Editing Mixed-member proportional representation (section)

=== Electoral thresholds ===
In systems with a threshold, people who prefer a larger party may [[tactical voting|tactically vote]] for a minor party that is predicted to poll close to or slightly below the threshold. Some voters may be afraid the minor party will poll below the threshold, and that that would weaken the larger political camp to which the minor party belongs. For example, the German moderate-right [[Free Democratic Party (Germany)|Free Democratic Party]] (FDP) has often received votes from voters who preferred the larger [[Christian Democratic Union (Germany)|Christian Democratic Union]] (CDU) party, because they feared that if the FDP received less than 5% of the votes, the CDU would have no parliamentary allies and would be unable to form a government on its own. This tactical voting also ensures that fewer votes are wasted, but at the cost of giving the FDP more seats than CDU voters would ideally have preferred. This tactic is the same in any method of proportional representation with a threshold.{{cn|date=May 2023|reason=I'm writing a thesis on this and in my literature I haven't found any sources that confirm that CDU-voters vote or have voted for the FDP because they fear it might fall under the threshold. If I, after a lot of study on this subject, can't find a source that corroborates with this, I think it is safe to say that this claim needs a source!}}

Similarly, in New Zealand, some voters who preferred a large party have voted for the minor party's local candidate to ensure it qualifies for list seats on the back of winning a single electorate. This notably occurred in the right-wing inner Auckland electorate of [[Epsom (New Zealand electorate)|Epsom]] in 2008 and 2011, where the [[New Zealand National Party|National Party]] voters gave their local vote to the [[ACT New Zealand|ACT Party]]. In this case the tactic maintained some proportionality by bypassing the 5% threshold, but is largely disfavoured by the public due to it awarding smaller parties extra list seats while parties with a higher party vote percentage that do not win an electorate receive no seats; this occurred in 2008 when ACT was awarded 5 seats on the back of one electorate seat and 3.7% of the party vote, while [[New Zealand First]] with no electorate seats and 4.1% of the party vote were awarded none. In 2011, some Epsom voters voting for the left-wing Labour and Green parties tried to block the tactic by giving their local vote to the National candidate; while it was unsuccessful, it did reduce ACT's majority over National from 12,900 to 2,300. In August 2012, the initial report on a review of the MMP system by the Electoral Commission recommended abolishing the one electorate seat threshold, meaning a party winning an electorate seat but not crossing the 5% threshold (which the same report recommends lowering to 4%) is only awarded that electorate seat.<ref name="MMPproposal">{{cite web |date=13 August 2012 |title=Review of the MMP voting system: Proposals Paper |url=http://www.mmpreview.org.nz/sites/all/themes/referendum/resources/ProposalsPaper/MMP%20Proposal%20Paper.pdf |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120901022210/http://www.mmpreview.org.nz/sites/all/themes/referendum/resources/ProposalsPaper/MMP%20Proposal%20Paper.pdf |archive-date=1 September 2012 |access-date=13 August 2012 |publisher=Electoral Commission}}</ref>