What is d'Hondt and how do we use it at the Assembly?

Unless you're an electoral systems nerd, you've probably never heard the name d'Hondt. And you're probably not alone. Even though it's used in many countries around the UK and internationally, it still seems to be a little-known electoral system. 

D'Hondt is a mathematical method for allocating parliamentary seats, designed for use in party-list proportional representation systems. It was developed by Belgian mathematician Victor d'Hondt in 1878. The Assembly use it to work out each party's entitlement to Ministers based on the number of seats they've won in the Assembly election.

It can get quite complicated. But to demystify process the Assembly's Education Service created this animation.

The Assembly & Executive from NI Assembly on Vimeo.