As someone who worked on the AV referendum campaign and for the Electoral Reform Society, I don’t write this article lightly. I have been on the coalface of attempts to change the voting system in this country on more than one occasion. But for some time now I’ve known something and been looking for the right way to say it: I actually think First Past the Post, the supposed “archaic” voting system we use for Westminster elections and local elections in England and Wales, is pretty good and is in some ways even the best system to use in many instances.
Let me back up a little here: I still believe that some sort of proportional system would be better to use in local elections in England and Wales. It’s used in Scotland, and I think has been pretty effective with no real downsides (unless you’re a Labour supporter and think that continuing to ignore of a huge chunk of Nationalist votes at local level would have prevented last May’s SNP deluge). I also think it would be good if we had a PR system at local level in England Wales given this: we want to devolve more things to a local government level. Great, I’m all for that. But under FPTP we often end up with one party states, places where Labour, the Tories (even the Lib Dems) end up with either 100% of the seats or thereabouts, on sometimes as low as half the vote. I think if we want local government to work effectively, we need decent oppositions in the cities – PR is the only way to get this withou a massive overhaul of the whole system (and even then, you’d probably still need a PR voting system).
But at Westminster, I actually think First Past the Post has definite advantages. Relevant to the age we live in, it keeps extremism at bay. Some electoral reformers talk endlessly about how the Tories got a majority with only 37% of the vote. Yet, if we’d had a proportional system in place, the most likely government would have been a Tory-UKIP coalition, which would have had just over 50% of the nationwide vote together. I don’t see that as a step up myself, and many centre-left voters who automatically see PR as more progressive should have a long, hard think about DPM Farage.
Another problem is that PR for Westminster can just sound like sour grapes. For instance, Caroline Lucas always going on about the Westminster voting system being “broken” or some other pejorative term. It feels a bit like, sorry to say, the Greens couldn’t break through under FPTP so now it’s time for a new voting system that will help them do better. Or then she talks about a Labour/Lib Dem/Green alliance. Putting aside the political realities standing in the way of that – if you want a “progressive majority” so badly, why don’t you just join Labour and fight for stuff inside of that party? In other words, if you like Corbyn so much, just go for it, Caroline – let’s look at the recent experience of coalition in Britain.
The last coalition may not have been to some tastes, but it was stable and it was effective at getting legislation passed. The Lib Dems thought if coalition could be shown to be functional over the course of a five year parliament, enough people would vote Lib Dem again in order to have another pluralist government. The Lib Dems were wrong about this, as May 2015 showed. And you can go on and on about tuition fees and what you see as the betrayals of the Lib Dems in government – you are only proving my point. The British people, and most pronouncedly in some ways now, those on the Left in Britain, are not prepared to accept coalition government. Given PR is almost guaranteed to produce coalition government in most instances, FPTP is the only way to go at Westminster level until the British public finds itself in love with coalitions (i.e. never).
Of course, it would be nice if we could have a grown up conversation about all of this. One where we could just admit that FPTP is necessary at Westminster level but all wrong for local government. Perhaps that’s the conversation I’m trying to start here.
Sorry Nick, utter tosh. We haven’t had a government that represented the majority view of the country for years. So what if the last election had delivered a Tory/UKIP coalition? If that was the will of more than 50% of the people in this country so be it.
FPTP has one – and only one – advantage. It delivers a local MP for constituents, but even then that MP often only represents the views of a minority.
FPTP isn’t fair. You point to the Greens, well why not point to the Liberal/SDP Alliance in 1983? Over 25% of the vote, within a whisker of Labour’s popular share, just 23 seats. Ultimately, FPTP suits both Labour and the Tories to the detriment of everyone else. It effectively says, vote for one of these two or your vote is wasted. It devalues people’s vote – in my case, back in 2005 voting Liberal Democrat was effectively one-quarter of a vote (1 seat for every 100,000 Lib Dem votes cast) compared to voting Labour (1 for every 25,000).
The mistake the Lib Dems made in the coalition was accepting such a pathetic alternative to FPTP, making it easy for the Tories and other anti-reformers to shoot it down in flames. That’s their fault, not a ringing endorsement of FPTP.
How about this as a compromise? 75% FPTP, 25% PR (as recommended in 1977). And rather than allow the parties to choose who gets elected through the 25% PR vote, why not devise a way to ensure the strongest second-placed candidates in each constituency get those additional seats, making for a more representational parliament and government without the ability for party machines to meddle? You can have a ceiling – 5% – to prevent smaller parties gaining a foothold, and you take the worse excesses of FPTP away.
