8 April 2007

The new electoral law

Good wishes for a Happy Easter to everyone!
I am publishing an interview I have given to il Corriere della Sera about the electoral law.

CdS: Minister Di Pietro, the debate about the electoral law is getting mad, but you seem to be absent…ADP: When there’s talk of the electoral law I give in. I give in until I see mouths closed and a text. OK I’m grown up and have all the vaccinations and I want to study the documents. Even at the cost of not sleeping the night to see where there is the trick. Because the Italian people have had lots of tricks played on them with the electoral laws. In the 1990s, when it was possible to choose, the majority voting was chosen, but the law was created to safeguard the usual ones.

CdS: Amato is proposing to go back to that law, to the single-winner constituencies.
ADP: I remember that even that law contained a proportional part. Amato is an intelligent and astute person, who is expert in these things, but I want to see the written proposals. Then I will try to make sure that my principles are taken forward.

CdS: So you too have a model to suggest?
ADP: I and Italia dei Valori have convictions and principles that can adapt to different models. For example, we are convinced that the reform cannot be done using a referendum. We won’t support the idea of a referendum in the collection stage nor later.

CdS: But that way you are going against the Di Pietro that collected signatures.
ADP: I believe in the referendum as a tool, but I am convinced that it’s not possible to write the electoral law with a “yes” or a “no”. A majority vote in Parliament is better than a a mad referendum.

CdS: And what will you say when Prodi consults you about the electoral law?ADP: We will say that to entrust to the party secretaries the choice of who is to be elected to Parliament is a terrible thing. It allows many characters in search of an author to become parliamentarians without the backing of the electorate. Thus we propose primaries opened up to all the citizens and if necessary with preference voting.

CdS: Minister, this is not a model.
ADP: I haven’t yet finished. We will tell Prodi that we need a great reduction in the number of parties. Including my own. I’m not going to go back on the need for this. It’s better that a party has a certain proportion of representation, or otherwise that they stay out of things.

CdS: And where would you go? In the democratic party?
ADP: As regards the democratic party I noted when it was starting up, that I was excluded by the Olive Tree because of a veto from the socialists. Now the conferences are starting and there will be the constitution of the PD. I hope in that phase that Italia dei Valori can give its contribution together with many other groupings in society. At the moment I just see a summit of the top brass of the DS and the Margherita.

CdS: Let’s go back to the electoral law.
ADP: Certainly. The other thing that we are thinking is that the citizens must be in a position to know who is the premier candidate, what is the programme and what the coalitions are that they can vote for. Then we propose that convicts cannot be candidates and that there is a limit of two terms of office in the same position. I want to discuss all this.

CdS: Your principles don’t seem so far away from the regional model.
ADP: The principles that I have indicated can be in line with different models. The regional model could mean anything or nothing. It depends on the lower limits, on the lists, on the democratic guarantees, on the choice of candidates. I’m not falling in love with the model, I want to see the text and see whether it embraces the principles that I have just indicated.

CdS: Do you want to bring about constitutional reforms?
ADP: If we start off with doing constitutional reforms before the electoral law we’ll get to three months from the vote for this law. And we’ll be doing a law that will be in the interests of some.

Posted by Antonio Di Pietro in Politics