To establish the winners, a quota for the district would be determined based on the number of valid ballots cast and the number of seats available in the district. All the votes would be counted and sorted by the voters' first preferences. Those candidates with enough first-preference votes to meet or exceed the quota are elected. A multiple-step vote counting and transfer process is then used to determine the winners of the remaining seats in the district, based on voters' secondary preferences. Although the mechanics of the vote-transfer process can be complicated, the general principle is that all votes should count, so that if a candidate is not elected, or has more votes than needed to be elected, the votes in question will be transferred to another candidate based on secondary preferences.