As independent MP Marlene Farrugia and others seek to form a new political force, Leonard Callus looks at how an electoral system that was meant to spawn multiple parties has actually produced an entrenched two-party tradition.

Maltese politicians smelt a rat when Morrison Bell from the Proportional Representation Society visited Malta in 1920 to explain the Single Transferable Vote system in the run-up to the 1921 Constitution. The Maltese needed unity to confront British imperial authorities. “We cannot permit ourselves the luxury of too many party divisions,” Enrico Mizzi, leader of the Democratic Nationalist Party, told him.

The Governor, Herbert Plumer, insisted that the political elite’s opposition was “influenced by party considerations only”.

Eventually, the British government rejected Maltese objections, claiming the STV was “best calculated to secure the fairest and most exact representation of all parties and points of view, to give the widest choice and, therefore, the greatest measure of political power to the voter”.

In reality, the British decision was inspired by divide-and-rule considerations. But the outcome was just the opposite!

The electorate tend to vote for established candidates who can potentially become ministers

In the short term, proportional representation did return several members from several parties to the legislature, says historian Dominic Fenech.

“But the 1927 election was already effectively a two-party contest. Whatever the theoretical claims of the STV system, the long-term result for Malta was the keenest of partisan rivalry, a clear-cut and obdurate two-party system and highest polling turnouts anywhere in the democratic world.”

Proportional systems (such as the STV) should in theory make it easier for small parties to make headway in contrast to other electoral systems, according to French political scientist Maurice Duverger.

Duverger’s law has in fact just been proven correct in Ireland, where the system has produced a Parliament made up of nine parties and 13 independent MPs. The Australian Senate, which also applies the STV, is made up of 76 seats that count seven parties and four independent senators.

But the system has not worked in the same way for Malta. Here it has produced a deep-rooted two-party contest, where a duopoly has reigned for the last 50 years.

The British system could also be said to defy Duverger’s law: despite being a first-past-the-post system, 11 parties (and one independent MP) were elected in the last UK general election.

“This confirms our electoral system is not to blame for the lack of success of small parties in our Parliament,” says electoral systems expert Hermann Schiavone. “We have to seek other causes, such as cultural attitudes.”

Historian Joseph Pirotta suggests that it may simply boil down “to the size of the country”.

“Our size generates bonds with politicians that are not seen in larger countries, fostering the clientelistic approach,” he says.

Dr Schiavone adds: “MPs are seen as fixers facilitating matters for constituents. The electorate tend to vote for established candidates who can potentially become ministers, hence the strong showing of incumbents in elections.”

In fact, since 1966, between 60 and 80 per cent of all elected members were incumbents.

“In the eyes of the electorate small parties’ candidates can never become ministers and therefore find it hard to attract support.

“Moreover, elections in Malta are usually won by a few thousand votes. While people might like and agree with a small party, voting for them is regarded as a wasted vote,” Dr Schiavone says.

The question is whether the Maltese really want alternative parties. After all, the ‘third’ parties have generally been splinters from the main two. The PL spawned the Malta Workers Party (1949), the Christian Workers Party (1961) and Alternattiva Demokratika (1989). The Democratic Action, Gozo and Jones parties (1947) and the Nationalist Democratic Party (1959) were PN splinters.

Historically, the least success-ful parties were those that sprang from the major ones: the Partit Demokratiku Malti, Partit Komunista Malti and Alleanza Nazzjonali all won less than 0.5 per cent of the vote.

Even the Gozitans have spurned the chance to be represented in Parliament. While the Gozo Party, founded under the leadership of Francesco Masini, managed to get three candidates elected in 1947, in four years it had been dissolved.

Case for a two-party system

“Democracy is all about throwing the rascals out,” said Australian-British Karl Popper in his book The Open Society and its Enemies.

In fact, some political scientists argue that a two-party system leads to governments that are more accountable. The party in power cannot shift the blame for failure onto coalition partners. Furthermore, voters can easily remove the party in government by voting for the party in opposition.

