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Union parliamentary group leader: reduce the number of constituencies to 270
The plenary hall of the Bundestag: Parliament has continued to grow in recent years due to overhang and compensation mandates. photo
© Kay Nietfeld/dpa
The debate about electoral law reform continues. The traffic light factions want to abolish the overhang and compensation mandates. CDU/CSU are against it and make a counter-proposal.
According to media reports, in the dispute over the downsizing of the Bundestag, the head of the Union parliamentary group is proposing to the traffic light coalition to reduce the number of constituencies from 299 to 270. This is reported by the media company Table.Media and the “Süddeutsche Zeitung”. The newspaper refers to a “lightning briefing” from the parliamentary group leadership to its MPs, the media house to coalition circles.
A reform of the electoral law has been disputed for years. The standard size is 598 mandates, due to overhang and compensation mandates, the parliament has continued to grow in recent years – most recently to the record size of 736 MPs. The traffic light groups have now proposed in a draft law that there should be no more overhang and compensation mandates in the future in order to get back to the norm. As a result, MPs directly elected in a constituency may not get a seat in the Bundestag. The union rejects that.
According to both media reports, the Union faction leadership suggests reducing the number of constituencies to 270. This would also significantly reduce the number of overhang and compensation mandates. It is also “conceivable” that “up to 15 overhang mandates will remain unbalanced”. These arise when a party wins more direct mandates in a federal state than it is entitled to seats in the Bundestag based on its second vote result. To ensure that the other parties are not disadvantaged as a result, since the 2013 federal elections they have been given equalization mandates.
According to the “Süddeutsche Zeitung”, the Union faction also proposes an amendment to the so-called basic mandate clause. This stipulates that a party that fails to meet the five percent clause can still send MPs to the Bundestag according to its second vote result if it has won at least three direct mandates. The left benefited from this in the last federal election. According to the report, the Union is now proposing to increase the number to five constituencies that can be won.