Audience of One

Proportional Representation

In the 2005 United Kingdom parliamentary elections, the Labour party was re-elected with 55% of the seats, having won 35% of the vote. The Conservative party won 32% of the vote and now have 30% of the seats. The Liberal Democrats won 22% of the vote and now have 9% of the seats.

To put it another way: for every 1% of the votes won, Labour got 10 seats, the Conservatives got 6 seats, the Lib Dems got 3 seats and the Greens got no seats.

Draw your own conclusions on whether or not this is fair. There are alternatives to the first-past-the-post system currently in use, however. Proportional representation is the catch-all term for systems of voting that aim to produce a result based on the proportion of votes for each party. It would take too long to explain them all, so have a read of the Wikipedia article on proportional representation if you want. This entry is mainly written to discuss some of the objections to the PR systems.

Firstly, the argument goes that PR gives rise to unstable governments, made up of coalitions of parties. This may well be the case – a government that has a majority is going to have a lot less in-fighting, and will be able to get on with the job a lot more easily. However, stability isn’t necessarily what should be desired above all else. China and Cuba have stable governments, but not a stable democracy. What we should be looking for is a stable democracy as an ideal. Which is more important: democracy, or a stable government? You could argue either way, but it’s almost unnecessary as they’re not mutually exclusive. It is possible to have a stable democracy, but I think it’s more likely to happen under a system of proportional representation.

Another argument is that small parties may have the balance of power. If Labour and the Conservatives win 40% of the votes each, and the Lib Dems win 20%, the Lib Dems will have a lot of power. Which way they go decides the shape of the government. They have the power, yet with only half the number of votes as everyone else.

This is harder to counter, as this has been shown to be the case in other countries. However, which is better: a majority government made up of one party that’s elected by a minority (our current system) or a majority government made up of two parties that are elected by a majority? The Liberal Democrats may hold more power than their votes represent, but that’s the situation Labour is in at the moment – and the Lib Dems would still have to compromise with Labour. Also, under the same system, smaller parties like the Greens might fight with larger parties like the Lib Dems to make a coalition, meaning that they’d compromise more to gain the attention of the bigger party. I honestly don’t know, but still think it’d be better than our current system.

The final argument I’ll look into is about extremist parties. Under PR, extremist parties such as the BNP could potentially get in. Well, yes, they could. However, it’s the current system that is also keeping out parties such as the Greens, who have much more important things to say. I personally feel that having one or two BNP MPs (or even 10 or so UKIP MPs) is a small price to pay for having a better democracy overall. After all, if people are voting for them it would be undemocratic to exclude them, even if they are a bunch of racists. (It’s not like they could do much; none of the major parties would deal with them in coalitions – even the Conservatives wouldn’t sink that low.)

There are problems with PR systems, but I would argue there are more problems with our current system. As for me, the 1976 proposals mentioned in the Wikipedia article on the Additional Member System seem to be entirely sensible. AMS is already used (though I’m not sure with the 1976 changes or not) in Wales, Scotland and for the London Assembly. I would personally introduce it nationwide. The major advantage of this system is that it maintains the MP/constituency link. The major disadvantage is that it is possible for more MPs to be elected than you have a percentage to account for. (For more detail, read the Wikipedia articles on overhung seats and the Additional Member System (also known as mixed-member proportional).

Roll on electoral reform. And I haven’t even started on the House of Lords yet.

Matthew @ 17:28, May 12, 2005 to Discussions, Politics | Comments (8)