Ruling: Electoral law reform of 2020 complies with the constitution
The Federal Constitutional Court has declared the electoral law reform implemented by the then grand coalition in 2020 to be constitutional. 216 MPs from the FDP, Greens and Left Party, who were all in opposition at the time and had filed a lawsuit, failed in Karlsruhe on Wednesday (case no. 2 BvF 1/21). Their application was unfounded, said the presiding judge of the Second Senate, Doris König.
The case concerned the regulations on seat allocation, according to which the current Bundestag was formed in 2021. The ruling is important for the planned repeat election in the federal capital - as this would have to follow the same rules as the main election. According to a decision by the Bundestag, the 2021 Bundestag election is to be repeated in some Berlin constituencies due to glitches on election day. Proceedings are also underway in Karlsruhe: on December 19, the Federal Constitutional Court will announce in how many constituencies this must take place and whether it is sufficient to cast only the second vote.
The grand coalition's electoral law reform in 2020 aimed to reduce the size of the Bundestag, which had become ever larger due to overhang and compensatory mandates. However, one point of criticism was that overhang mandates were only compensated for by compensatory mandates for other parties from the fourth mandate onwards.
Overhang mandates arose when a party won more direct mandates than it was entitled to according to the second vote result. Compensatory seats for the other parties were intended to ensure that the final distribution of seats corresponded to the ratio of votes. König said that the challenged law sufficiently defined how and up to what point the number of seats in the Bundestag was to be increased.
The version of the electoral law now before the Constitutional Court is already outdated. The traffic light coalition of SPD, Greens and FDP had initiated its own electoral law reform. This goes significantly further than the previous reform and is in turn heavily criticized by the current opposition. Lawsuits against it are also pending before the Federal Constitutional Court.
The standard size of the Bundestag was originally set at 598 MPs. However, there are currently 736 members of parliament, more than ever before. Basically, everyone agrees that there is a need for reform. The only thing that has been debated for years is how. Because everyone wants to avoid changes being made at their own expense.
The Bundestag's composition was challenged in court over the 2020 electoral law reform, which aimed to reduce its size but was found to comply with the Constitution by the Federal Constitutional Court. The Judgments of this court will also impact future elections, as any repeat election in Berlin must follow the same rules.
Source: www.dpa.com
