Talk:Elections to the European Parliament/Archive 1

message: The Netherlands is not a constituency of the European Parliament, as no such thing exists at this level. MEP are elected from Member States, which may or may not decide to divvy up this process into constituency elections. Intangible2.0 00:13, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Em, if a member is elected there when it is a constituency, the whole country forms one. You have voters divided off into a specific area and they as an electorate vote for a set number of MEPs to represent that area. That is a constituency. Wikipedia's own article: "group or area from which voters in an election are drawn." It is nothing new that a constituency may coincide with other administrative boundaries. In the UK you don't have people elected from "district councils, not constituencies" as that would imply the election is going via the other administrative structure whereas it is in fact direct. - J Logan t: 07:18, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Can you cite EU law that states that Member States form a constituency, in EP elections? Intangible2.0 10:09, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I may be wrong here, but your point feels like a straw man argument: the case for referring to a member state as an "European Parliament constituency" revolves not around EU law specifically referring to them as such, but from the fact that a defined area used to elect representatives can be called a "constituency". However, making the effort to address your concerns, I note that European Parliament Factsheet 1.3.4, section "Arrangements Subject To National Provisions", subsection B "Constituency boundaries", states that "...Since the 2002 Council Decision, a number of the old Member States have amended or are amending national laws. France has abandoned the use of a single electoral constituency and has established eight large regional constituencies: Northwest, West, East, Southwest, Southeast, Massif Central, Île-de-France and Overseas..." (my bold, see link here for the original). Regards, Anameofmyveryown 11:12, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Well from the 1976 EU election act : "In accordance with its specific national situation, each Member State may establish constituencies for elections to the European Parliament or subdivide its electoral area in a different manner, without generally affecting the proportional nature of the voting system." So it is up to Member States to decide. One cannot talk in general terms. Intangible2.0 12:58, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It is a way of describing the country's function in the EP electoral process, and in that process they function as a constituency. It's that simple. —Nightstallion 14:09, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: If the Member State forms one electoral constituency, it is still a Member State constituency, not a European Parliament constituency. MEPs are elected in Member States, not in Europe. Intangible2.0 19:52, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

text: That doesn't make any sense. Any member is elected in the constituency, but it is to something that defines the point of the constituency. They are elected to they European Parliament, hence making the constituency of the Parliament. They are not elected for any national structure. What you're suggesting is like having "Bristol West (Bristol West Constituency)" simply because that's where they're elected, rather than where they're going. - J Logan t: 08:02, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Precisely. I see nothing wrong with the current titles. —Nightstallion 21:05, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Name

message: Okay, returning to the navbox issue. I've looked through and tried different ways of presenting that data but it just doesn't seem to work in way that is simple to understand - esp. if you have just come across it. Hence what I propose is firstly, just having a simple lower navbox like this between the main election pages and for the subnational system we have a side bar that will list the other elections for that state/constituency and for that year. For example if you were on France 2004 election, the side bar would display links to all other French elections and all other national elections in 2004. Hence you have a simple display to everything you would want to compare from that article without having a massive clutter of links at the bottom. I have already created a parent page here to se don't loose the general grid system (well the page is more of a grid than the navbox which was hard to read). Thoughts? - J Logan t: 15:43, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I quite like the current navbox... —Nightstallion 12:15, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Navbox 

message: As some of you may know, I'm plowing thru the European Parliament election articles trying to harmonize them. Although I've been concentrating on the EU-wide elections, I have been giving some thought to the by-election articles (81, 87, 95, 07) with the intent of dealing with them sometime in '08. Whilst doing so, I happened along the European Parliament election, 1995 article, which states that "...The 1995 European parliamentary elections were held in Austria, Finland and Sweden..." Just one problem: the Sweden election was held in 1995, 'tis true, but the Austria and Finland elections were (according to these sources: 
) held in 1996. Can anybody confirm/deny this and, if true, what is the best way to resolve this? Kind regards, Anameofmyveryown (talk) 02:05, 30 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I think I came across this problem when doing the history but sure I found something giving the exact election dates in 1995, might have been the history timeline on Europa. But if there are others sources contradicting then perhaps a change. However I was thinking that as they are all on different dates, why do we even have overarching pages for them? It seems particularly pointless for Greece's.- J Logan t: 09:39, 30 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: aaargh...it's getting worse. Here's the official results for the Constituency of the Province of Vienna 1996 Elections to the European Parliament  I'm going to have to chase this up in 2008. Ouch! Anameofmyveryown (talk) 01:19, 24 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Euro elections in Austria & Finland 1995... Er, just one problem...

