Liberal leadership vote: How it works

The Newfoundland and Labrador Liberal Party will pick a new leader Sunday at the end of its convention, using a new process.

It's similar to the process used this spring by the federal Liberals to select Justin Trudeau.

The new system — which was revised at the provincial party's annual general meeting last year — will "offer an open and democratic process for the election of the leader of the party," the Liberals said in a news release.

How it works

It's a preferential one-person, one-vote system that's weighted by provincial district.

Only registered voters can cast their ballots in the leadership election, and they have until Sunday at noon to do so.

They can cast their ballots online, by phone, or at any location by remote voting, or at a satellite voting station. Registered voters will mark their vote within their district.

A preferential ballot means each registered voter will rank the candidates in order of preference, from one to five.

Each district gets 100 points per count, for a province-wide total of 4,800 points for each count.

It doesn't matter how many voters there are in a district; the number of points up for grabs is 100.

Each candidate will be awarded a number of points per district, in line with the percentage of the first preference votes that they get. That number is then converted to points. (For example, if a candidate gets 20 per cent of the first preference ballots in a district, they'll get 20 points.)

Those points given to each candidate in the 48 districts across the province will be totalled, and that will be their result for the first count.

If a candidate hits the magic number of 2,401 points — 50 per cent plus one vote — or more on that first count, he or she will be declared the new provincial Liberal leader.

But if that doesn't happen, the votes will be tabulated on a second count.

Round two, and beyond if required

The candidates who receive the lowest number of points, or less than five per cent of the total points on the first count, will drop off.

If a voter's first choice was a candidate who didn't make it to the second round, the second preference on their ballot will be counted instead.

If no candidate gets 2,401 points or more on the second count, that means more counts will take place under this same process, until a winner is declared.