To think that the election results don't add up?

You don’t understand how it works though, if you did you wouldn’t be asking the question.

Though a slightly bigger vote share.

I'm pointing out something a lot of people have got fuddled on; percent of the vote nationally is a meaningless statistic whether you have FPTP or PR. A candidate wins a seat by getting the largest share of the vote, or they don't. That is the same under both systems. The differences come in the formation of a government once the vote is in; one party (to rule them all) versus a coalition.

Yes, people might vote differently if we had PR. Or they might not. Either way, Reform could run a close second in every single seat and still not win a single seat in government.

Quite, it is simply to do with the fact that we have a representative democracy and it is where votes are cast that matters. National voting numbers are actually fairly meaningless because that is not how our election works. Why have the LDs done better than Reform - because they have targeted key seats and developed voter base in those seats. Reform have largely been a protest vote for disgruntled Tories who never had a hope of winning beyond a handful of target seats. In my constituency, reform just split the Tory vote but even if you combine Tory + reform they weren't enough to overcome Labour's vote.

It really does.

Is there something I'm missing or are you suggesting there's something more going on? Genuine question.

Yes it's quite ironic that you're using LDs as an example of benefitting from our voting system when they have long campaigned to change it.

Their attempts to change it did not work. You can't blame them for learning to play the game, which is what they've done by targeting seats not votes generally.

The fact that percent of votes won nationally and percent of seats won don't correlate has nothing to do with FPTP.

Would be interesting to look at each constituency and see where the Reform vote is localised.

Same for Labour, Conservative and Lib Dem.

If we had a different voting system, then I am sure vote shares would change as well compared to what is seen now

Thank you for saying this (I forgot the date!). If you don't like the way FPTP produces results, this was the chance. I realise there are now people within the electorate that couldn't vote then but ditto with Brexit and apparently we can't have a go-over there either!

If you're genuinely interested in understanding, and not just narked because "your" preferred party didn't get the result you want, definitely do some reading around political systems and how First Past The Post compares to proportional representation (PR). (Spoiler alert, PR has some serious drawbacks too.) But the fact that the national fraction of the vote a party got doesn't equate to the seats it won has nothing to do with FPTP. Everywhere, people vote for a representative from their direct area, and the person with the most votes is elected, because you can't elect part of a representative. It wouldn't matter if there were only two candidates in every constituency and Reform got 49% of the vote in every single one, thus winning 49% of the vote nationally; they would still have won 0 seats.

Yabu as you don't understand the FPTP system used as others have pointed out

Labour got 33.7% of the vote - just 1.6% up on Corbyn. The country didn't vote overwhelmingly for Labour. But that's the benefit of FPTP. You don't vote to elect governments.

Because back in 2011 when we had a vote on AV as a consession to the Lib Dems as part of the coalition the vote was just shy of 70% no. The Tories campaigned hard no.

Lib Dem’s, like Labour .. did a great job at identifying seats where a relatively small swing would win the seat and concentrated resources there. Lib Dem’s didn’t target my seat at all, got nothing off them.

Reform were a little disorganised, if they are to stay a party (I don’t think they will), they will learn to work under FPTP.

Exactly, if you know the system, it makes perfect sense and Labour got it right at last.

It's pointless analysing this outside the context of the FPTP system. A lot of people vote tactically or as a form of protest. I doubt Reform would have got the same share of votes if there was a chance of them gaining a significant number of seats. Labour, however, should take note.

I mean, I understand how it works

But do you? If you did, you wouldn't be saying they don't add up!

The Liberals really pushed for changes to the system towards proportional representation way back when but were defeated in the referendum. Of all people to blame, it isn't the liberals!

There was an interesting interview with one of the new Lib Dem MPs earlier this morning. The Lib Dems have long campaigned for PR as opposed to FPTP. But given that hasn't happened, this election they focused their efforts on winning seats not winning votes. That's how they got so many seats. Reform just don't have that level of historical time in local councils, resource and organisation.

Reform, like UKIP before them, can’t consolidate votes. Lots of votes/a large vote share doesn’t necessarily translate into lots of seats. It’s a foible of the system and one that has screwed NF over many a time.

Honestly, I do want PR, really I do, but this is one the few things that gives me pause. I know that FPTP isn’t very democratic but at least it keeps NF and co in check.

It’s how the First past the post system works. You’d be less pissed off if your lot got in!
Thanks god we don’t have p rep … though I don’t say that last time there was an election…

Labour has less total votes than Corbyn at the last election.

Just this. Locally, the votes determine the winner of the seat.
Then number of seats determine election outcome. Not number of votes.

That's the issue with the FPTP system. Although PR also has it's own cons.