A Note on the Electoral Rules for the Welsh Assembly

A recent article in this journal highlights,using simulated data, potential paradoxes inherent in thesystem of election to the Welsh assembly. This paper examinesthe data for the assembly elections held in 1999 to illustratethe occurrence of yet another paradoxical outcome, theelection of the first ever First Minister due to a fall insupport for his own party.     

Proportional Representation in the Welsh Assembly

The proposed rule for electing members to the Welsh Assembly gives each voter two votes, to cast at the Parliamentary constituency level, and at the bigger European constituency level. Half of the members are to be elected for the Assembly by a form of proportional representation, where party support is calculated by aggregating the two votes. The voters will be allowed to cast the second vote for a different party than the one for which they voted at the parliamentary level. This additional degree of freedom can frustrate the objective of obtaining better correspondence between party support and the number ofseats.     

Distribution of THO1, TPOX, CSF1PO, vWA, D13S317, D7S820 and D16S539 alleles in a Turkish population sample.

Allele frequencies of seven short tandem repeats (THO1, TPOX, CSF1PO, vWA, D13S370, D7S820 and D16S539) were obtained from a sample of 165-213 unrelated individuals born in Central Anatolia region of Turkey