message: The trick is to realise that in Poland, the number of seats in a constituency isn't decided until after the election. (source: )
I think (I can't swear to it) that the sequence of events goes something like this. (source: this document  from this page  on this website )
1) Parties register lists in as many or as few constituencies as they like. 
2) Voters vote in a given constituency for the lists registered in that constituency. 
3) The Poland National Election Commission totals up all the votes nationally. 
4) Lists that didn't reach 5% of the total national vote are discarded. 
5) Each list that did make it is given (D'Hondt method) a number of seats ("mandates") depending on their share of the national vote. The total number of mandates is 54.  
6) Each constituency is given (Hare-Niemayer method) a number of seats depending on the number of people who voted in that constituency. The total number of seats is 54.  
7) Lists are matched to seats depending on the number of people in each constituency that voted for that list. 
8) Members from those lists are assigned to those seats depending on the number of votes they personally had. 
It's quite complicated, but it has these advantages.
A) People stand for constituencies
B) Voters vote for people in constituencies.
C) Everybody who gets a seat will represent a party who reached the 5% threshold nationwide.
D) The number of seats in a constituency depends on the number of people who voted in it.
E) The constituency vote for each person is known.
F) It's possible to build an election table for each constituency (yay!). 
Regards, Anameofmyveryown (talk) 22:45, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Poland electoral procedure for European Parliament elections

