2008 Spanish general election


A general election was held in Spain on Sunday, 9 March 2008, to elect the members of the 9th Cortes Generales under the Spanish Constitution of 1978. All 350 seats in the Congress of Deputies were up for election, as well as 208 of 264 seats in the Senate. It was held concurrently with a regional election in Andalusia.
The surprise victory of the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party at the 2004 election, amid the public shock caused by the 11M Madrid train bombings, had led to an increase of bipolarisation in Spanish politics, with the opposition People's Party under Mariano Rajoy and right-wing media embracing conspiracy theories about the blasts' authorship and motives while engaging in a strategy of rising tension and street protests against the new government. One of the first measures adopted by Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero was the withdrawal of Spanish troops from Iraq, which caused a downturn in relations with the U.S. administration of George W. Bush. This period saw the implementation of same-sex marriage in Spain, express divorce, measures fostering women's rights and the fight against gender-based violence, as well as the Historical Memory Law recognizing the victims of political repression during the Spanish Civil War and the Francoist dictatorship.
Zapatero's decision to engage in talks with the separatist group ETA—after three years of relative calm and a ceasefire in March 2006—was not without controversy, and the government was forced to halt all negotiations following the Madrid–Barajas Airport bombing in December that year. The PSOE government also attempted to enforce a policy of reform of the regional statutes of autonomy, with the issue of the 2006 Catalan statute being the most controversial: its curtailment in the Cortes Generales caused the downfall of regional president Pasqual Maragall's cabinet and an appeal to the Constitutional Court being filed by the PP. Although Zapatero's first term saw a continuation of the economic growth of previous years, the growing property bubble in housing prices and a multinational subprime mortgage crisis started showing symptoms of a potential real estate and financial crisis by late 2007.
The electoral outcome saw a record result for both PSOE and PP, which combined amounted for more than 83% of the vote share and 92% of Congress seats. The PSOE benefitted from tactical voting against the PP—at the cost of peripheral nationalist parties, such as Convergence and Union, Republican Left of Catalonia, the Basque Nationalist Party or Aragonese Union, falling to historical lows of popular support—and emerged as the most-voted party just seven seats short of an overall majority, which allowed Zapatero to be sworn in for a second term in office in April 2008. On the other hand, Rajoy's PP saw an increase in its vote share and seat count, but remained unable to overtake the Socialists. United Left had its worst general election performance ever with less than 4% of the share and 2 seats, whereas the new Union, Progress and Democracy party—founded by former PSOE member and leadership contender Rosa Díez—became the first nationwide party aside from PSOE, PP and IU securing seats since the Democratic and Social Centre was left out of parliament in 1993.

Overview

Under the 1978 Constitution, the Spanish Cortes Generales were envisaged as an imperfect bicameral system. The Congress of Deputies had greater legislative power than the Senate, having the ability to vote confidence in or withdraw it from a prime minister and to override Senate vetoes by an absolute majority of votes. Nonetheless, the Senate possessed a limited number of functions—such as ratification of international treaties, authorization of collaboration agreements between autonomous communities, enforcement of direct rule, regulation of interterritorial compensation funds, and its role in constitutional amendment and in the appointment of members to the Constitutional Court and the General Council of the Judiciary—which were not subject to the Congress's override.