To take one election as an example, this is what would have happened in 2005:
Labour 325
Conservative 201
Lib-Dem 82
Other 37
Labour majority 5
A far more representative sample of how people vote. FPTP as it stands is not the answer – and turning your back on electoral reform suggests to me you’ve given up on democracy. Or at least a version of democracy where we do what’s right, not what panders to some vague notion of “British public opinion”.
The last coalition had over 50% of the vote, so your argument is completely flawed.
Not really. The last government did have over 50% support but as the Lib Dems had far fewer seats than they deserved they didn’t have as much leverage as they should have.
Also a Lib Dem-Labour coalition would have been viable under PR in 2010. Lib Dem voters in 2010 were closer politically to Labour than Tories so I imagine that would have been the outcome.
Voters might have been, but the leadership wasn’t. Nick Clegg preferred doing a deal with Cameron than with Brown.
Sorry, but no. The FPTP system is inherently anti-democratic, disproportionately rewards parties for territorial concentration rather than broad appeal (think SNP vs. Lib Dems and UKIP at the last election) reduces accountability and is simply bad for governance. Worst of all, under the pressure of Duverger’s law, it reduces every issue to a binary one – my camp or your camp. Caroline Lucas isn’t in Labour because she has different political priorities and policies – and that’s OK. People should be able to express their support for her, and for a more complex set of political priorities generally. We aren’t all simply Labour or Tories, waiting to finally be reunited under the one big tent. This is before we get to the obscenity of a party being able to govern the country single handedly with a third of the vote. If your argument is simply ‘A Tory-UKIP coalition would have been awful’ you’re effectively saying ‘I really don’t like a certain party, so even though it got 13% of the vote we should rig the game to disenfranchise it’s voters.’ That’s certainly easier than doing actual politics and winning the argument, but it’s not a terribly morally defensible position. It’s also why the country at large is so hugely divorced from Westminster.
If people vote UKIP, or Green, they are entitled to political representation. It really is that simple.
Why? Under FPTP you are voting for a candidate and party that you KNOW will have zero representation in the government. It is a protest vote, and an impotent one at that.
Do the small number of people who vote Loony deserve representation? Or the inevitable Scientology Party that would be set up under PR? Or parties set up to promote interpretations of religion which are inimical to our hard-earned values and culture?
FPTP has [mostly] provided governments which are not ham-strung by pork-barrel deals with minor partners, by endless damaging internal politicking, and by watered-down legislative compromises which promise the earth but achieve nothing.
“Do the small number of people who vote Loony deserve representation? Or the inevitable Scientology Party that would be set up under PR?”
Yes!
Quite so, and it’s called democracy!
It is also worth pointing out that people who vote Loony must know their votes will be ineffective and many Loony votes are probably protest votes. If we had a voting system that made all – or even most – votes effective, fewer people might vote Loony.
I disagree about the hamstrung compromises bit – there have been plenty of pointless symbolic compromises that achieved nothing under our system, they were just ways of pacifying and resolving internal wrangles between supporters of the same party.
I can see you’re at risk of getting slated for saying this, and it’s – in a sense – pretty brave of you to do so.
Looking at some of the comments above, I don’t agree with those who say FPTP is inherently undemocratic – to me, that is imposing a particular meaning of ‘democracy’ and excluding all other outcomes.
However, I still don’t agree with you.
FPTP is not inherently evil, but it’s not inherently infallible, and there are other perfectly legitimate ways of doing things that – crucially – give the voter more choice.
I feel that if you are saying that FPTP works for national government whilst other, proportional systems (like STV) work for local government, you’re at risk of saying we need two different groups of political party – one lot that work at local level only, and one lot that work at national level only. Because to me, FPTP is effectively a 2 party system for most of the country, or at best a 2.5 and a bit party system. Heck, in Scotland it’s a 1 party system right now.
That’s not just about who gets to form the government; that’s about the choices voters get offered by their local parties. Parties who don’t think they’ve got a chance put up paper candidates – or no candidate at all – so people in certain areas are denied the right to choose whole swathes of the political spectrum.
I think voters both want and need more choice, there is just not a consensus on what is the right system to give them that choice.
I can get that having all seats elected by STV or by list PR may not be the way forward, and I can clearly see a viable parallel voting system in my mind that retained elements of FPTP (ideally alongside STV, for me).
