FPTP doesn't work - time to reform it

[twodowntwotogo]

There's such a wild mismatch between % of the vote and the actual result - the most extreme ever. It makes for a 'cleaner' outcome but given the mutli-party system, isn't it time to move to proportional representation as more democratic? Thoughts? (I'm all for it but would be interested in hearing if anyone seriously champions FPTP).

I'd love PR. But in the scheme of things we need to fix as a country I'd put it quite far down the priorities.

Perhaps we need to fix the way we're governed first.

Our biggest issue is an unelected upper house. Totally undemocratic. We need to be able to elected a second chamber and get rid of the HOL.

Well Labour would have had my vote upping their share but I had to vote tactically. I am sure I am not alone.

It will be interesting to see how far Starmer goes on reform of HOL, I am a bit disappointed the manifesto was not clearer and more ambitious on the subject.

I do think the answer may lie in an elected upper house by PR, with a different term length.

Agreed. Fptp only works when there are two parties. Now there are so many and they're getting roughly 15% of votes it means the craziness we have today - a ruling party that was only voted for by 1/6th of the population.

I actually think they should get rid of constituency MPs. Very few of them actually represent their communities unless they're really good. I've lived all over the country and so many of my MPs have been invisible in the community

It's crazy really.

In 2017 Corbyn won 12.9m votes. In 2019 he won 10.3m votes. Yesterday, Starmer won 9.7m votes. Such is our system.

I wanted the tories out, so I'm not unhappy about the result. But I would also rather we had more proportional representation, and that the UK was less terrified of coalitions.

@Shortfatsuit

"It's about prioritising mainstream views over extreme fringe ones, whether that's extreme right, extreme left, fundamentalist religious parties or whatever"

Sure but who gets to decide what are extreme fringe views and what are mainstream views?

And what's to stop a politician standing on a mainstream view but then becoming an "extreme fringe " view after being elected or vice versa.

It's a democracy and the reality is that some people will want to vote for parties that you wouldn't want to vote for.

I am equally concerned about the hard left's loose interpretation of democracy as I am about the hard right's interpretation.

Yes, NI - as part of the UK left the EU in 2020. It didn't want to. But there you go. One of the strengths of being in a union is you can be safely ignored if you aren't an equal.

And no-one with a working brain and straight face has ever claimed the UK is a union of equals.

That is true. We had a great MP and the previous MP was just as good. I have turned to them for help on a couple of occasions and they were supportive and very quick to reply. They were both Conservatives, I'm not but voted for them because of who they are. Due to tactical voting we now have a LibDem MP, first time in over 100 years this constituency hasn't had a Conservative MP. I hope they are as good as their predecessors.

Who gets to decide what are mainstream views and what are fringe views?...Well, the electorate, obviously! Surely that's the whole point!

Your question suggests that you don't really understand the point that I was making because it doesn't make any sense!

I'm not pretending noone supported it. I voted yes at the time.

Bit it doesn't change the fact that the overwhelming majority (adding up no-shows and no votes) didn't want the change at the time.

I can't see the benefit of turning this into another Scottish independence referendum where we just keep voting until we get the answer that someone in power wants. Regardless of the voting system, there are strategies and tactics all parties employ to maximise efficiencies of gain

Ireland has PR. We vote directly for our own representatives for the constiuency, not off a country wide list or for a party. Though like the uk most people vote for the party, not the candidate. Unlike the uk, there is little or no parachuting in to safe seats. TDs run for election where they live. Each constituency has its own PR, and has 3, 4 or 5 TDs to represent it.

I voted Labour. I’m delighted with the outcome of the election but still firmly pro-PR. I sincerely hope that the new government don’t get so dazzled by their enormous majority that they miss the fact that the left of British politics is generally more crowded and suffers more from their vote being split than the right. What happened with reform yesterday is unusual and it might not last. If reform fizzle out or there’s some sort of Tory-Reform deal then we will be back to conservatives winning elections comfortably despite the combined progressive vote (Labour, Lib Dem, Green and the nationalist parties) being consistently higher than the vote on the right.

I’m not afraid of coalitions. Political compromise is not a bad thing. In terms of the constituency link, that can be preserved by using STV in modestly sized multi-member constituencies.

AV is not a proportional system (not even semi-proportional). I don’t see how rejecting a majoritarian system at a referendum has any bearing on a debate about proportional representation. They aren’t the same thing.

This.

And I don't believe the different parties would actually pull together for the good of the country. It would just be arguments and pettiness and nothing would ever get done

Who’s the, ‘hard left’, did a communist party stand somewhere and win seats!!

T

But the % of votes seen now is thrown by tactical voting.

There is no way to prove the vote share would be what it is in a PR situation. A lot of people voted tactically and not for their party of choice.

The Labour vote would have been higher in a PR situation in most of the South West, but they've had to vote tactically Lib Dem...

Exactly! One of the joys of PR is that you don't have to go for a protest vote, you can just vote for who you want to. Also, you don't have to vote tactically.

I'm thoroughly in favour of PR, it's just noticeable that, until now, right wing parties were always absolutely adamantly against it.

Hypocrisy is never an edifying look...

Might be a stupid question but how would PR work with representing an area. I’m from up North and would worry that there would be no one speaking up for the specific issues in my area. We’ve spoken about levelling up but would it mean taking away any sort of voice for specific areas?

STV in moderately sized multi-member constituencies would keep the tie between the MP and constituency, whilst improving proportionality significantly.

And that's fair enough, but it would be wrong not to acknowledge that representatives would have to cover much larger areas than our current constituencies would. That might not be an issue, but it's worth considering - the close connection that currently exists between an MP and their constituency would probably be diluted.

Assuming the same vote. You can’t assume that though. Lots of people voted reform because they wanted to get a Tory out. Lots of a lib Dems voted Labour to get a Tory out. Lots of Labour supporters voted Lib Dem to get a Tory out. And so on. With these votes, yes,Reform would have more seats, but you really can’t assume that would have happened in a PR election.

I agree with this to an extent, but it's like everything else, you have good constituency MPs and poor ones. DH and I needed help with something a few years ago and there was a poor response from 2 of 5. But two were helpful and one of the 5 played a blinder. With one MP per constituency, if they don't help, what can you do?

In Ireland you have 3-5 TDs representing your constituency, depending on its size. These are nearly always people who grew up and live in the constituency.

It's my understanding that we had a referendum on changing our voting system 13 years ago and as you know once you've had one of those you are stuck with the result forever more.