Arguments for the British system

UK Electoral Sytems

Introduction

In most democratic political systems, there is a range of different types of election, corresponding to different layers of public governance or geographical jurisdiction. Some common types of election are:

• Presidential election
• General election
• Primary election
• By-election
• Local election

Most electoral systems can be categorized as either proportional or unproportianal. Among the former are party-list proportional representation and additional member system. Among the latter are First Past the Post (FPP) (relative majority) and absolute majority

Electoral systems practised in the UK

The United Kingdom like most democratic countries has five distinct types of elections:

General

Local,

Regional,

European and

Mayoral.

Elections are traditionally held on Thursday. General and local elections do not have fixed dates, but must be within five years of the last election. Five different electoral systems are currently used: single member plurality system (First Past the Post, FPTP), Party list, Single Transferable Vote, Additional Member System and Supplementary Vote.

The United Kingdom continues to use FPTP, a plurality electoral system for national and local government elections in England and Wales. Scotland, Northern Ireland, the Republic of Ireland and New Zealand are examples of countries within the UK, or with previous links to it, which do not use FPTP.

First Past The Post

The Plurality electoral system (or first past the post electoral system), is a voting system for single-member districts. The name "first past the post" (abbreviated FPTP or FPP) is an analogy to horse racing; the system is also variously called winner-take-all or relative majority. In political science, it is known as Single-Member District Plurality or SMDP.. It is used in some former British colonies [1] and in 43 of the 191 countries in the United Nations.

Procedures

For election purposes Britain is divided into 646 areas, called constituencies; each constituency is represented by one Member of Parliament (MP) in the House of Commons.

MPs are elected in a general election and the leader of the party which has the most MPs in Parliaments becomes the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister must call a geheral election at least every five years.

Citizens who are 18 years old or older may vote in general elections, but voting is not compulsory. People who are not allowed to vote include members of the Royal family, members of the House of Lords, people serving prison sentences and some patients in mental hospitals.

Anybody over 21 can stand for election providing they are not discqualified for any reason – bankrupts, some clergy, members of the House of Lords and certain government employees are excluded. And anyone can form a political party.

There are currently two main parties – Conservative (right wing) and Labour (left wing). There is an influential centre party called the Liberal Democratic party. There are also nationalistic parties from Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales.

Each voter in a given electoral district selects one candidate. All votes are counted and the candidate with more votes than any of the other candidates is the winner. The winner represents the entire constituency, though the majority of people may have actually voted for other parties.

How can this happen? It is easier to understand if you look at what can happen in the individual constiturencies.

Election day

Each voter goes to a polling station in his/her constituency. There he/she is given a piece of paper (ballot) on which the names of the candidates and the parties they represent are printed (ref. the chapter “Ballot types”).i

The voter draws a cross(X) next to the candidate of his/her choice. When voting has finished, the votes are added up. Let us imagine that the results are as shown in the table

ADAMS CON	25,000
JOHNSON LDP	7,000
MAXWELL LAB	19,000
THOMAS nationalistic party for Wales	11,000

The winner is Adams, the Conservative candidate-even though the total of the votes for the other candidates was greater. Adams, then, will represent the constituency in the House of Commons. Note that this system does not require that the winner have a majority, but only a plurality It is easy to see that if this type of result is repeated in other constituencies, the make-up of the house of Commons will not necessarily accurately reflect the way that people voted across the country. This voting system is commonly called the first -past –the- post system or winner take all.

Ballot types

.The secret ballot is a relatively modern development, but it is now considered crucial in most free and fair elections, as it limits the effectiveness of intimidation.

Ballots can be of two forms. The simplest form is a blank ballot where the name of a candidate is written in by hand. A more structured ballot will list all the candidates and allow a mark to be made by a single candidate. (A ballot with a candidate list can include space for a write-in candidate as well).

Arguments for the British system

Many people in Britain, particularly supporters of smaller parties, argue that the first-past-the-post system is undemocratic because it is unrepresentative. Supporters of the system, however say that it is easy to administer and that proportional representation often leads to a coalition government – a government formed by an alliance between two or more parties neither of which has won a majority of seats in Parliament. This leads to a government for which no one specifically voted and could also therefore be said to be undemocratic; it also gives disproportional power to the smaller parties because they hold the balance of power and are therefore able to force the major parties to adopt their policies. This can lead to inefficient government and instability. At least the British system nearly always produces a clear winner and there is rarely any need for coalitions.

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