Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has suffered a significant political setback after her government lost a key vote on electoral reform in the lower house of parliament. In a result that exposed deep fractures within her own coalition, MPs rejected a central amendment to the proposed new electoral law by 188 votes to 187 — a margin so thin in what was meant to be a safe parliamentary majority that it pointed to as many as 50 government-side MPs voting against the measure in a secret ballot.

The defeated amendment concerned preference voting, a provision championed by Meloni's party, Brothers of Italy (FdI), which would have allowed voters to choose up to three preferred candidates from within a party list. The broader electoral reform — still being pursued by the government — would scrap Italy's current mixed system, which allocates roughly 63 percent of seats through proportional lists and 37 percent through constituency contests. The new framework would move to a fully proportional model, but with a significant twist: any party or coalition securing more than 42 percent of the vote would receive a substantial seat bonus in both parliamentary chambers. Coalitions would also be required to campaign on a shared platform and a single prime ministerial candidate.

Meloni has defended the reform as a path to more stable governments — a persistent challenge in Italian politics — and had hoped to pass it through both houses before the summer recess. Critics, however, have called it an