Should the Tories and Labour agree to implement PR to stop Farage becoming PM in the next election?

[JeremyVineyard]

There is a very real likelihood that Farage will win the next election Partly because of this countries outdated, first past the post election system.

Under PR(Proportional Representation) parties will usually get the same percentage of seats as their percentage of the vote.

With the electorate split 3 or 4 ways and a lot of people too disillusioned to vote, he could become PM with as little as 20% or 25% of the vote under first past the post.

Under PR Reform would get 20/25% of the vote and therefore get 20/25% of the seats.

If the Tories and Labour support a referendum on PR it will likely be passed as the other smaller parties will support it.

It may mean that the Tories and Labour need to form a coalition after the next election and while this may be hard to swallow, it would be for the greater good to stop the far right getting into power.
The Tories and Labour are both fairly centrist parties anyway so it makes more sense than the Tories and Reform getting into bed together.

Those very rich men don’t own one of the biggest social media outlets in the world.

Starmer would be better off helping out our more deprived communities and taxing the rich. Do what Labour should do. And maybe prosecute some of these disgustingly dog whistling racist rags for inciting racial hatred. Scumbags.

@SskkaI think the politicians do want change and prosperity for all. They just don’t always see how as their dogma gets in the way and they certainly have limited options. World events get in the way. The British public gets in the way. Reform can tinker at the edges but large scale reform won’t happen. Too many people would be howling. Look at winter fuel. Then look at pip. Then look at your list. I agree with it but changing anything will cause such a huge outpouring of bile - from people who would vote Reform.

Should say these children go through school without the help they need from schools When I had a child at school there was a pupil all through primary and secondary school no one wanted to sit near them No doubt they never got a job either

Much as I support PR, it won't happen before the next election.

Given they suggested that people from diverse backgrounds don’t contribute I’d say they’re on the bigoted side.

And don’t know how to punctuate.

Usually I’m not one for correcting people’s punctuation and spelling but when someone has such abhorrent opinions. I think it’s only fair to point out their intellectual inadequacies.

I don't generally blame the politicians, but right now they are prisoners of the system themselves. To take one problem I know a bit about—that human rights legislation has created an immigration system that we would never choose for ourselves—the solution is obvious but it's completely unimaginable that Starmer would go ahead and disapply human rights, because how could he? Pretty much the whole political class, and him in particular, have committed their careers to the idea that human rights are good, that internationalism is the ultimate in legitimacy, etc.

Other issues are similar, whether it's equal pay creating havoc in Birmingham, the third sector going off the rails on gender, criminal law being selectively enforced, university bloat or whatever – these problems are created by the things our politicians have believed in and upheld their whole careers. The public are howling for change but they cannot deliver, and I don't think it's solely because pain awaits the voters. If it was just that, wouldn't they sort out the enraging part of the immigration system? It's because they can't do it, they are stuck in the bad paradigm themselves.

I suppose I would make an exception and blame Blair and Brown for cheating by entrenching these systems. Britain's strength was its flexibility and they neutered it. This is the cost – a broken system and no way to change it without a massive rupture. That's what the surge in reform is telling us I would say.

To take a few of these issues: we have the system of government we have. There’s no evidence that dictatorships or communism are better. No overthrow of our political system will happen and we are not prisoners of our political system. What else would you favour? A Farage dictatorship? An absolute monarchy?

ECHR was founded by us amongst others. We have a Supreme Court and our law interpretation stops with them for nearly everything. We also win many cases af ECHR. We have signed up to refugee rules and so has nearly everyone else that matters. These are fairly standard commitments amongst western countries.

Equal pay for equal work is hardly new. That Birmingham Council were asleep and didn’t evaluate jobs is entirely their fault! Everyone else did respect equal pay legislation and not pay women less for work of equal value to men’s work. Saying the legislation is wrong is unbelievable! Are you a dinosaur?

