Electoral Reform In Britain

Electoral Reform In BritainElectoral disentangle in britain was initiated by the purify form of 1867 and consequently first past the post was chosen as the best solution. This essay is trying to establish whether this voting ashes is still beseem-for-purpose and whether on that point is a circumstances that it may be changed to a more proportionate electoral system. It defines purposes and foundations of the existing voting system and tries to deduce how it works in reality. To do so it assess levels of third company support, their lay in the parliament and the general bias of the electoral system. Based on these explanations it focuses on the reasons for and against change, especially from the point of great deal of the conservatives and labour, and concludes that although remediate is possible it is very un belike to happen in the short-term.Is the UKs First Past the Post electoral system still fit-for-purpose and is there much chance it will be changed, if not in the short-term, in the medium- to long-term?First Past the Post (FPTP) or simple plurality, as this alternative name suggests, is superstar of the simplest and earliest mechanisms for voting and is widely adoptive around the world including the largest democracies, India and the USA (Sberg Shugart, 2008, p. 7). In the UK, it came ab bug out from amalgamation of different mixed voting systems in 1866 and was adopted for all constituencies in the Reform Act of 1884 (Ahmed, 2010, pp. 1069-1074).This essay examines whether the First Past the Post (FPTP) electoral system is suitable for Britains current political environment and whether there is a chance of tame in the future. In particular, it focuses on successes and failures of FPTP and contrasts it with the functions and foundations of elections. It then considers the debate in Britain about electoral reform, a debate that looks set to be put to the political archives once again after the Alternative ballot (AV) referendum in 2011. Fi nally, it argues that although FPTP has particular shortcomings in handling third party votes and is hotshot-sided against the Conservatives in the presence of political will, electoral reform is only likely to take place in the long-term.This author tries to define fit-for-purpose from the foundations of FPTP rather than establish on democratic ideals such as clean-livingness and proportionality. As far as this essay is concerned, the purpose of an electoral system is to elect Members of Parliament (MPs) and in turn, the presidency and not proportional representation, as the latter is one of many functions that any electoral system may perform. To assess whether FPTP electoral system is fit-for-purpose, effects of it on the membership of the House of Commons should first be examined. The desirability of these effects or absence of some desired outcomes of a preferred electoral system would therefore define the need for reform.Firstly, defining the function of superior genera l elections would help to decide whether reform is indeed necessary. The arguments could broadly be divided into two oppose ideas one that seeks to make the parliament a fully representative body of public opinion and the former(a) that puts the emphasis on the ability of the electorate to determine the following(a) political sympathies. The former prefers to leave government formation in the hands of the negotiating parties after the elections and the latter is willing to sacrifice proportionality to provide the electorate with this choice. This latter argument is one that has promoted FPTP and a system of single-party government, giving the choice between the governing party and the opposition to the electorate by using an electoral system that more or little guarantees an overall legal age to whichever party comes first in votes (Curtice, 2010, pp. 624-626). This, in other words, facilitates a system where two largest parties alternate between government and opposition, the system that has generally governed Britain in the post-war era. There seems to be a desire to keep with this latter function, twain historically and at present, whilst attempting to add a degree of proportionality (Ahmed, 2010, pp. 1072-1074 Jenkins Commission, 1998, 9).Whether FPTP is fit for purpose or otherwise depends solely on what is expected from it, and how far these expectations are met. Curtice (2010, p. 625) identifies four crucial foundations to the argument expanded in the previous separate based on Duvergers Law and stoppage law. The former states that FPTP favours a two-party system, making life difficult for third parties the latter tries to formulate how FPTP can tell against the second party by disproportionate laurelsing of pose to the party that has won the elections even if by a very narrow margin (Cox, 1997, pp. 13-15, 72-74). Curtice (2010, p. 625 1986, pp. 210-211) argues that a simple mass electoral system hinders support for third parties by disco uraging voters