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Balance of power (parliament)

In parliamentary politics, balance of power is a situation in which one or more members of a parliamentary or similar chamber can by their uncommitted vote enable a party to attain and remain in minority government. The term may also be applied to the members who hold that position. The members holding the balance of power may guarantee their support for a government by either joining it in a coalition government or by an assurance that they will vote against any motion of no confidence in the government or will abstain in such a vote. In return for such a commitment, such members may demand legislative or policy commitments from the party they are to support. A person or party may also hold a balance of power in a chamber without any commitment to government, in which case both the government and opposition groupings may on occasion need to negotiate for that person's or party's support.

For other uses, see Balance of power.

New Zealand[edit]

Since the implementation of a mixed-member proportional (MMP) and multi-party system, several small parties have commonly held the balance of power following elections in New Zealand. Following the first MMP election in 1996, New Zealand First, a third party, held the balance of power, and the formation of a new government by either of the two major parties, Labour and National, depended on the support of New Zealand First and its leader Winston Peters.[4]

Sweden[edit]

With Sweden having proportional representation, small parties in the centre of politics often have vast influence over government formation, such as in the 2014 and 2018 election cycles, where the original coalitions could not form majorities in the Riksdag and bipartisan agreements were formed in bids to deny the Sweden Democrats the balance of power that was apparent by both election results. In 2018, the Social Democrats entered a pact with two centrist parties.[5] This required the government to go against several key promises from the campaign regarding no tax cuts for high-income earners due to the coalition lacking a majority to stay otherwise. The Sweden Democrats voted for opposition budgets after both elections, leaving the leftist government to govern on right-leaning financial terms for the first halves of 2015 and 2019. Under the previous bloc-dominated politics, the balance of power was less flexible, with the smallest party of the governing bloc usually holding the balance of power courtesy of close elections.

British Electoral Facts 1832–1999, compiled and edited by Colin Rallings and Michael Thrasher (Ashgate 2000)

Gladstone, by E.J. Feuchtwanger (Allen Lane 1975)

History of the Liberal Party 1895–1970, by (Sidgwick & Jackson 1971)

Roy Douglas