But to say 100% FPTP is the best for Westminster and always the best for Westminster? Hmmm. I don’t – and can’t – follow you there.
“So what if the last election had delivered a Tory/UKIP coalition? If that was the will of more than 50% of the people in this country so be it.”
But of course no one at the last election voted for “Tory/UKIP coalition”. That option wasn’t on the ballot paper.
The problem with PR is that you can vote for a party you like and get a government you loathe. Of course, that’s what happened to many Lib Dem voters in 2010. And it’s quite possible for that government to have many policies that the majority of voters don’t support.
At least with FPTP the electorate tends to be presented with a reasonably clear choice, rather than being invited to vote for a pig in a poke.
“The problem with PR is that you can vote for a party you like and get a government you loathe.”
And the problem with FPTP is that you can be forced into voting for a party you don’t like, end up with a government whose policy agenda the majority of the country opposes, and still wind up with zero effective representation in parliament.
Again – there’s a reason virtually every other democratic state has abandoned FPTP as a worthless anachronism (while, interestingly, some of the post-Soviet states have embraced it – makes rigging elections easier).
“And the problem with FPTP is that you can be forced into voting for a party you don’t like, end up with a government whose policy agenda the majority of the country opposes, and still wind up with zero effective representation in parliament.”
Of course that kind of thing can still happen under FPTP (except that no one is forced to vote for anyone!). But generally it’s less likely to happen, because FPTP tends to foster a two-party system which offers the electorate a clear choice of the kind I mentioned. In contrast, a multi-party system and endemic coalition government is much more likely under PR.
As for effective representation in parliament – I voted Lib Dem in 2010, and what happened after that felt more like betrayal than representation.
“. But generally it’s less likely to happen, because FPTP tends to foster a two-party system which offers the electorate a clear choice of the kind I mentioned. In contrast, a multi-party system and endemic coalition government is much more likely under PR.”
That would be my point. To argue, particularly in the 21st century, that the nation can or should be roughly divided into two political camps is barmy. We’re a more complex society than that, and we need more complex representation as a result (not to mention lowering the ‘cost of entry’ means the established parties have to put more effort into maintaining the loyalty of their constituents and the feasibility of Corbynist entryism declines radically). As to the second point – so what? If no strand of political opinion can carry the majority of the country then politically representative elites should be able to compromise with one another.
I’m afraid I can’t share your emotions about the Lib Dems in coalition, mainly because I grew up in a country where coalition governments are the norm, people generally accept that this involves trade-offs and compromises and that the smaller parties don’t get to set the agenda. Frankly I find a lot of the ‘betrayal’ narrative has it’s roots in FPTP’s tendency to sort the electorate into two ‘sides’ and make electoral contests more about one’s particular team ‘winning’ or ‘losing’.
What if instead we thought of elections primarily as the means by which the state and society speak to one another, and by which society achieves representation in the state’s institutions? FPTP simply doesn’t have the structural ‘bandwidth’ to reflect the complexity and diversity of opinions out there in any meaningful way. So instead of a nuanced conversation we end up with ‘the Tories are all swine’ and ‘Labour wants to give your money to immigrants.’
“To argue, particularly in the 21st century, that the nation can or should be roughly divided into two political camps is barmy.”
Well, what happened in 2010 was that immediately after the general election the politicians divided themselves into two political camps for the next five years, without the electorate having any say in the process.
The virtue of a two-party system is that the groupings are clear before the election, and the choice is made by the electorate, not by politicians.
“Frankly I find a lot of the ‘betrayal’ narrative has it’s roots in FPTP’s tendency to sort the electorate into two ‘sides’…”
Frankly, I think that’s nonsense. Those who felt most strongly betrayed weren’t supporters of either of the two main sides.
As someone who joined the Lib Dems mainly due to opposition to Iraq and concerns about civil liberties, I never felt ‘betrayed’ at any point during the process. I’m sorry you’ve got a problem with coalitions, but that’s how most parliamentary democracies work. And I’m pretty certain the SNP would disagree with your analysis of the way the various forces shook out in parliament (as would the DUP and other parties in regions of the UK that are virtually invisible to the British establishment because they have political preferences that aren’t simply ‘Tory or Labour.’)
“But of course no one at the last election voted for “Tory/UKIP coalition”. That option wasn’t on the ballot paper.”