The Police are not what they should be. I have some sympathy with that. They don’t apply law in the same way across all of society and their leaders need to ensure this happens.

I don’t see the great flexibility debate. Flexible at what? Ripping off unprotected workers? Lack of laws to protect workers health? No. I don’t want to go back there.

Neither do a I buy the broken system dialogue. Mostly it’s not. Mostly it should work. What has gone wrong is lack of clarity of direction. Deciding what’s important and sidelining what isn’t. No LA will save much by getting rid of an equality officer. That won’t get the potholes filled! Reform voters have no idea of how LA finance works. Shouting about minor areas they don’t like makes no difference to the social care budget. It’s selling a dream - or snake oil. Mostly to the financially illiterate.

Hysterical much?

For 50 years the borough I live in has had a fallow year every 4 years. Only now the tin foil hat thickie puddings have leapt onto it. Why is that?

But that's what we have, or have had. The Tories had a great majority under Johnson / Sunak, and Labour were a very weak opposition, and frequently voted alongside the Government. We now have a majority Labour government, that aren't making bold choices. Starmer was very weak and pathetic in opposition, and appears pretty weak in Government - and to me this feels like a Tory/Labour government anyway. Which ironically it doesn't have to be, because the Government could legislate and move quite fast if necessary. Even if we had a real Labour government given media opposition and support for Reform (that to me aren't even a serious political party) I doubt they would last two terms. The press would be much more critical. And any semi-radical change would likely see reversal. Corbyn wasn't even that radical but at least had the populace at heart. Reform is hardly a protest vote, it would be turkeys voting for Christmas. The Johnson years might even look tame by comparison, and that's a pretty bleak episode in the UK's political history. In terms of numbers it's wholly unfair that Reform don't get more representation. I've had the luck of voting for one MP I liked in one general election. Other times I've just had to hold my nose. I loathe FPTP with a passion. And as the Brexit vote and the US's 2024 shows you can be very close to the wire and end up dividing the entire populace down the middle. Coalition politics is suggested to be weaker, but just look at the UK for the last 15 years. Even majority governments are weak as piss.

@TizerorFizz

"Equal pay for equal work is hardly new. That Birmingham Council were asleep and didn’t evaluate jobs is entirely their fault! Everyone else did respect equal pay legislation and not pay women less for work of equal value to men’s work. Saying the legislation is wrong is unbelievable! Are you a dinosaur?"

The legislation is very clear that women and men should be paid the same salary for doing the same job. Equal pay for the same job.

What is different and new in the legal case that Birmingham City Council lost is the concept of "equal value " which is very subjective. Refuse collectors (or Bin men) the overwhelming majority of which were male were paid more than office cleaners and Teachers Assistants the majority of which were female.

The case was that Office Cleaners and Teachers Assistants were jobs of "equal value" to Bin Men despite clearly being different jobs.

This ruling took no account of the differences in the roles for example Bin Men is an outdoors role, physically more strenuous and has a greater danger risk to it than office cleaners or TAs. It also doesn't take into account whether it would be more difficult to recruit and retain Bin Men if they were paid the same as office cleaners.

It also brings into question the subjective decision on what is "equal value ". For example it could be argued that a cancer nurse working for the NHS is of "more value" than a legal professional in HR or an accountant working for the NHS, despite getting paid much less.

Equal pay for the same job is clear. Equal pay for different jobs that are subjectively viewed as "equal value" is far from clear.

@1dayatatime You are not correct. It was never equal job. Remember the Ford car seat makers case? Women workers got equal pay because their seat making work was of equal value to the men working in similar skilled roles elsewhere in the factory. Men didn’t make the seats so the women were considered to be of less value and paid less. The skills don’t need to be identical, they need to be of equal value.