Electoral system

Voting for each chamber of the Cortes Generales was on the basis of universal suffrage, which comprised all nationals over 18 years of age and in full enjoyment of their political rights, provided that they were not sentenced—by a final court ruling—to deprivation of the right to vote, nor being legally incapacitated.
The Congress of Deputies was entitled to a minimum of 300 and a maximum of 400 seats, with the electoral law setting its size at 350. 348 members were elected in 50 multi-member constituencies—corresponding to the provinces of Spain, with each being allocated an initial minimum of two seats and the remaining 248 being distributed in proportion to their populations—using the D'Hondt method and a closed list proportional voting system, with an electoral threshold of three percent of valid votes being applied in each constituency. The two remaining seats were allocated to Ceuta and Melilla as single-member districts and elected using plurality voting. The use of the electoral method resulted in a higher effective threshold based on the district magnitude and the distribution of votes among candidacies.
As a result of the aforementioned allocation, each Congress multi-member constituency was entitled the following seats:
SeatsConstituencies
35Madrid
31Barcelona
16Valencia
12Alicante, Seville
10Málaga, Murcia
9Cádiz
8A Coruña, Asturias, Balearic Islands, Biscay, Las Palmas
7Granada, Pontevedra, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Zaragoza
6Almería, Badajoz, Córdoba, Girona, Guipúzcoa, Jaén, Tarragona, Toledo
5Cantabria, Castellón, Ciudad Real, Huelva, León, Navarre, Valladolid
4Álava, Albacete, Burgos, Cáceres, La Rioja, Lleida, Lugo, Ourense, Salamanca
3Ávila, Cuenca, Guadalajara, Huesca, Palencia, Segovia, Teruel, Zamora
2Soria

208 seats in the Senate were elected using an open list partial block voting system: in constituencies electing four seats, electors could vote for up to three candidates; in those with two or three seats, for up to two candidates; and for one candidate in single-member districts. Each of the 47 peninsular provinces was allocated four seats, whereas for insular provinces, such as the Balearic and Canary Islands, districts were the islands themselves, with the larger being allocated three seats each, and the smaller one each. Ceuta and Melilla elected two seats each. Additionally, autonomous communities could appoint at least one senator each and were entitled to one additional senator per each million inhabitants.
The law did not provide for by-elections to fill vacated seats; instead, any vacancies that occurred after the proclamation of candidates and into the legislative term were to be covered by the successive candidates in the list and, when required, by the designated substitutes.

Eligibility

Spanish citizens of age and with the legal capacity to vote could run for election, provided that they were not sentenced to imprisonment by a final court ruling nor convicted, even if by a non-final ruling, to forfeiture of eligibility or to specific disqualification or suspension from public office under particular offences: rebellion, terrorism or other crimes against the state. Other causes of ineligibility were imposed on the following officials:
Other causes of ineligibility for both chambers were imposed on a number of territorial-level officers in the aforementioned categories—during their tenure of office—in constituencies within the whole or part of their respective area of jurisdiction, as well as employees of foreign states and members of regional governments. Incompatibility provisions extended to the president of the National Commission on Competition; members of RTVE's board and of the offices of the prime minister, the ministers and the secretaries of state; government delegates in port authorities, hydrographic confederations and toll highway concessionary companies; presidents and other high-ranking members of public entities, state monopolies, companies with majority public participation and public saving banks; as well as the impossibility of simultaneously holding the positions of deputy and senator or regional legislator.
The electoral law allowed for parties and federations registered in the interior ministry, alliances and groupings of electors to present lists of candidates. Parties and federations intending to form an alliance ahead of an election were required to inform the relevant electoral commission within ten days of the election call, whereas groupings of electors needed to secure the signature of at least one percent of the electorate in the constituencies for which they sought election, disallowing electors from signing for more than one list of candidates. Amendments to the electoral law in 2007 introduced requirements for a balanced composition of men and women in the electoral lists, so that candidates of either sex made up at least 40 percent of the total composition.

Election date

The term of each chamber of the Cortes Generales—the Congress and the Senate—expired four years from the date of their previous election, unless they were dissolved earlier. The election decree was required to be issued no later than the twenty-fifth day prior to the scheduled date of expiry of parliament and published on the following day in the Official State Gazette, with election day taking place on the fifty-fourth day from publication. The previous election was held on 14 March 2004, which meant that the chambers' terms would have expired on 14 March 2008. The election decree was required to be published in the BOE no later than 19 February 2008, with the election taking place on the fifty-fourth day from publication, setting the latest possible date for election day on Sunday, 13 April 2008.
The prime minister had the prerogative to propose the monarch to dissolve both chambers at any given time—either jointly or separately—and call a snap election, provided that no motion of no confidence was in process, no state of emergency was in force and that dissolution did not occur before one year had elapsed since the previous one. Additionally, both chambers were to be dissolved and a new election called if an investiture process failed to elect a prime minister within a two-month period from the first ballot. Barring this exception, there was no constitutional requirement for simultaneous elections to the Congress and the Senate. Still, as of, there has been no precedent of separate elections taking place under the 1978 Constitution.
In November 2007, it was announced by Andalusian president Manuel Chaves that he had agreed with Zapatero to hold the regional election in Andalusia simultaneously with the 2008 Spanish general election in March. The Cortes Generales were officially dissolved on 15 January 2008 with the publication of the dissolution decree in the BOE, setting election day for 9 March and scheduling for both chambers to reconvene on 1 April.

