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Alist MP is amember of parliament (MP) elected from aparty list rather than a geographicelectoral district. The place in Parliament is due to the number of votes the party won, not to votes received by the MP personally. This occurs only in countries with an electoral system based wholly or partly onparty-list proportional representation.
In some countries, seats in alegislative chamber are filled solely in accordance with the share of votes won by each individual party. Thus, allKnesset (MKs) members inIsrael are list members. Under this system, MKs are appointed from lists of candidates created by each party until the party has reached its allocated number. In other countries, a more complicated system is used. In the method used inJapan,South Korea andTaiwan, some seats are filled using party lists, while others are filled by the "traditional"first-past-the-post (FPP) voting system. Under themixed member proportional (MMP) system, the method used inGermany andNew Zealand, a merger of party-list representation and geographic representation is employed — parties contest geographic seats (districts) but are then "topped up" with members from a party list.
New Zealand has at least 120 members of Parliament (MPs), out of which there are 72electorate seats elected using FPP, and the other MPs are selected from the party lists. The number of list MPs each party receives is the difference between a party's proportional allocation ofparliamentary seats and its number of electorate MPs. Since the introduction of the list of MPs, New Zealand parliaments have been more proportionate.[1]
The existence of a list of MPs has caused controversy in some countries. It is sometimes complained that because list MPs do not have a geographic electorate, they are not properly accountable to anyone. In addition, the methods used to create party lists are sometimes criticised as undemocratic — in aclosed list system, the public has no way of influencing the composition of a party list. In this situation, the public cannot support one candidate without supporting other candidates from the same party. Supporters of party-list proportional representation sometimes retort that the public often has little control over the selection of local candidates, either — if a voter's preferred party selects a poor candidate, the voter is forced to either vote for a candidate they dislike or vote for a party they dislike. Under a party list system, voters can support their preferred party even if they are unwilling to vote for its local candidate.
Anopen list system,[2] however, may go some way to addressing the concern that voters can only support all the candidates the party proposed. A notable example of this was in the2006 Dutch general election. TheVVD had chosenMark Rutte as their list puller (lijsttrekker). In the Netherlands, the party leader usually gets a large majority of the votes for that party, but in 2006, the number 2 on the list,Rita Verdonk, got over 10% more votes than Mark Rutte. This eventually led to Rita Verdonk leaving the VVD and starting her own party.
There is also debate about the right of a list MP to switch parties. Because list MPs gain their seats by virtue of being on a party list rather than by winning votes personally, some contend that the party, not the MP, is the rightful "owner" of the seat. InNew Zealand, there have been several controversies regarding list MPs who left their parties —Alamein Kopu, elected from theAlliance list, controversially became an independent,[3] andDonna Awatere Huata, elected from theACT list, similarly became an independent. In the latter case, Awatere Huata's former party went to theSupreme Court to expel her from Parliament under so-calledwaka-jumping or "party-hopping"legislation. ACT alleged that it was ACT, not Awatere Huata, who was awarded the seat in the last election and that when Awatere Huata left ACT, she should not have been able to take the seat with her. ACT's view was accepted, and Awatere Huata was expelled from Parliament.[4]