Another argument in favour of a two-party system is that ease of alternation of power is essential in a democracy, which crucially requires ‘clarity of responsibility’.

The UK appears to have taken these arguments to heart: the first coalition government there since World War II was elected only in 2010.

Then, in 2015, the Conservatives were returned to power with an absolute majority of seats while their Liberal coalition partners were strongly punished by the voters.

Italy and Greece have changed their electoral systems away from strict proportionality and towards a clearer accountability. Italy is now ensuring a guaranteed absolute majority of seats (340 out of 630) to the winning party, as long as it gains at least 40 per cent of the popular vote, while Greece gives a 50-seat bonus (in a parliament of 300 seats) to the party winning most votes.

One may argue for strictly proportional parliaments in order to represent small yet significant ethnic, linguistic or religious minorities.

Belgium has a highly proportional parliament which takes into consideration its linguistic divide, but this produces very unstable governments. After the 2010 election, Belgium spent a year and a half without a government!

The case for another party

More and more people are questioning whether the bi-party system is seriously failing the Maltese people, says Marlene Farrugia.

Having only two voices in Parliament, she says, appears to undermine the desired level of representative democracy for a more articulate and heterogeneous society.

“But what has really triggered, in these last few months, the debate on the need of a third party in Parliament has been the realisation that the way our two main parties have behaved in Opposition and in government has not delivered good governance.

“More worryingly, people are losing hope that either of the two main parties are capable of ever delivering good governance once one of them attains power.”

She describes the PN’s attempt to admit to its failures as having appeared half-hearted and its current process of renewal seen by a largely cynical electorate as just going through the motions while it awaits its turn to gain power and give more of the same.

The Labour Party’s situation is “much worse”. These last three years, Dr Farrugia says, have seen the disintegration of Joseph Muscat’s movement, with the electoral promise of ‘Malta Tagħna Lkoll’ becoming a source of embarrassment to both first-time and traditional Labour voters.

“An increasingly large number of Maltese citizens are feeling disenfranchised in a rigid bi-party system that has not succeeded in renewing itself to deliver the good governance they are crying out for.

“When I floated the idea that a solution to ensuring good governance could be the creation of a new party, I received overwhelming expressions of support from all walks of life.”

The coming months, she adds, will tell if the present move in favour of a third party in Parliament gathers further momentum.

“It might well prove to be the only hope left for us Maltese to ensure the good governance of our country.”

The national quota proposal

Smaller Maltese political parties have claimed that the current district-based single transferable vote electoral system militates inordinately against them. They are required to enjoy at least 16.6 per cent support in a single district to be represented in Parliament.

One solution put forward is a national quota: if a party garners enough votes across the entire country, it would be rewarded with seats in Parliament.

In the Maltese system a national quota comes into play when seats won by two parties do not match their share of the vote. The national quota is then used to adjust seats according to votes.

In 2013, when the district quota average was 3,900, Alternattiva Demokratika obtained 5,053 votes (1.8 per cent). This led to the claim that over 5,000 voters were not represented in Parliament.

However, in each district, a full quota of votes goes ‘to waste’ for the purpose of electing representatives. In 2013, about 85 per cent of the ‘wasted votes’ belonged to PL and PN and less than 15 per cent to AD. If one had to adjust for AD’s non-represented votes, one would have to do the same for the other two parties, leading a much bigger Parliament.

In 1995 the Nationalist government presented proposals to reform the electoral system, including having a national threshold of five per cent to be eligible for seats.

The Labour Party was against the proposals. Jimmy Magro, then PL secretary general, argued it was a question of formulating a just electoral system that reflected the will of the electorate “and respects the fact that Malta must have a stable government, a government able to implement its political programme without succumbing to ‘blackmail’ of any minor interest group.

“If this were to happen,” he said, “we would have the minority dictating to the majority.”

It was rumoured that in 2005 the two parties had agreed on a 7.5 per cent national quota, although this was never confirmed.