Asturias (Spanish Congress Electoral District)

Asturias is one of the 52 electoral districts (circunscripciones) used for the Spanish Congress of Deputies - the lower chamber of the Spanish

Spain

Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

Parliament, the Cortes Generales

Cortes Generales

The Cortes Generales is the legislature of Spain. It is a bicameral parliament, composed of the Congress of Deputies and the Senate . The Cortes has power to enact any law and to amend the constitution...

. The total electorate in April 2008 was 982,230 and the largest municipalities were Gijón

Gijón

Gijón , officially Gijón / Xixón, is a coastal industrial city and a municipality in the autonomous community of Asturias in Spain. Early mediaeval texts mention it as "Gigia". It was an important regional Roman city, although the area has been settled since earliest history...

with 232,000, Oviedo

Oviedo

Oviedo is the capital city of the Principality of Asturias in northern Spain. It is also the name of the municipality that contains the city....

with 179,000 and Avilés

Avilés

Avilés is a city in Asturias, Spain. Avilés is with Oviedo and Gijón, one of the main towns in the Principality of Asturias.The town occupies the flattest land in the municipality, in a land that belonged to the sea, surrounded by small promontories, all of them having an altitude of less than...

with 70,000. Siero

Siero

Siero is a municipality of the province and autonomous community of Asturias, in northern Spain. Its capital is Pola de Siero.-Parishes:...

(41,000), Langreo

Langreo

Langreo, , officially Llangréu / Langreo is a municipality of northern Spain, province of The Principality of Asturias....

(39,000) and Mieres (38,000) were the only other municipalities with more than 20,000 voters.

Boundaries and electoral system

Under Article 68 of the Spanish constitution
the boundaries must be the same as the province of Asturias

Asturias

The Principality of Asturias is an autonomous community of the Kingdom of Spain, coextensive with the former Kingdom of Asturias in the Middle Ages...

and under Article 140 this can only be altered with the approval of congress. Voting is on the basis of universal suffrage

Universal suffrage

Universal suffrage consists of the extension of the right to vote to adult citizens as a whole, though it may also mean extending said right to minors and non-citizens...

in a secret ballot

Secret ballot

The secret ballot is a voting method in which a voter's choices in an election or a referendum are anonymous. The key aim is to ensure the voter records a sincere choice by forestalling attempts to influence the voter by intimidation or bribery. The system is one means of achieving the goal of...

. The electoral system used is closed list

Closed list

Closed list describes the variant of party-list proportional representation where voters can only vote for political parties as a whole and thus have no influence on the party-supplied order in which party candidates are elected...

proportional representation

Proportional representation

Proportional representation is a concept in voting systems used to elect an assembly or council. PR means that the number of seats won by a party or group of candidates is proportionate to the number of votes received. For example, under a PR voting system if 30% of voters support a particular...

with seats allocated using the D'Hondt method

D'Hondt method

The d'Hondt method is a highest averages method for allocating seats in party-list proportional representation. The method described is named after Belgian mathematician Victor D'Hondt who described it in 1878...

. Only lists which poll 3% or more of all valid votes cast, including votes "en blanco" i.e. for "none of the above" can be considered for seats. Under article 12 of the constitution, the minimum voting age is 18.

Eligibility

Article 67.3 of the Spanish Constitution prohibits dual membership of the Cortes and regional assemblies, meaning that candidates must resign from Regional Assemblies if elected. Article 70 also makes active judges, magistrates, public defenders, serving military personnel, active police officers and members of constitutional and electoral tribunals ineligible.

Number of members

In the general elections of 1977, 1979 and 1982 Asturias returned 10 members. That figure was reduced to 9 members for the 1986 General Election. It lost a further seat for the 2004 election and now elects 8 members, although at the 2004 election its electorate was larger than Vizcaya

Vizcaya (Spanish Congress Electoral District)

Biscay is one of the 52 electoral districts used for the Spanish Congress of Deputies - the lower chamber of the Spanish Parliament, the Cortes Generales. It is situated in the Basque Country and the largest city is Bilbao where around 30% of the electorate of almost a million live...

which elected nine members.

Under Spanish electoral law, all provinces are entitled to a minimum of 2 seats with a remaining 248 seats apportioned according to population. These laws are laid out in detail in the 1985 electoral law. (Ley Orgánica del Régimen Electoral General) The practical effect of this law has been to overrepresent smaller provinces at the expense of larger provinces like Asturias.

In 2008 for example Spain had 35,073,179 voters giving an average of 100,209 voters per deputy. In Asturias however the number of voters per deputy was 122,779 one of the largest ratios. In contrast the ratio was 38,685 and 38,071 respectively in the smallest provinces of Soria and Teruel.

