House of Representatives of the Seafaring Confederation

House of Representatives of the Seafaring Confederation
Type
Type	Lower House
Term limits	6 years
Leadership
Speaker of the House	Lena Auermann, Democratic Party
Majority Leader	Deainn Athruaigheadéais, Seafaring National Party
Opposition Leader	Therese Riasdötter, Labour Party
Structure
Seats	720
Political groups	Government      Seafaring National Party      Democratic Party      Socialist Party      Liberal Party      Green Party      Marine Party Opposition      Labour Party      Social Liberal Party      Corporate Party      Christian Brethren      Christians for God Others      National Parties      Independent
Meeting place
Seafaring House, Hamburg

The House of Representatives of the Seafaring Confederation is the 720-member lower house of the Seafaring Confederation. Half of the House is elected using a cumulative voting system and the other half using party-list proportional representation. Each half of the House serves for a 6-year term, however, there are elections every 3 years, where the party-list proportional representational half is elected in uneven years and the cumulative voting half in even years. The House sits in Seafaring House in the capital Hamburg.

Functions

The House of Representatives is one of the two Houses that make up the Assembly of the Seafaring Confederation, the other House being the High Council of the Seafaring Confederation. It has legislative powers and the power to control the cabinet on their decisions. Legislation of the House can only affect the Confederation as a whole, with nation-specific legislation illegalized. It can also force the High Council to accept a piece of legislation sent to them if it manages to get a three-fifths supermajority of the Members of the House.

Elections

Terms of Members of Parliament are 6 years long, after which they can seek re-election. Anybody over the age of 18 can set up a political party and contest the elections, as well as vote in the elections. Elections are called when the government loses parliament's confidence, the governing coalition collapses, the term of the Members of Parliament expires, or when no viable coalition government can be formed.

Elections are held every three years, wherein in the even years the half which is elected through cumulative voting is elected, and in uneven years the half which is elected through party-list proportional representation is elected. Members of Parliament that are elected through cumulative voting are elected to represent constituencies, wherein each nation is its own constituency. The largest constituency, Saxony, sends 80 representatives, whilst the smallest constituency, the Faroe Islands, sends 10 representatives.

The nations in between each send a number of representatives that is a multiplication of ten of the number that they rank in the list of number of inhabitants that the nations have, wherein rank number 1 is the lowest number of inhabitants. This means that Rockall, ranking 7th in number of inhabitants, gets to send 70 inhabitants, whilst Rom, ranking 2nd in number of inhabitants, sends 20, and so forth.

This setup means that some nations are heavily over-represented, whilst other nations are heavily under-represented. For instance, if this system were representative by population, Saxony would be entitled to 280 seats, whilst the Faroe Islands and Rom would be entitled to only 1 seat. This means that Saxony is 3.5 times under-represented (-350% as representative of the population), whilst the Faroes is 10 times over-represented (1,000% as representative of the population), and Rom is 20 times over-represented (2,000% as representative of the population).

Members elected through cumulative voting are known as Members National; members elected through party-list proportional representation are known as Members Ordinary.

The next elections will be held in September, 2016, to elect the Members-National.

Current situation

There are currently 19 parties and 137 independents in the House. The government is a centre-right coalition.

Government

The government is a coalition of the following parties:

• the Seafaring National Party, a nationalistic, mostly progressive centre-right party with 81 seats;
• the Confederational Democratic Party, a social-liberal progressive centre-left party with 66 seats;
• the Seafaring Socialist Party, a socialist left-wing party with 58 seats;
• the Liberal Party of the Seafaring Confederation, a liberal socially progressive but economically conservative centre-right party with 55 seats;
• the Seafaring Green Party, a relatively left-wing progressive green party with 49 seats;
• the Marine Party, a liberal socially and economically progressive but traditionally conservative centre party with 65 seats.

With 374 seats the government holds a majority of 14 seats.

Opposition

Unlike other parliamentary systems, the parliamentary system of the Seafaring Confederation often features one or more parties from the opposition to join the government in talks and decisions, with one or more parties often taking the side of the government.

The opposition parties are:

• the Seafaring Labour Party, a social-democratic progressive left-wing party with 65 seats that often sides with the coalition but chose to stay independent;
• the Social Liberal Party of the Seafaring Confederation, a social-liberal generally conservative right-wing party with 18 seats;
• the Corporate Party, a single-issue party focused on the representation of the corporate societies in the House of Representatives with 17 seats;
• the Christian Brethren, a Christian-democratic socially conservative but economically progressive centre party with 20 seats;
• Christians for God, an Orthodox Protestant political party believing government is only to serve God, with 10 seats.

The official opposition has 130 seats.

National parties

National parties are parties that are elected specifically to represent the issues of their specific confederational member nation. They tend to be nationalistic, but often side with the government rather than with the official opposition.

The national parties are:

• the Party for Saxony with 27 seats;
• the Party for Rockall with 13 seats;
• the Party for Dogger with 18 seats;
• the Party for Schleswig-Holstein-Jutland with 8 seats;
• the Party for the Highlands with 5 seats;
• the Party for Howry and the Party for the Faroe Islands with 3 seats each;
• the Party for Rom with 2 seats.

The national parties hold a total of 79 seats in the House of Representatives.

Independents

There are a total of 137 independents in the House of Representatives, most of which are considered right-wing progressive.