No but, with STV, it could have been and so could other options like a Tory/Lib Dem coalition, Labour/Lib Dem coalition or (in Scotland) a Labour/SNP coalition.
Voters themselves could have indicated with their later preference votes what kind of coalition they would have liked. it would not have been left entirely to politicians in smoke-filled rooms.
If a majority of Lib Dem voters had indicated with preference STV votes in 2010 that they would like a coalition with Labour, it would have been much harder for the Lib Dem leadership to go into coalition with the Tories or, indeed, the other way round.
Hi Nick,
Kudos to you for being brave enough to say what you think. But I’m astonished you should be saying this now.
The greatest potential problem with FPTP is that, if the big two move to the far left and far right, because the system punishes new parties so viciously, you could end up with a extremist party, even though that’s not what people want.
To some extent, this happened in the 1980’s.
If Corbyn retains control of Labour, and the Tories move towards the right, it’ll happen again. And it’s hardly surprising it should happen.
Most people want a centre-left or centre-right government. A new party of the left or of the right would get no where. So rightwingers and leftwingers have no incentive to form a new party, instead they join one of the big two. You can hardly blame them.
As party memberships have declined, UK political parties have become increasingly vulnerable to entryism from the extremes.
The disaster that is Corbynism would never have happened if there had been the safety value of a viable socialist party, to syphon off socialist members.
If Corbyn remains, and if the Tories move to the right as looks extremely likely, we’ll have a serious disconnect between public opinion, and the potential governments of the country. That’s a serious problem, and, if it doesn’t lead to one party ruling for 20 years, it’ll lead to enormous uncertainty as the political pendulum swings between the far left and the far right.
https://www.facebook.com/SocialDemocratGroup
I think you are both right and wrong.
A lot of the issues outlined do make FPTP problematic for national government. However, I think a lot of them have roots in the fact that the UK has been a FPTP system for so long.
If we switched to PR, in the long run voters would become more mature (and hence less outraged by coalition politics) and parties would evolve from 2+1/2 main one’s and a load of protests to a good number of meaningful parties across the political spectrum.
“As someone who joined the Lib Dems mainly due to opposition to Iraq and concerns about civil liberties, I never felt ‘betrayed’ at any point during the process. ”
That’s the impression I got from your previous comments.
But can you really not understand how many people would have seen – for example – secret courts as a betrayal of fundamental Lib Dem principles? Particularly bearing in mind that, as in so many other cases, it was presented by Nick Clegg not as the result of an unpalatable compromise, but as something to be supported wholeheartedly?
I have to say I find it ironic that those who lament political tribalism most loudly are often those least willing to give an inch, in terms of conceding the validity of differing points of view.
I can certainly concede there are many actions taken by the coalition government that I find deeply regrettable, and I thought the LD leadership’s attempts to pretend otherwise politically foolish. But I also recognise the Tories won the election (just) and the the role of the LDs in government was largely constricted to restraining their worst impulses.
If the country had an electoral system that acknowledged nearly a 1/4th of the country voted yellow in 2010, and allocated the seats accordingly, the outcomes and the level of Lib Dem influence would have been different. But it doesn’t and they didn’t.
Well, it’s a fair point that things would work differently under PR. And hung parliaments under FPTP have been so uncommon that the Lib Dem bargaining position in 2010 was no doubt further weakened by the expectation that in a further general election one of the other parties would probably have won an overall majority.
But I think proponents of coalitions would do better to come up with suggestions for new ways of running them, which would allow junior partners to retain their separate identities – something the Lib Dems lost several years ago and haven’t yet recovered. If there ever is another coalition government in our lifetimes, why should it be bound by a Victorian concept of collective responsibility?
However, I think a better way to go would be working towards sortition, and ditching professional politicians altogether – or relegating them to the position of the people’s servants.
I just checked the date….its not April 1st is it?? Nick….I’m speech less have you ‘lost it’.??
As a Liberal I believe in fairness FPTP IS NOT FAIR. PR systems are mostly better/fairer.
Nick,
You and I were colleagues campaigning for that “miserable little compromise” of AV in 2011, which would have been a step on the way to fuller reform and I am delighted you still support electoral reform for local government elections in England and Wales. I agree with you that the number of local one-party “states” makes that imperative.
I am not going to join the chorus of disapproval taking you to task for supporting FPTP now for Westminster elections. Instead, I suggest you campaign whole-heartedly to reform local government elections in England and Wales.
