The Closed List System of PR removes the link between MEPs and the current Euro-Constituencies. Mainland Britain has been divided into 11 regions, electing in total 84 MEPs. The number of MEPs elected per region varies depending on the size of the electorate (The South East region, the largest, elects 11 MEPs, whilst the North East elects only 4).
The Yorkshire & The Humber region (electing 7 MEPs) comprises of the following Counties and Unitary Authorities:
Kingston upon Hull
East Riding of Yorkshire
North East Lincolnshire
North Lincolnshire
North Yorkshire
South Yorkshire
West Yorkshire
York
Each party whishing to put up candidates for the Yorkshire & The Humber seats submits a list of 7 candidates, in rank order.
On entering the polling booth, the voter has only a list of parties to choose from; no candidate names are given. They select one of the parties to cast their vote for.
The total votes for the region for all parties is then tallied and then divided by the number of seats available: in this case, 7.
So, for example: in 1994, 1273618 people voted in the region. Had these elections been run under the closed list system, this figure would have been divided by 7.
1273618 divided by 7 = 181,945
This is the 'threshold' to recieve one seat.
The votes of each of the parties is then divided by the threshold. Using the 1994 figures:
Labour: 702498 = 3.86
Cons: 330279 = 1.81
Lib Dem: 194018 = 1.0
Green: 46823 = 0.25
Thus 5 seats have been automatically allocated:
Labour: 3
Conservative: 1
Lib Dem: 1
Thus, the first 3 candidates on Labour's list are elected, along with the first candidates on the Conservative and Lib Dem lists.
This leaves 2 more seats to allocate: the parties with the greatest number of votes remaining after their main seats have been distributed recieve these.
Labour has 0.86, so recieves an extra seat (the 4th candidate on their list)
The Conservatives have 0.81, so recieve an extra seat (the 2nd candidate on their list)
The final tally would be:
Labour: 4 seats
Conservative: 2 seats
Lib Dem: 1 seat
Compared with the current position, the Labour party is the main loser, being in effect one seat down on their 1994 tally. The Tories have consolidated their position with 2 seats and the Lib Dems would make their first breakthrough in the region by taking a seat at Labour's expense.