January 3022 Wiltshire legislative elections

The **January 3022 Wiltshire general election** was held on Friday, 14 January 3022 to elect the 27th Wiltshire National Assembly, Wiltshire's supreme legislative body. The election was the first to see the newly admitted cities of Lorikeet and Rockfield to participate. In addition, this election was the first to see the new 100-seat model and the newly raised 5% threshold to enter the National Assembly. This snap election was called by Prime Minister Mitchell A. Crawley, in an attempt to win an overall majority for his government.

Incumbent Prime Minister Mitchell Crawley was of the right-wing Stability Party, which had been in government since its victory in the previous election. Crawley's government introduced what many called the most radical reforms to Wiltshire's approach to government in the history of Wiltshire's politics, privatizing public services, introducing Market Securities and granting local government significantly more powers.

The campaign was mostly focussed on the Labour Party, the main opposition party, which attempted to brand itself as a "fresh start". Their acting Leader, Caitlyn O'Hare, announced that she would not become the Prime Minister if Labour were elected. As such, Labour had no clear leader for the campaign and, with their policy pledges seeming vaguer and vaguer by the day, much of the country was unconvinced. Mitchell Crawley was re-elected with a significant margin, making it the largest electoral victory since October 3020. Despite falling short of an overall majority, most commentators branded the result a "near-landslide" for the Prime Minister, in contrast to what many expected as Labour held a small but consistent lead in pre-election opinion polls.

## Electoral system

Since the Third Elections Act, 3020, Wiltshire uses a system of mixed-member proportional (MMP) representation for elections to the National Assembly. Each voter gets two votes: one for a political party (the party vote) and one for a local candidate in their geographic electorate (the electorate vote). Political parties which meet the threshold (5% of the party vote or one electorate seat) receives representation in the Assembly in proportion to the percentage of the party vote they receive. 50 of the 100 seats are filled by Assembly Members (AMs) elected from the electorates, with the winner in each electorate determined by the first-past-the-post method (i.e., most votes win). The remaining 50 seats are filled by candidates from each party's closed party-list. If a party wins more electorate seats than seats allocated based on the popular vote, overhang seats are allocated which add to the total number of seats in the Assembly.

In order to appear on the national ballot, a political party must meet any two of the following three criteria:

* Reach 10,000 signatures on a ballot petition
* Reach 1,000 individual donors
* Currently hold seats in the National Assembly or hold an elected Mayoralship.

For the January 3022 election, eight parties qualified for ballot access:

* Daokan Unionist Party\*
* Grunen-31
* Kaitiaki Ropu\*
* Partido Socialista\*
* Progressive Conservatives
* Stability Party of Wiltshire
* Walkerton National Party\*
* Wiltshire Labour Party

\*Special interest parties, only appearing on the ballot in certain cities.

In electorates, individual candidates require a nomination petition of 500 signatures to appear on the electorate ballot or be a nominated candidate from a qualifying national political party.

### **Boundary changes**

The Wiltshire Elections Authority (WEA) confirmed the publication of new electoral boundaries to take into account population changes as a result of the IDO/NCR war and the admission of Lorikeet and Rockfield into the republic.

The biggest losers in the boundary changes is Newton and Walkerton.