Piedmont returns to the polls for the twelfth time in its history, with the aim of electing the president and the regional councilors who will make up the hemicycle of Palazzo Lascaris. The first time was in 1970. The first candidate on the regional list who obtained the highest number of valid votes within the single regional college will be proclaimed President of the Region.
Voting takes place on 8 and 9 June
As stated in the decree of the President of the Council, the so-called “election rallies”, which in bureaucratic language are the days on which one can go to vote, “are called for the days of Saturday 8 June 2024 from 3pm to 11pm and on Sunday 9 June 2024 from 7am to 11pm”.
The new law
This year there is something new, however. Piedmont has adopted a new electoral law which provides for some changes compared to the past. After a long process in the Commission and in the Regional Council, in fact, last 19 July the Subalpine Assembly approved law 12 of 2024, which among other things deals with the representation of the territories with the seats allocated in a proportional way, provides for the substitutes for councilors appointed as councilors and establishes gender equality in voting: anyone who decides to give two preferences will necessarily have to choose two candidates of different sexes, otherwise the second preference will not be taken into consideration. Furthermore, it is expected that neither sex, both in the constituency and regional lists, can be represented in excess of 60 percent, with alternation as far as possible.
The substitution
When we talk about substitution we are referring to the suspension from the functions of the elected councilors for the period in which they carry out their councilor duties. These councilors, having arrived at the skyscraper in Piazza Piemonte, will be replaced by substitutes in via Alfieri. If someone elected in proportional representation becomes a councillor, the first person excluded from his list and constituency takes over; if the councilor has been elected on the list, he is replaced by the first excluded at regional level, from the list to which the candidate is related.
The alternate is in office for the entire time of the office in the executive: the councilors will still be able to take their place as councilors in the event of a reshuffle that sees them personally involved, therefore excluding the alternates.
In any case, the President of the Council can appoint up to a maximum of 3 external councilors, as per the Statute. In total, there can be up to 11 councilors, while before the 2012 statutory change there were up to 14.
With an amendment to the Statute of the Piedmont Region, starting from the next twelfth legislature, the figure of two undersecretaries has been introduced, with the simultaneous cancellation of the president’s consultants.
The thresholds and signatures
There are thresholds: coalitions with at least 5 percent of the valid votes will be able to enter the Council and lists that are not united in a coalition or are part of a coalition that has not exceeded the 5% threshold, which have individually obtained more than 3%.
For the presentation of the constituency lists, the previous regulations were confirmed in relation to the number of signatures of the signatories and the methods, adding the exemption from the collection of signatures for all political forces or movements corresponding to parliamentary groups present in at least one of the two Rooms.
50 councilors, in addition to the president
The councilors remain 50, as in the last legislature (before the 2012 change there were 60) and their election is determined by article 10 of the electoral law: there are forty regional councilors to be elected on the basis of competing constituency lists, with the proportional system of the highest integer quotients and remainders in the individual constituencies; the other ten are elected on the so-called list of the winning coalition or party, i.e. “with a majority system based on competing regional lists”, as per the decree.
The constituencies and the 40 places available are divided as follows:
Alessandria (407 thousand inhabitants) 4 seats; Asti (208 thousand inhabitants) 2 seats; Biella (170 thousand inhabitants) 2 seats; Cuneo (580 thousand inhabitants) 5 seats; Novara (361 thousand inhabitants) 3 seats; Turin (2 million and 208 thousand inhabitants) 21 seats; Vco (154 thousand inhabitants) 1 seat; Vercelli (166 thousand inhabitants) 2 seats.
As mentioned, “the remaining ten seats, equal to one fifth of the total, are assigned with a majority system, on the basis of the regional lists of each candidate for President of the Council, except as provided with reference to the majority bonus and the guarantee of minority representation ”, which according to the new electoral law cannot have fewer than 20 representatives, except in the case that the majority at the polls reaches or exceeds 60% of the votes: only in this extreme case does it reach 18 opposition representatives.
The majority bonus determines that the winning coalition will receive at least 55 percent of the seats, or 28, in the event of victory with a percentage of less than 45 percent of the valid votes; at least 60 percent of the seats, i.e. 30, with votes between 45 and 59 percent, finally 32 seats from 60 percent of the valid votes.
After having calculated, in the single regional constituency, the number of seats due to each group of lists, the constituencies to which to assign them are identified:
- it is edited for each group of lists, a ranking of the constituencies obtained by arranging the results of the division in decreasing order:
remains of each constituency list / constituency electoral ratio (QEC);
- on the basis of this ranking, the seats belonging to each group of lists are assigned in each constituency.
Seat reservation
- The reservation of seats in favor of the second-placed Presidential candidate entails the loss of the last seat due to the constituency lists connected to himassigned within the single regional college (see slide no. 13 on the procedure for the distribution of the remaining constituency seats).
- If this group of lists is entitled to further seats following the application of the guarantee of representation of minorities, the last seat obtained for this reason will be sacrificed.
REGIONAL ELECTION NUMBERS
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