Conservative opponents of electoral reform have had to re-package their argument slightly.
Stuart Wilks-Heeg is the Executive Director of Democratic Audit
The stock Conservative argument in favour of ‘first-past-the-post’ (FPTP) is that it is the only system which produces clear and decisive electoral outcomes, thereby avoiding the need for parties to ‘haggle’ post-election; with FPTP producing precisely a situation in which the party leaders are forced to negotiate (in the way many voters would appear to like them to), Conservative opponents of electoral reform have had to re-package their argument slightly.
Over on Conservative Home, we are told by Jonathan Isaby that “we are currently witnessing the best advert against changing the electoral system”. Unfortunately, to make this new version of the argument work requires a re-writing of British political history. In Isaby’s view the current situation is “unprecedented” and “very much the exception to the rule”.
He goes on to claim that:
“First Past The Post has in the main always delivered a decisive result, with a Prime Minister re-appointed or turfed out within hours of the votes being counted.“
Even if we take a generous view, this claim only stands up if we take ‘always’ to represent 1945-2009. Even then, Isaby is skating on thin ice. The elections of February 1974 failed to produce a decisive result, as is well known. Moreover, wafer-thin majorities were returned for the Conservatives in 1950, and for Labour in 1964 and in October 1974. Fresh elections were called in 1951 and 1966, but were not an option after October 1974. The 20-seat majority which the Conservatives secured in 1992 was not sufficient to prevent John Major being held to ransom in Parliament by Euro-sceptics within his party, and had anyway disappeared by early 1997.
If we take ‘always’ to extend a little further back in history, then the picture is even more complex. Four elections in the early twentieth century failed to return a majority government – January 1910, December 1910, December 1923 and May 1929. There would almost certainly have been more, but for the formation of the National Government in 1931 and the outbreak of war in 1939. From 1910-1945, minority governments and coalitions were the norm, involving a great deal of inter-party negotiation. In short, the current situation is far from ‘unprecedented’.
The experience of the inter-war years tells us something of enormous importance. FPTP only delivers clear outcomes in a two-party system (and even then it is far from guaranteed). It was the emergence of Labour in the first half of the twentieth century which made ‘hung Parliaments’ commonplace (although nobody called them that at the time).
The re-emergence of the Liberals is now producing a similar effect in the early twenty-first century. From 1945-70, both Labour and the Conservatives could usually command at least 45 per cent of the vote. Neither party has been able to do so since 1974. Unless one of the three main parties is reduced to a rump, as the Liberals were in the immediate post-war years, then we are facing the prospect not only of general elections producing ‘hung Parliaments’ on a regular basis, but also of them producing seriously disproportional results. This is surely the worst of both worlds.
But disproportionality is not one of Isasby’s concerns. Instead, he goes on to argue that “proponents of proportional representation actually want to institutionalise the very confusion and chaos which we are currently witnessing”. His horror scenario is that electoral reform enabling “a small party to hold disproportionate sway – permanently, after every general election – as to which is the majority partner in the coalition government”.
We have to assume that, when Isaby says “a smaller party”, he does not mean the DUP – with whom Cameron would have preferred to do a deal, had the numbers added up. So this must mean he is referring to the Liberal Democrats – whose 6.8 million votes come in at two-thirds of the Conservatives’ total and four-fifths of Labour’s. By European standards, this is a very odd definition of a ‘small party’, which would normally be one with around 5-10 per cent of the votes cast.
If Isaby’s knowledge of British political history is a bit shaky, the same applies to his grasp on European politics. He suggests that PR would “give almost perpetual power to that smaller party, as has been the case for the German FDP over the decades”. The Germany example is only true for the period until 1997; the FDP were out of power for 12 years from 1997 and have only just returned to government as a junior coalition partner following last year’s national elections.
The German political system over the four decades from 1969-2009 shows that all sorts of combinations are possible – ranging from Social Democrats and Liberals (1969-82), Conservatives and Liberals (1982-97), Social Democrats and Greens (1997-2005) and Social Democrats and Conservatives (2005-2009). Coalition patterns have shifted as the balance of political views in the German electorate has changed.
Conservative opposition to PR is rooted in their fear that left-of-centre electoral reformers will be proved right, and it will tip the balance towards centre-left government in the UK, locking the Tories out of power for a generation or perhaps for longer. The current Lib-Con negotiations suggest this need not be the case, as does the experience in Germany and elsewhere.
