Barcelona City Council election, 1995

Barcelona City Council election, 1995

28 May 1995
All 41 seats in the City Council of Barcelona 21 seats needed for a majority
Opinion polls
Registered	1,368,148 0.9%
Turnout	906,038 (66.2%) 10.7 pp
First party Second party Third party   Leader Pasqual Maragall Miquel Roca Enrique Lacalle Party PSC–PSOE CiU PP Leader since 2 December 1982 7 July 1994 1987 Last election 20 seats, 42.9% 16 seats, 34.1% 4 seats, 9.8% Seats won 16 13 7 Seat change 4 3 3 Popular vote 347,083 276,276 150,284 Percentage 38.4% 30.6% 16.6% Swing 4.5 pp 3.5 pp 6.8 pp   Fourth party Fifth party   Leader Eulàlia Vintró Pilar Rahola Party IC–EV ERC Leader since 1987 11 March 1995 Last election 3 seats, 6.4% 0 seats, 2.6% Seats won 3 2 Seat change ±0 2 Popular vote 68,813 46,272 Percentage 7.6% 5.1% Swing 1.2 pp 2.5 pp
Mayor before election Pasqual Maragall PSC Elected Mayor Pasqual Maragall PSC

The 1995 Barcelona City Council election, also the 1995 Barcelona municipal election, was held on Sunday, 28 May 1995, to elect the 5th City Council of the municipality of Barcelona. All 41 seats in the City Council were up for election. The election was held simultaneously with regional elections in thirteen autonomous communities and local elections all throughout Spain.

The unveiling of numerous corruption scandals throughout 1994 affecting Felipe González's Socialist government marked the electoral campaign. For the first time in 16 years, a real possibility for change in the local government resulted in a heated race between Socialists' Party of Catalonia (PSC) candidate and incumbent Mayor Pasqual Maragall and Convergence and Union (CiU) candidate Miquel Roca. Another factors influencing the political debate were the People's Party (PP) rise in opinion polls as well as Republican Left of Catalonia (ERC) recovery.

The election resulted in a surprising comfortable win for PSC and Pasqual Maragall, which was elected for a fourth consecutive term in office with 16 seats and 38.4%. On the other hand, CiU suffered from the PP growth and obtained its worst result since 1983, winning 13 seats and 30.6%. The People's Party nearly doubled its 1991 result with 7 seats and 16.6%, while both Initiative for Catalonia (IC) and ERC improved their electoral performances, with the latter narrowly surpassing the 5% threshold to enter the City Council.

Electoral system

The City Council of Barcelona (Catalan: Ajuntament de Barcelona, Spanish: Ayuntamiento de Barcelona) was the top-tier administrative and governing body of the municipality of Barcelona, composed of the mayor, the government council and the elected plenary assembly. Voting for the local assembly was on the basis of universal suffrage, which comprised all nationals over eighteen, registered in the municipality of Barcelona and in full enjoyment of their political rights, as well as resident non-nationals whose country of origin allowed Spanish nationals to vote in their own elections by virtue of a treaty.^[1][2][3]

Local councillors were elected using the D'Hondt method and a closed list proportional representation, with a threshold of 5 percent of valid votes—which included blank ballots—being applied. Parties not reaching the threshold were not taken into consideration for seat distribution.^[1][2][3] Councillors were allocated to municipal councils based on the following scale:

The mayor was indirectly elected by the plenary assembly. A legal clause required that mayoral candidates earned the vote of an absolute majority of councillors, or else the candidate of the most-voted party in the assembly was to be automatically appointed to the post. In case of a tie, a toss-up would determine the appointee.^[3]

The electoral law provided that parties, federations, coalitions and groupings of electors were allowed to present lists of candidates. However, groupings of electors were required to secure the signature of a determined amount of the electors registered in the municipality for which they sought election. For the case of Barcelona, as its population was over 1,000,001, at least 8,000 signatures were required. Electors were barred from signing for more than one list of candidates. Concurrently, parties and federations intending to enter in coalition to take part jointly at an election were required to inform the relevant Electoral Commission within ten days of the election being called.^[1][2]

Opinion polls

Results

← Summary of the 28 May 1995 City Council of Barcelona election results →

Parties and coalitions		Popular vote			Seats
		Votes	%	±pp	Total	+/−
	Socialists' Party of Catalonia (PSC–PSOE)	347,083	38.39	–4.56	16	–4
	Convergence and Union (CiU)	276,276	30.56	–3.50	13	–3
	People's Party (PP)	150,284	16.62	+6.83	7	+3
	Initiative for Catalonia–The Greens (IC–EV)	68,813	7.61	+1.19	3	±0
	Republican Left of Catalonia (ERC)	46,272	5.12	+2.55	2	+2
	Ecologist Alternative of Catalonia (AEC)1	3,304	0.37	–0.16	0	±0
	Democratic and Social Centre (CDS)	1,256	0.14	–0.70	0	±0
	Revolutionary Workers' Party (POR)	726	0.08	+0.01	0	±0
	Civic Platform–New Socialist Party (PC–NPS)	571	0.06	New	0	±0
	Workers' Revolutionary Party (PRT)2	376	0.04	–0.13	0	±0
	Platform of Independents of Spain (PIE)	320	0.04	New	0	±0
	Humanist Platform (PH)3	298	0.03	–0.77	0	±0
	European Nation State (N)	181	0.02	New	0	±0
Blank ballots		8,263	0.91	–0.01
Total		904,023			41	–2
Valid votes		904,023	99.78	+0.08
Invalid votes		2,015	0.22	–0.08
Votes cast / turnout		906,038	66.22	+10.71
Abstentions		462,110	33.78	–10.71
Registered voters		1,368,148
Sources[4][5][6][7]
Footnotes: 1 Ecologist Alternative of Catalonia results are compared to Green Barcelona totals in the 1991 election. 2 Workers' Revolutionary Party results are compared to Workers' Socialist Party totals in the 1991 election. 3 Humanist Platform results are compared to The Greens Ecologist–Humanist List totals in the 1991 election.

References