.

This means that MMP effectively has to be voted out in 2 referenda (unlike FPP).

Personally, the STV seems to be the best of the proportional systems, because it means that every MP has to be directly elected (even if it is on 2nd, 3rd or 4th choice votes), which makes each MP answerable to at least part of the electorate rather than to the Party that controls list positions.

From the last thread (apologies to any that read it already)

"Peter S #98 08:38 am Oct 21 2009 These two links illustrate the problem with MMP.

http://psychology.about.com/od/psychologicaltesting/f/genius-iq-score.htm

http://www.robertniles.com/stats/stdev.shtml

In the first link the first graph shows the bell graph of IQ. 1 Standard deviation covers 68% of the population (rated as average intelligence to above average IQ 85-129).

That means that 16% (the graph shows them on the left) are rated as mild to profound mental disability.

With a 5% threshold for political representation that means in theory 3 political parties.... Truly a case of the lunatics running the asylum."

I say raise the threshold to at least 20% just to protect us from lunacy.

WHAT ESPINER Fails to see is that a HUGE MAJORITY OF PEOPLE DISLIKE MMP for very good reasons,,we have seen the smacking law pushed through because labour wanted green support for their own agendas,and the electoral finance act which has been a disaster,,,what mmp is giving us is law by minority, and unelected minority,,,it cannot be sensible to allow 3/4%of voters via mmp via a minor party creating policy against a vast majorty who do not want these barmy laws passed,,,there has to be a better and fairer way

I agree with Colin except I would add to things that should be fixed, the overhang problem.

Probably the best way to fix it is to abolish the Maori seats. I see no reason the Maori Party can't survive on its own merits and constituency as do the other minor parties.

There is no system that does away with list MP's othe tyhan FPP - and that's worse IMO, so get used to them.

the MMP % threshold - IMO any party that gets more % vote than another party which gets an electorate should probably be in parliament - so, even though it chokes to think of Winnie the political princess being in parliament still, NZF should be there as they got a higher % than ACT.

Supplementary member proportional differs from MMP only in that both votes are independant of each other - one is a party vote, the other solely for your electorate. List MP's in SMP are elected from the part vote and regardless of the number of electorate MP's they get, whereas on MMP the number of list candidates elected depends upon the % of the party vote AND on the number of electorate candidates.

so in SMP both votes are worth something towards the makeup of Parliament, whereas in MMP only the Party vote is important.

While I think MMP is a far superior system to FPP and I like the diversity of parties in parliament, my main beef with the system is that there are far too many MPs now. I think if we had the 60 electorate MPs and a further 30 list MPs we'd have plenty. That's roughly equivalent to the number of MPs we had under FPP. List MPs are party bootlickers, not representatives of the people. At least constituency MPs are accountable to their electorates.

I don't want a referendum. I just want the worst aspects of MMP fixed.

With NACT, It's back to the 90s we go..

I agree MMP should stay. The reasons we got rid of FPP are still as valid today as they were 16 years ago - it creates a massive upheaval in the political process each time there's a change of government. We spend more money on rebranding the stationary than on health, education etc. The other proprotional representation systems have their strengths, but I don't think they offer enough to warrant a change.

eddie #1 MMP is not hard to understand and it is democratic and representative - do we toss it out because people are to stupid to work it out? No... Why? Because that would be stupid to. And voting for a system because it has the least number of MPs is also stupid.

Yeah - MMP is not perfect, but FPP was a sham, undemocratic and open to highjacking. Of course not everyone understands the workings of MMP, but then we have a country where lots of people don't know scrum laws, can't read cereal box instructions and don't know the name of the leader of the opposition.