Outgoing parliament

The tables below show the composition of the parliamentary groups in both chambers at the time of dissolution.

Parties and candidates

Below is a list of the main parties and electoral alliances which contested the election:
In the Canary Islands, an alliance was formed between New Canaries and Nationalist Canarian Centre, two splinter groups from Canarian Coalition. In the Valencian Community, Valencian People's Initiative —splinter from United Left of the Valencian Country —joined a coalition with the Valencian Nationalist Bloc and The Greens–Ecologist Left of the Valencian Country. Unity for the Isles, an electoral alliance based in the Balearic Islands, was formed by PSM–Nationalist Agreement, Majorcan Union, Republican Left of Catalonia, Agreement for Majorca and The Greens of Menorca.

Timetable

The key dates are listed below :

Campaign

Party slogans

Although the official electoral campaign period in Spain only lasts for the 15 days before the election,, many parties, especially the PP and PSOE, start their "pre-campaigns" months in advance, often before having finalised their electoral lists.
The first phase campaign was done under the slogan "Con Z de Zapatero", a joke based on the Prime Minister and socialist candidate's habit of tending to pronounce words ending with D as if they ended with Z. The campaign was linked to terms like equality or solidarity, emphasizing the policies carried out by the current government. The second phase was done under the slogan "La Mirada Positiva", emphasising the future government platform, and "Vota con todas tus fuerzas", aiming to mobilize the indecisive or potentially abstaining voters. Another common slogan through all the campaign was "Motivos para creer".
For the pre-campaign the PP used the slogan "Con Rajoy es Posible". Usually emphasizing PP's campaign proposals, such as "Llegar a fin de mes, Con Rajoy es Posible". IU accused PP of copying its slogan from the last municipal elections
IU chose the pre-campaign slogan "LlamazarES + Más Izquierda", calling attention to their position as the third national party.

Events and issues

The economy became a major campaign issue due to a number of factors:
  • A slowing down in the housing market, with prices even beginning to fall in some areas.
  • Sharp increases in prices of some basic commodities.
  • Global instability as a result of market uncertainty.
  • A rise in unemployment.
The sudden emergence of the economy as a political issue came after several years of steady economic growth, and led some observers to suggest that maybe the government would have benefitted from calling an earlier election. In addition to those factors both the PP and the PSOE made competing proposals on taxation.

Election debates

;Opinion polls
DebatePolling firm/CommissionerPSOEPPTie-
DebatePolling firm/CommissionerTie-
21 FebruaryTNS Demoscopia/Antena 347.437.0–15.6–
25 FebruarySigma Dos/El Mundo45.542.0––12.5
25 FebruaryMetroscopia/El País46.042.012.0––
25 FebruaryOpina/Cuatro45.433.48.2–13.0
25 FebruaryInvymark/laSexta45.730.124.1––
25 FebruaryTNS Demoscopia/Antena 345.439.3–15.3–
3 MarchSigma Dos/El Mundo49.040.2––10.8
3 MarchMetroscopia/El País53.038.09.0––
3 MarchOpina/Cuatro50.829.013.4–6.8
3 MarchInvymark/laSexta49.229.821.0––
3 MarchCIS53.321.56.915.82.5

Voter turnout

The table below shows registered voter turnout on election day, without including non-resident citizens.