message: As for the question of what the constituencies are called, the best I can come up with is this:
===Polish National Election Commission names/descriptions===
(source: this document  from this page  on this website )
The full official Polish names and descriptions (it's difficult to separate the two) for the constituencies are as follows:
1) Okręg wyborczy nr 1, obejmujący obszar województwa pomorskiego.
2) Okręg wyborczy nr 2, obejmujący obszar województwa kujawsko-pomorskiego.
3) Okręg wyborczy nr 3, obejmujący obszar województwa podlaskiego i województwa
warmińsko-mazurskiego.
4) Okręg wyborczy nr 4, obejmujący obszar części województwa mazowieckiego: m. st.
Warszawy oraz powiatów: grodziskiego, legionowskiego, nowodworskiego, otwockiego,
piaseczyńskiego, pruszkowskiego, warszawskiego zachodniego i wołomińskiego.
5) Okręg wyborczy nr 5, obejmujący obszar części województwa mazowieckiego: powiatów:
ciechanowskiego, gostynińskiego, mławskiego, płockiego, płońskiego, przasnyskiego,
sierpeckiego, sochaczewskiego, żuromińskiego, żyrardowskiego, białobrzeskiego,
grójeckiego, kozienickiego, lipskiego, przysuskiego, radomskiego, szydłowieckiego,
zwoleńskiego, garwolińskiego, łosickiego, makowskiego, mińskiego, ostrołęckiego,
ostrowskiego, pułtuskiego, siedleckiego, sokołowskiego, węgrowskiego, wyszkowskiego
oraz miast na prawach powiatu - Płock, Radom, Ostrołęka i Siedlce.
6) Okręg wyborczy nr 6, obejmujący obszar województwa łódzkiego.
7) Okręg wyborczy nr 7, obejmujący obszar województwa wielkopolskiego.
8) Okręg wyborczy nr 8, obejmujący obszar województwa lubelskiego.
9) Okręg wyborczy nr 9, obejmujący obszar województwa podkarpackiego.
10) Okręg wyborczy nr 10, obejmujący obszar województwa małopolskiego i województwa
świętokrzyskiego.
11) Okręg wyborczy nr 11, obejmujący obszar województwa śląskiego.
12) Okręg wyborczy nr 12, obejmujący obszar województwa dolnośląskiego i województwa
opolskiego.
13) Okręg wyborczy nr 13, obejmujący obszar województwa lubuskiego i województwa
zachodniopomorskiego.
===European Parliament Electoral Website names/descriptions===
(source: 
The European Parliament Electoral Website  translates the above word-for-word, which gives us this:
1) Constituency 1 Pomorskie Voivodship 
2) Constituency 2 Kujawsko -pomorskie Voivodship 
3) Constituency 3 Podlaskie and Warminsko- Mazurskie Voivodship 
4) Constituency 4 City of Warsaw and part of the Mazowieckie Voivodship (powiats: grodziski, legionowski, nowodworski, otwocki, piaseczynski, pruszkowski, warszawski zachodni i wolominski) 
5) Constituency 5 The remaining part of the Mazowieckie Voivodship (powiats: ciechanowski, gostyninski, mlawski, plocki, plonski, przasnyski, sierpacki, sochaczewski, zurominski, zyrardowski, bialobrzeski, grójecki, kozienicki, lipski, przysuski, radomski, szydlowiecki, zwolenski, garwolinski, losicki, makowski, minski, ostrolecki, ostrowski, pultuski, siedlecki, sokolowski, wegrowski, wyszkowski and the cities of Plock, Radom, Ostroleka and Siedlce) 
6) Constituency 6 Lódzkie Voivodship 
7) Constituency 7 Wielkopolskie Voivodship 
8) Constituency 8 Lubelskie Voivodship 
9) Constituency 9 Podkarpackie Voivodship 
10) Constituency 10 Malopolskie and Swietokrzyskie Voivodship 
11) Constituency 11 Slaskie Voivodship 
12) Constituency 12 Dolnoslaskie and Opolskie Voivodship 
13) Constituency 13 Lubuskie and Zachodniopomorskie Voivodship 
===Resultant en.wikipedia names===
After translating the Polish names into their English equivalents (which is normal en.wikipedia practise for EuroParl constituiencies, see France & Italy for proof), that gives us this:
1) Pomeranian 
2) Kuyavian-Pomeranian 
3) Podlachian and Warmian-Masurian 
4) Warsaw 
5) Masovian 
6) Łódź 
7) Greater Poland 
8) Lublin 
9) Subcarpathian 
10) Lesser Poland and Świętokrzyskie 
11) Silesian 
12) Lower Silesian and Opole 
13) Lubusz and West Pomeranian 
===pl.wikipedia names===
pl.wikipedia names for the constituencies are inconsistent. One set of articles (source:  uses the following names for the constituencies:
1) Okręg wyborczy Gdańsk 
2) Okręg wyborczy Bydgoszcz 
3) Okręg wyborczy Olsztyn 
4) Okręg wyborczy Warszawa 
5) Okręg wyborczy Warszawa II 
6) Okręg wyborczy Łódź 
7) Okręg wyborczy Poznań 
8) Okręg wyborczy Lublin 
9) Okręg wyborczy Rzeszów 
10) Okręg wyborczy Kraków 
11) Okręg wyborczy Katowice 
12) Okręg wyborczy Wrocław 
13) Okręg wyborczy Gorzów Wielkopolski 
I think they're either following the convention of naming constituencies after their capital cities (much as a Cold War drama will use "Washington" and "Moscow" as shorthand for "United States of America" and "Soviet Union"), or they're adopting the name of the nearest Polish national parliament constituency (which is disputable, since they don't have the same borders: see )
However, the pl.wikipedia constituency infoboxes () uses different names for the constituencies (see ), and the two don't match up.
Given the above, I think I'll be forgiven for using the Pomeranian, Kuyavian-Pomeranian,... Lower Silesian and Opole, Lubusz and West Pomeranian names for the constituencies, since I can source it in English and Polish. 
regards, Anameofmyveryown (talk) 22:45, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Poland European Parliament constituency names

message: pl.wikipedia names for the constituencies are inconsistent. One set of articles (source:  uses the following names for the constituencies:
1) Okręg wyborczy Gdańsk 
2) Okręg wyborczy Bydgoszcz 
3) Okręg wyborczy Olsztyn 
4) Okręg wyborczy Warszawa 
5) Okręg wyborczy Warszawa II 
6) Okręg wyborczy Łódź 
7) Okręg wyborczy Poznań 
8) Okręg wyborczy Lublin 
9) Okręg wyborczy Rzeszów 
10) Okręg wyborczy Kraków 
11) Okręg wyborczy Katowice 
12) Okręg wyborczy Wrocław 
13) Okręg wyborczy Gorzów Wielkopolski 
I think they're either following the convention of naming constituencies after their capital cities (much as a Cold War drama will use "Washington" and "Moscow" as shorthand for "United States of America" and "Soviet Union"), or they're adopting the name of the nearest Polish national parliament constituency (which is disputable, since they don't have the same borders: see )
However, the pl.wikipedia constituency infoboxes () uses different names for the constituencies (see ), and the two don't match up.
Given the above, I think I'll be forgiven for using the Pomeranian, Kuyavian-Pomeranian,... Lower Silesian and Opole, Lubusz and West Pomeranian names for the constituencies, since I can source it in English and Polish. 
regards, Anameofmyveryown (talk) 22:45, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: pl.wikipedia names