Registered 2,405,455 3.2% 25 October 2006 26 January 2007 21 seats, 36.7% 4 seats, 7.2% | 16 October 2002 25 October 2006 30 seats, 51.3% 21 seats, 36.7% Date 27 May 2007 | |
 | ||
Turnout 1,585,402 (65.9%)
3.0 pp | ||
The 2007 Madrid City Council election was held on Sunday, 27 May 2007, to elect the 8th Madrid City Council, the unicameral local legislature of the municipality of Madrid. At stake were all seats in the City Council, determining the Mayor of Madrid. The number of members increased from 55 to 57 compared to the previous election.
Alberto Ruiz-Gallardón's People's Party (PP) went on to win the largest victory achieved by a candidate in a municipal election in Madrid to date, with over 55% of the votes and nearly 60% of the seats. The Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE) plummeted barely above 1995 levels, while United Left (IU) recovered from its negative result in 2003 and gained support for the first time since 1995.
Electoral system
The number of seats in the Madrid City Council was determined by the population count. According to the municipal electoral law, the population-seat relationship on each municipality was to be established on the following scale:
Additionally, for populations greater than 100,000, 1 seat was to be added per each 100,000 inhabitants or fraction, according to the most updated census data, and adding 1 more seat if the resulting seat count gives an even number. As the updated population census for the 2007 election was 3,128,600, the Madrid City Council size was set to 57 seats.
All City Council members were elected in a single multi-member district, consisting of the Madrid municipality, using the D'Hondt method and a closed-list proportional representation system. Voting was on the basis of universal suffrage in a secret ballot. Only lists polling above 5% of valid votes in all of the municipality (which include blank ballots—for none of the above) were entitled to enter the seat distribution.
The Spanish municipal electoral law established a clause stating that, if no candidate was to gather an absolute majority of votes to be elected as mayor of a municipality, the candidate of the most-voted party would be automatically elected to the post.