and awarding those parties with smaller proportions of sit down allocates more seats to the winning party to facilitate a majority government and at the same time awards this majority without bias to the two largest parties in different elections. These are features of an ideal electoral system in Britain conducted under the rules of FPTP. The question is whether influence of other parameters have changed the outcome of the elections to circumvent results predicted by Duvergers Law and cube law (Curtice, 2010, pp. 624-626 Curtice Steed, 1986, pp. 209-213 Jenkins Commission, 1998, 3.19-3.32).Let us first consider the effects of FPTP on third party votes and allocation of seats. Curtice (2010, pp. 626-629) utilises data compiled by Rallings and Thrasher (2007) and shows that although until 1974 share of third party votes in General elections was compatible with predictions of Duvergers Law, since then it has gone up from an average of less than 10% in previous years to an all-time high 34.9% of the vote . Moreover, the take of seats won by third parties in general elections has also increased from less than a dozen before 1974 to nigh 90 in 2010 (BBC News, 2010 Rallings et al., 2007). It is fair to consider that this outcome is still compatible with Duvergers Law in that their share of seats are far less than their share of votes. However, this discrimination against third parties depends on geographical concentration of their voters (Curtice, 2010, p. 629 Jenkins Commission, 1998, 3.30). A similar share of votes in 1983 only awarded them 27 seats. This change is likely to make a hung parliament more possible.Secondly, FPTP should award more seats to the winning party than its lead in the polls. If cube law is to operate, a 1% swing to the winning party should result in as much as 3% of seats changing hands between the winning and second parties (Duverger, 1963, p. 322). This exaggerated effect that gives an easy majority in the House of Com mons to the party in government is shown to be dependent on the number of borderline seats (Curtice, 2010, pp. 629-631 Curtice Steed, 1986, pp. 209-213). Ever since 1974 general election, the number of marginal seats that have changed hands between Labour and the Conservatives has come down from over 27% to 15% at the last general election, due to a trend towards geographical concentration of the Conservative and Labour support (Curtice Steed, 1986, pp. 209-228). Another factor that skews this further is to do with the last foundation described above that the cube law operates without bias towards any parties. Curtice (2010, pp. 633-635) demonstrates that FPTP has been treating Labour more favourably when awarding exaggerated majorities in the recent years. This bias towards Labour adds to an already reduced number of marginal seats to fail FPTP in its main goal of providing two main alternatives to the electorate.Whether there is need for reforming the electoral system for the G eneral elections in the UK, this reform may well happen or its chances become limited based on political calculations of the party/parties in power. Under the then Labour government, The free-lance Commission on the Voting System (Jenkins Commission) was setup in 1997 with a remit to find an alternative electoral system to conform to a dip of requirements that are broadly based on an extension of FPTP. These requirements were (i) broad proportionality (ii) the need for stable government (iii) an extension of voter choice and (iv) the maintenance of a link between MPs and geographical constituencies (Jenkins Commission, 1998, 1.1). Comparing these requirements to the foundations of FPTP discussed above and as the requirements were not absolute one could argue that the need for a majority government would demand an exaggerated number of seats allocated to the winning party, something FPTP is already trying to achieve, and still be considered broadly proportional (Jenkins Commissi on, 1998, 9.18). The Jenkins Commission therefore proposed Alternative Vote (AV), another plurality voting system, plus a number of top-up seats to make it more proportional. Since AV is the best option put forward and has already been rejected by the electorate, it is hard to imagine that an electoral reform based on AV could happen anytime in the short- or medium-term.The reasons that hinder the change to the electoral system are not as numerous as they used to be over most of the twentieth century. FPTP does not provide the full outcome of the exaggerative qualities it once did. Although, all major parties have mentioned reform of one kind or another in their latest manifestos (2010 Party Manifestos, 2010), the level of acceptance for reform amongst political parties also depends on whether they are in government or in opposition. Political parties in opposition tend to favour electoral reform, still when a party comes to power under FPTP, they are less likely to adopt changes (Sberg Shugart, 2008, p. 47). They