Birmingham lost because they didn’t evaluate the jobs. They knew they needed to evaluate women’s and men’s roles to ensure they met the requirements of the legislation. Everyone else did - so why didn’t Birmingham? Of course there are techniques to compare. How do you think the Ford women won their case? The legislation has always been clear - it’s equal value, not identical skills or job. You don’t pay women less for “women’s work”. You evaluate the skills and then the value of the skills when compared within the workforce. You don’t pay women less who do work of equal value to men.

Hope that clears it up for you.

You do realise breakfast clubs give working parents the opportunity to drop there kids off at school early so that can go to work ..most ask for a small contribution. Otherwise those parents might not have joined jobs. The toast comment is just plain and simple heartless ....

I live in Scotland. The system here is a mixture of First Past the Post and a more proportional system (not quite PR but closer). I think it works well up here.

The problem I have with pure PR is it removes the link between MPs and particular constituencies.

I agree about the system used for the Scottish Parliament and the Senedd in Wales.

The system used for the Northern Ireland Assembly and the Dail Eireann in the Republic of Ireland keeps the constituency link, and also you can indicate a preference for one person in a party instead of another.

I m not heartless as mentioned above I ended up as a single parent I just don't believe there is really much need for breakfast clubs just my opinion I don't think there are many children whose parents can't afford breakfast If it is the case what about tea time and holidays ?I do though remember a girl who went through primary and secondary school smelling so bad others couldn't stand to sit next to her Why is that an issue for some children and no effort made to help I don't think there is any chance she would ever have got a job since

I admit I thought breakfast clubs were going to be free though and I think it's reasonable If it's paid for by parents

This is interesting

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/may/06/welsh-labour-first-minister-says-she-is-losing-patience-with-starmers-policies?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

Who is still voting Labour anyway? Absolutely hopeless. And the Tories wrecked everything.

What?

I'd still vote Labour, not because I like their policies, but because I feel if I don't, then that allows another of the parties to get in by proxy. Other parties that I think will do a worse job. I guess it's the best of a bad bunch. Awful.

Sounds like she's saying she will vote tory or reform and hopes they will stop employing disabled people because we don't contribute much. Along with other diversity hires which I guess includes women and ethnic minorities?

I actually can't abide this mindset. So if you don't want disabled people to have jobs, what does she propose the gov do? Pay them a living wage in benefits? I doubt it. So what's the outcome, they're homeless? What a worrying sentiment and a quite concerning look into the minds of tory/reform voters.

I'd be happier if political parties came up with decent policies that would attract public support, and won the argument against Reform, rather than trying to fiddle the rules to make them unelectable. A point that Farage would not be slow to make, of course. There too much of "I don't like it, therefore let's ban it" going on. The same could probably be said about the 'ban' on the AfD in Germany.

Changing the long term electoral system on account of one individual in one moment of time is ridiculous.

We had a referendum on PR only 12/13 years ago and it was rejected by a notable majority. That was the LibDem’s 30 pieces for enabling the Tories to take power, they had a say of the variety of PR and the wording on the questions and the majority required (only a simple majority, IMO constitutional change should need at least 2/3). They wanted a form of PR which would simmply turn a 2 party system into a 3 party system and give them the permanent balance of power - very Liberal and high minded I’m sure.

PR discussions also assume that people will vote the same way under PR that they do under FPTP. That flies in the face of experience. It also assumes that the parties remain the same. In reality FPTP historically has forced the two main parties to be broad coalitions up until the last few years. There is no reason to assume that won’t return over time.

I supported PR back in 2012 but was not in favour of the system the Liberals wanted.
I also have some sympathy for Barbara Castle’s argument - the two party system wasn’t perfect but it gave the winning party a real chance to implement a programme and real accountability for it. It also meant that with either party winning there would be a reasonably representative consensus on the winning side rather than extreme ends taking the balance and gaining disproportionate power.

If the two main parties want to take back power from Farage under any system then the Tories need to get their act together and revert to broad right coalition and Labour need to remember that not all their voters live in Islington and their older voters don’t all have generous final salary pensions.