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24 Responses to “Debunking the latest arguments in favour of first-past-the-post”
Carmen D'Cruz
RT @mattlodder: Debunking the latest arguments in favour of first-past-the-post: Our guest writer is Stuart Wilks-Heeg, Director, … http://bit.ly/96JXrT
Nicholas Buzzard
RT @mattlodder: Debunking the latest arguments in favour of first-past-the-post: Our guest writer is Stuart Wilks-Heeg, Director, … http://bit.ly/96JXrT
Modicum
@Daniel Harley
“Please, somebody explain to me how government by committe, decided by the smaller and less popular parties, policies decided on behind closed doors (as we see right now) is fairer!?”
I would agree that there are some advantages to single party government. What I actually feel is that the choice we’re presented with is a false dichotomy. It is not beyond the wit of man to devise a system based on single party government which does not have all of the manifest flaws of the single member plurality system (aka “first-past-the-post”).
I think even opponents of PR should agree that FPTP has big problems:
(1) It produces perverse results, such as a party being elect despite losing the popular vote (as happened 3 times in the last century)
(2) It creates safe seats.
(3) It leaves those who vote for smaller parties totally unrepresented.
(4) It allows a government that might be strongly opposed by a majority of voters.
The obvious alternative for single party government is a directly elected prime minister (i.e. switching to a presidential system but keeping the queen). The disadvantage is this could lead to gridlock between the prime minister and parliament.
Another option is a proportional system but with a set number of bonus seats for a “winning” party. Perhaps there could be a separate vote to chose which party wins. The current method is a very poor way of choosing a “winning” party.
The only reason we have FPTP is an accident of history. If it didn’t exist no-one would ever invent it as means of governing a modern democracy. But conservatives seem to think that it cannot possibly be improved upon.
Daniel Harley
@Modicum, thankyou for your response but, again whilst I note the flaws you present for FPTP, I cannot get my head around how the alternative really improves upon the situation.
Whilst FPTP is a product of history, it cannot be called an accident of it, and it does work, has worked, for a long time.
We either have common hung parliaments, in which the unarguable losing parties decide government, or we have FPTP in which a number of the electorate (albeit not all of it) decides. Isn’t the latter the most preferable.
What also concerns me is that I don’t think FPTP is to blame for safe seats. Safe seats are the product of the way in which this country’s population is divided, and they would not be abolished with PR, it would just mean some areas would be safe for the left wing parties and others the right.
I worked hard at this election, and we had some successes in my party down undoubtably to our hard work and determination in what has always been quite safe for Labour. Should our hard work go unnoticed by abolishing a system in which the person most favoured (locally) is not elected but forced to share with those who didn’t?
I do thank you howver for not greeting my clearly biased comments with hostility 🙂
Modicum
Thanks for reading my last long-winded post.
“FPTP …does work, has worked, for a long time.”
Three times in the last century the party that won most votes did not win most seats. If Labour had done a little better in this election they might have won most seats despite coming third. Personally I don’t think you can call that a system that works well.
“We either have common hung parliaments …or we have FPTP.”
This is really a false dichotomy. Any system in which all MPs are elected in single-seat constituencies will not produce common hung parliaments. So a change to a better single-seat system (such as the Alternative Vote, or the French Two Round system) should be something that advocates of one-party-government can support.
“I cannot get my head around how the alternative really improves upon the situation.”
I laid out 4 flaws that exist under FPTP. Actually they exist under any single-seat constituency system. The biggest problem is that when you have 650 separate, individual elections the overall result doesn’t match the overall national votes.
My suggestion is that while one-party-government may be desirable, single-seat constituencies are a poor way of achieving it. So we could use PR for the Commons but use a separate system to chose the Prime Minister, such as a direct election by the whole nation. I hope this is a bit clearer.
“What also concerns me is that I don’t think FPTP is to blame for safe seats.”
You’re partly right; in any system there will be popular politicians who are assured of re-election. STV is used in Ireland (North & South) and the experience is that while some seats are fairly safe, in every constituency at least a couple of seats are competitive. So an elector doesn’t feel that it’s a waste of time to turn up and vote. Believe it or not, a common complaint in the Irish Republic is that seats are too competitive.