新西兰英语 80 Official Election Results

　　The official results for the election were announced on Saturday. 270,000 special votes were counted and all other votes were re-counted. Special votes were votes by people who were not in their own electorate¹ on Election Day. Some of these people were overseas and some were in other parts of New Zealand that day, on holiday or business.
Under MMP, a small party has to get at least 5% of the party vote; then they get 6 MPs. New Zealand First gained only 4.1% so no MPs. However, if a party gets one person elected to an electoral seat, then their party vote counts. ACT got one person elected: Rodney Hide in Epsom. Although they got only one MP, they got 3.7% of the party vote which entitled them to 5 MPs. New Zealand First probably does not think this is very fair.
The National Party does not like MMP and would like to change it. In 1993, New Zealanders voted to change from FPP, First Past the Post, which is like winning a race by running past the post first. Under FPP, the Labour and National parties won all the seats in Parliament. The idea of MMP, Mixed Member Proportional, is to give minor² parties some seats. The aim of proportional voting is to match the proportion or percentage of votes with the number of seats in Parliament. MMP is used in Germany, Scotland and Wales. However, there are other proportional systems of voting used in Australia and other countries. We may be asked to vote on this again in the future.

1 electorate   

n.全体选民；选区

参考例句：

• The government was responsible to the electorate.政府对全体选民负责。
• He has the backing of almost a quarter of the electorate.他得到了几乎1/4选民的支持。

2 minor   

adj.较小(少)的，较次要的；n.辅修学科；vi.辅修

参考例句：

• The young actor was given a minor part in the new play.年轻的男演员在这出新戏里被分派担任一个小角色。
• I gave him a minor share of my wealth.我把小部分财产给了他。