Summary of seats won 1977-2008

	1977	1979	1982	1986	1989	1993	1996	2000	2004	2008
Seats	10	10	10	9	9	9	9	9	8	8
Spanish Socialist Workers' Party Spanish Socialist Workers' Party The Spanish Socialist Workers' Party is a social-democratic political party in Spain. Its political position is Centre-left. The PSOE is the former ruling party of Spain, until beaten in the elections of November 2011 and the second oldest, exceeded only by the Partido Carlista, founded in... (PSOE)	4	4	6	5	4	4	4	3	4	4
Democratic Centre Union (UCD)	4	4
People's Party People's Party (Spain) The People's Party is a conservative political party in Spain.The People's Party was a re-foundation in 1989 of the People's Alliance , a party led and founded by Manuel Fraga Iribarne, a former Minister of Tourism during Francisco Franco's dictatorship... (PP)	1	1	3	2	3	4	4	5	4	4
United Left United Left (Spain) The United Left is a political coalition that was organized in 1986 bringing together several political organisations opposed to Spain joining NATO. It was formed by a number of groups of leftists, greens, left-wing socialists and republicans, but was dominated by the Communist Party of Spain... (IU)	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	1
Democratic and Social Centre (CDS)				1	1

Seats shown for the People's Party include seats won by their predecessors, the Popular Alliance and the Popular Coalition before 1989. Seats shown for United Left include seats won by the Communist Party of Spain before 1986.

Vote share summary 1977-2008

	1977	1979	1982	1986	1989	1993	1996	2000	2004	2008
Spanish Socialist Workers' Party Spanish Socialist Workers' Party The Spanish Socialist Workers' Party is a social-democratic political party in Spain. Its political position is Centre-left. The PSOE is the former ruling party of Spain, until beaten in the elections of November 2011 and the second oldest, exceeded only by the Partido Carlista, founded in... (PSOE)	31.7	37.3	52.1	46.0	40.6	39.3	39.9	37.0	43.4	46.9
Democratic Centre Union (UCD)	30.9	33.0	4.9
People's Party People's Party (Spain) The People's Party is a conservative political party in Spain.The People's Party was a re-foundation in 1989 of the People's Alliance , a party led and founded by Manuel Fraga Iribarne, a former Minister of Tourism during Francisco Franco's dictatorship... (PP)	13.5	8.6	27.9	27.2	26.5	37.4	41.0	46.3	43.8	41.6
United Left United Left (Spain) The United Left is a political coalition that was organized in 1986 bringing together several political organisations opposed to Spain joining NATO. It was formed by a number of groups of leftists, greens, left-wing socialists and republicans, but was dominated by the Communist Party of Spain... (IU)	10.5	13.7	8.1	9.2	15.6	15.4	15.5	10.3	8.4	7.2
Popular Socialist Party Popular Socialist Party (Spain) The People's Socialist Party was a Spanish political party.The origins of the party dated back to 1954 when the University professor, Enrique Tierno Galván published various academic studies of a Marxist character. In 1965, working together with Raúl Morodo, he formed the Castillian Socialist... (PSP)	7.1
Democratic and Social Centre (CDS)			4.3	13.2	12.5	3.7	0.2	0.1	0.1

2008 General Election

Spanish Socialist Workers' Party

The Spanish Socialist Workers' Party is a social-democratic political party in Spain. Its political position is Centre-left. The PSOE is the former ruling party of Spain, until beaten in the elections of November 2011 and the second oldest, exceeded only by the Partido Carlista, founded in...

People's Party (Spain)

The People's Party is a conservative political party in Spain.The People's Party was a re-foundation in 1989 of the People's Alliance , a party led and founded by Manuel Fraga Iribarne, a former Minister of Tourism during Francisco Franco's dictatorship...

United Left (Spain)

The United Left is a political coalition that was organized in 1986 bringing together several political organisations opposed to Spain joining NATO. It was formed by a number of groups of leftists, greens, left-wing socialists and republicans, but was dominated by the Communist Party of Spain...

Union, Progress and Democracy

Union, Progress and Democracy is a Spanish political party founded in September 2007.It is a progressivist party, between social democracy and social liberalism. One of its goals is to build a federal system for Spain and European Union, with clear responsibilities distributed among local...

|align="right" valign=top|9,485
|align="right" valign=top|1.36
|align="right" valign=top|0
|align="left" |
|-
|align=left|Others
|align="right" |11,902
|align="right" |1.7
|align="right" |0
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2004 General Election

Summary of the 14 March 2004 Congress of Deputies election results

Spanish legislative election, 2004

Legislative elections were held in Spain on 14 March 2004. At stake were all 350 seats in the lower house of the Cortes Generales, the Congress of Deputies, and 208 seats in upper house, the Senate. The governing People's Party was led into the campaign by Mariano Rajoy, successor to outgoing...

People's Party (Spain)

Spanish Socialist Workers' Party

United Left (Spain)

Confederation of The Greens

The Confederation of the Greens is a green political party in Spain....

|align="right" valign=top|5,013
|align="right" valign=top|0.71
|align="right" valign=top|0
|align="left" |
|-
|align=left|Others
|align="right" |11,719
|align="right" |3.72
|align="right" |0
|align="right" |
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source:

External links

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