Proportional Representation

I'm all for it

Whitewavemark2

I’m going to write to my MP

I recently wrote to my MP about a completely unrelated matter. She sent back a template, but unfortunately forgot to delete one sentence which didn't apply and one of the names was wrong.

I don't think I'll bother writing!

Gin

I expect there are many like me for whom it is quite pointless voting as my constituency as been through and through blue since time began. At least with pr I would feel I had some input.

Mine is the same. The Tories have a stranglehold here, with some very underhand goings-on to keep them in place.

However, I do still vote. Not least because people use the numbers of actual votes to show just how unacceptable FPTP is.

I don't yet know if it will be the Greens or the LDs who will have the best chance of getting the Tory out next time. We are moving into a newly formed constituency but I imagine it will be just as blue as our previous one. Someone with more knowledge than I have in these areas will no doubt work it out and I am happy to vote for either.

Fennel

In principle PR seems to be the fairer electoral system. But in practice there are disadvantages.
eg Israel, which has PR. The current govt. coalition has had to resign as it can't get a sufficient majority to pass laws.
The 5th election in 3 years.

Some of the most stable and successful societies in the world, such as Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden, use PR so that seats match votes. So why can’t we?

Why do you believe we could only do it badly?

I admit that I didn't know that so many other countries had PR.
Maybe they're morwPargumentative in Israel.
An example here of PR being unfair was the last GE when Farage's party should have had many more seatwith PR. And one of the Scottish parties. So then the Tory's number would be well down. Not that I support Farage.
I've given the link for this a few times but have lost it now.

ed more argumentative.

Andy Burnham says Labour must ‘seize moment’ and back proportional representation

www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/jun/25/andy-burnham-says-labour-must-seize-moment-and-back-proportional-representation

He argues there is now an opportunity for the Tories’ opponents to work together more. Doing so, they could create a political system in which power is spread more evenly and fairly, rather than being concentrated in what he describes as a “small Whitehall elite” as a result of a first-past-the-post election system, which traditionally has favoured the Tories.

Changing the voting system, a move likely to boost small parties and increase the chances of coalitions, would foster a spirit of consensus and agreement on other radical and necessary elements of political modernisation, such as replacing the House of Lords with an elected second chamber and more devolution.

And one of the Scottish parties.

Sorry Fennel, but really One of the Scottish parties?

It would have been quicker to write SNP, no? Well, at least we know where we stand.

I thought the UK had a vote over whether to change the voting system, during the Tory/LibDem coalition, and voted, by a large majority, to leave it FPTP? ?

DiamondLily

I thought the UK had a vote over whether to change the voting system, during the Tory/LibDem coalition, and voted, by a large majority, to leave it FPTP? ?

I can’t remember the details but it was not fully thought through and was not in all senses PR. Perhaps someone else can remember the details?

My DD was describing New Zealand’s system. They have. PR system whereby each constituency has a member voted for by the majority (I think). They also have a list so all other votes are proportioned out to the parties and representatives are taken from each list in order of popularity. Anyway, she seemed to think it works well for NZ.

I’m all in favour of PR. It ensures parties must work together. One of our most successful governments, IMO was the wartime cabinet WW2. PR hopefully would help longer term planning and could lead to improved services in the NHS etc.

It might even be possible to persuade more people to vote if their vote counted.

varian

Andy Burnham says Labour must ‘seize moment’ and back proportional representation

He's not wrong varian, but timing will be all in getting a progressive parliament which will do this. The Tories, particularly in their current incarnation, will never do it.

DiamondLily

I thought the UK had a vote over whether to change the voting system, during the Tory/LibDem coalition, and voted, by a large majority, to leave it FPTP? ?

If you look at number 8 in this article, it explains that this was not a vote for PR.

getprdone.org.uk/faqs-on-pr/

I think any party whilst in power is happy with the status quo and therefore doesn’t want to change things, understandably! Then, once they are in opposition some of their supporters start agitating for P.R.
?

That would not be my view Urmstongran nor do the facts support it.

When the Tories are in power, they have already formed a coalition - we can currently see that very clearly . They threw out some obvious conservative MPs and are run at the moment by far-right neo-liberals some of whom verge on fascists.

The fact that they all call themselves "Conservatives" does not mean each and every one of them is the sort of "Conservative" a conservative voter would choose. They are also not a coalition chosen by the voter but one concocted by themselves.

PR would allow the number of voters for each MP to represent the number of supporters for that form of politics. For example, in the 2019 UK General Election the number of Conservative votes cast works out at 38,264* per MP, while the Greens won 864,743* votes but had only one MP.

I think many on the very far-right would think that is okay. I don't and neither, it seems, do the voters generally.

* Source: Electoral Reform Society

I think one of the things the parties and groups working for PR need to do is to point out that we already have recurrent coalitions.

It's just that voters don't choose them.

The Conservative Party does.

The idea that there would be more diverse opinions and arguments within a coalition elected by the people than in the Conservative one thrust upon us is laughable.

PR fine. It should be fairer and might even, as someone posted earlier, encourage more people outside GN to vote.
I’m impressed that Andy Burnham is trying to promote it, but governments have talked about it for ages. Maybe, when Labour win at the next GE, they’ll be the party to put it in place.

Mollygo

PR fine. It should be fairer and might even, as someone posted earlier, encourage more people outside GN to vote.
I’m impressed that Andy Burnham is trying to promote it, but governments have talked about it for ages. Maybe, when Labour win at the next GE, they’ll be the party to put it in place.

Introducing PR was put forward in a motion to the LP conference last year; the motion was defeated by the unions' vote (notable Unite). However, it's being presented again, I believe and both Unite and Unisons (big unions, I don't know about the rest) have said they will support it.

I voted in favour of the rather unsatisfactory version of PR because I felt that anything was better that FPTP. If PR is Labour & LibDem policy and they turn out to be the controlling majority after the next GE then at least we wouldn't have to have another referendum on the topic

Volver Apologies but there was a time when there was a Conservative party in Scotland. And others. but maybe not in Westminster.
Like Henetha my sister lives in Scotland. We grew up near the Border and have family on both. sides.
I like Nicola, but to get my sister to give an opinion is impossible. She worked in the Scottish Office as a civil servant for all her working life.

There's still a Conservative party in Scotland Fennel. (Although they are called the Conservative and Unionists here.) In Westminster they sit with the Conservative party from the rest of the UK. The same with Labour and the Lib Dems.

I'm not being funny Fennel, but I do think people have got a really skewed idea of how politics works in Scotland.

Sorry if I'm misunderstanding what you are meaning.

The problem in Scotland is that there is only one issue that matters, independence, but the Unionist majority never wins because there are three Unionist parties but only one independence one.

Seats in the Scottish Parliament held by independence supporting parties (parties plural. i.e. more than one). 72.

Seats in the Scottish Parliament held by unionist parties. 57

I think you need to revisit your ideas there Urms

Fennel What a brilliant word - Pargumentative - sums up the Israeli Knesset beautifully!

Urmstongran

The problem in Scotland is that there is only one issue that matters, independence, but the Unionist majority never wins because there are three Unionist parties but only one independence one.

Rather like the English coalition of "conservatives" then.