appreciate the advantages, namely a strong mandate and one-party majority government that are less likely to exist if a more proportionally representative electoral system were to be adopted (Dunt Stevenson, 2013). In increase to this, there are also conflicting arguments as to who is the beneficiary of reform. There is no doubt that all third parties will gain more seats under any electoral system that is more proportionally representative than FPTP. The question is which large party is going to lose. The majority of literature claims that if nothing changes apart(predicate) from the voting system, e.g. number of MPs, constituency boundaries, etc., the Conservatives are going to lose the most seats (Blau, 2008, pp. 864-866 Payne Quilty-Harper, 2011). This can partly be eliminated by redrawing boundaries and reducing the number of MPs both proposed by the coalition government but they are unlikely to have an enormous effect in addressing the discrimination towards the Conservatives (Curtice, 2010, p. 637).Besides, this same dependence of an exaggerated majority in parliament to such a small swing in votes brings government public policy to the ideological centre and encourages legislation by consensus based on logical explanations by Chandler and Downs (cited in Curtice Steed, 1986, p. 211). This affects public satisfaction with the government in a positive way, since every party favours staying in power as long as possible. Because of this, public support for reform of the voting system is unlikely to be substantial.However, apart from pressure groups and minority parties who mainly favour proportional representation there are several reasons why larger governing parties mainly the Conservatives and Labour may favour electoral system reform. The most weighty and often forgotten reason beingness their attempt to defend their share of vote by adopting a more proportional system to prevent losing out to growing su pport of the third parties (Dunleavy Margetts, 2005, pp. 854-855). Moreover, Blau (2008, pp. 61-63) considers three other reasons for a change from within proposing a popular reform and gaining votes as a result as a concession to a coalition partner and the prospect of more votes and seats owing to an electoral reform . Blau (2008, p. 63) emphasises that the first reason is the most likely way for a reform process to start, but it also needs to be self-promoting to the party to gain traction. This could be one of the reasons why electoral reform did not happen in the current government after the 2010 General elections, as Dunleavy and Margetts (2005, pp. 864-866) show the Conservatives are the least likely to gain any seats from a move to a more proportional electoral system.In considering reasons for this change, there are many other arguments that could not be expanded in this short essay. Such arguments include among many, under-representation of women and ethnic minorities du e to the great emphasis on party affiliation a great number of MPs being elected by plurality rather than majority of votes, prevalence of safe-seats limiting the choice for some voters, and as a result producing lower turnouts, and also no choice in electing a government and local representatives separately (Curtice, 2010 Dunleavy Margetts, 2005 Jenkins Commission, 1998, 3,4b).In addition, one should also consider the historic context where electoral system reform has been considered. As already mentioned in the beginning of this essay, many debates were held in the parliament in the latter half of the nineteenth century, for and against adoption of proportional representation in which FPTP has always been the outcome (Ahmed, 2010, pp. 1069-1074). This continuation of reform initiatives shows that there is a prospect of change only if it comes in the right time. This author believes that such reform is passing unlikely to take place in the short-term due to the recent AV referen dum. It is also unlikely in the medium-term, as no other alternatives to AV have been proposed and large parties have little incentive to implement changes. However, this situation can only improve in the long-term. Change to proportional representation has been discussed for almost 150 years and is most likely to happen when favourable conditions exist.In conclusion, change seems possible if not likely, considering that we extrapolate current voting trends into the future (Blau, 2008, pp. 85-87). intimately literature discussed above is of the belief that change will happen if third parties continue winning more seats and pose a threat to the duopoly (Ahmed, 2010 Curtice, 2010, 2012 Dunleavy, 2013 Dunleavy Margetts, 2004). It may result in a swap between the Liberal Democrats and one of the two largest parties, as happened in first half of the twentieth century. On the other hand, the prospect of a hung parliament in itself is not enough to make this change take place. Interests of large parties and MPs should also be aligned with it.