In praise of first-past-the-post
With many labelling this year’s British election as historically unrepresentative, calls to reform or abandon the first-past-the-post system are ringing loudly. But the case against the UK system is deeply flawed – both factually and conceptually – and the alternatives on offer are even worse.
BRITONS had good reason to celebrate earlier this month, as Keir Starmer’s Labour Party put an end to 14 years of Conservative Party rule. But after saying good riddance to the Tories, many within the British establishment had a nagging feeling of guilt: perhaps Labour owed its whopping majority not to disgust with the Tories, but to the first-past-the-post (FPTP) electoral system.
Compared with the last election, Labour’s vote share went up by less than two percentage points (from 32.2 per cent to 33.8 per cent); yet it won 412 seats in the House of Commons, up from 203 the previous time. The Liberal Democrats also benefited mightily from FPTP, rising from 11 to 72 seats, even though their vote share was roughly constant. Contrast that with the fate of the far-right Reform UK party: it received nearly 600,000 more votes than the Lib Dems nationwide; yet it garnered only five seats.
With many labelling this as Britain’s least representative election result ever, calls for electoral reform are ringing loudly. But changing the system would be a big mistake. While critics claim that FPTP is a bad electoral system, the conventional alternative, proportional representation (PR), can be far worse.
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