When that is achieved, we can then see whether it is such an improvement that we should go on to campaign to change the way we elect MPs. You may disagree now, but I think it will be a vast improvement and the case to reform parliamentary elections will be even more unanswerable than it is now.
Kind regards,
Anthony.
PR results in Governments that have an excuse for not preforming their manifestos.
Other than the odd anamoly FPTP provides strong government and accountability.
FPTP is neither the most democratic system nor is it the worst.
Personally I would keep FPTP in Commons and reform Lords to remove appointments and just have AV rep with less members than present. Keep PA 1911/49.
“Other than the odd anamoly FPTP provides strong government and accountability.”
Not true. It massively raises the cost of entry and creates hundreds of ‘safe’ seats in which the incumbent has virtually no chance of ever losing. This in turn encourages misbehaviour and entitlement, ala the expenses scandal.
“FPTP is neither the most democratic system nor is it the worst.”
Also not true. In terms of electoral systems used by functioning democracies FPTP consistently produces results at odds with the national will (see – Thatcher in 83, the Harper Government, GOP control of House of Representatives despite losing popular vote in 2012).
I am slightly shocked by your conclusions which I really can’t support.
Had the 2010 Parliament been elected by a proportional system, Lib Dems would have had just under 3 times as many MPs and their collective voice within the Coalition would have been much stronger.
I think that it is incumbent on a democratic system to give people as close to the Parliament they asked for as is humanly possible. First past the post doesn’t do that. How can it be right that one party can win 95% of the seats on 50% of the vote?
My commitment to a proportional system that gives voters most choice is unwavering.
These points in order:
1 – Under PR, someone I dislike might have got in.
Yeah, that’s called “democracy”. If he’s really concerned, rather than speculating about how an election in the UK might have gone with very different parameters, look around the world and see if extremism is a huge problem in the many, many PR systems.
2. Pointing out the issues with FPTP is “sour grapes”
What
3. PR distracts people from joining my favoured Party.
Labour has a monopoly on “anti-Tory”; Conservatives a monopoly on “anti-Labour”. Monopolies are not good. Free choice is better, sorry
4. PR leads to Coalitions and Britain hates Coalitions
Anecdote alert – I’ve met a lot of people who wanted the Coalition to continue, but were worried that Miliband would get in – so voted Tory. I’ve seen several reports of similar.
And if Britain hates Coalitions, Britain can simply give one Party a majority of the vote, if it so chooses.
Its real message is “I only supported PR because I believed the myth of a “progressive majority. It turns out the will of the people was different to my belief; I no longer support the will of the people”. If so, you can call yourself many things, but not democratic.
Looking back at the comments on this thread, I think Nick has hit on something and the reaction to it is interesting and worrying.
I really don’t think Nick is right that 100% 1-seat FPTP is right for Westminster, as I said above.
But do I think Nick is right that based on the current impasse backed up by resistance to change of some elements, any voting system will need to retain an element of FPTP in some way somewhere to achieve a meaningful compromise that will be sellable to the political players and the country as a whole.
The furious force of those whom I agree with, who will not accept that anyone could find FPTP acceptable at all and be called a democrat, is not going to produce meaningful compromise and will end up still leaving us with what I do consider to be a seriously flawed constitutional settlement.
You’re all wrong. FPTP and PR are BOTH undemocratic: they are both just a way of electing a dictator. They are a red herring. Direct Democracy is the only answer; then it doesn’t matter who gets elected!
Of course whether you elect MPs by FPTP or STV – the Government will get in, and multi-national corporations will be in power!
Makes me wonder why Nick Tyrone is still a member of the Liberal Democrat Party. Isn’t electoral reform fundamental to party policy. Also I have noticed his blog entries becoming increasinging neo liberal and with an elitist attitude towards the poor and the working class.
To everybody, please look at the big picture and note that it needs rehanging. If 13%of the voters chose UKIP and another 22% voted Museli Eaters Alliance then this should be reflected in Parliament as it is what the British public voted for . Any form of pr ,be it STV,party list or AMS must be better for democracy than the current system. Surely it is better to vote for a small vibrant party with a clear message even if it has announced its intention to join a coalition and KNOW that your vote means something. Or would you rather vote for one of two parties that are riddled with infighting and driven by their own desperate need for as much power as they can get ,dominated by their own self intrests and not caring one jot about the British electorate? They both know that they cannot win a majority of the vote so they cling to this broken down outraged system that keeps them in power regardless of how the public voted.