FPTP in the UK

First past the Post: Thirteen Percent Gets You One Seat in Parliament

     In the United Kingdom elections are conducted under a “first-past-the-post” system. This means that whichever candidate receives a plurality of the votes within a given district (called constituencies) takes the seat. Since a majority of votes is not required, but only a plurality, it is conceivable that if ten candidates were running for a seat and the vote were split almost equally that one could win a seat while only receiving less than 11% of the total vote within said district. This FPTP system seems to destroy the democratic concept of “one person, one vote” as many votes are simply “wasted" when they are discarded within a district, rather than be tallied nationally. This result is highly undemocratic.

     Of all the possible democratic electoral systems currently in place around the world, the FPTP system seems to produce the most undemocratic and disproportionate results. In the most recent UK election, the UK Independence Party received some thirteen percent of the vote nationally, but only attained one seat in parliament. The reason that such a result is possible is because the UKIP votes were distributed geographically, rather than concentrated within a few districts. The FPTP system rewards the largest and best organized parties, as well as those that are regionally concentrated. As a result, one would expect two main parties to dominate per “Duverger’s Law”, but this is not the case in the UK. Duverger’s law predicts that as a result of there being so many wasted votes in the FPTP system that voters will react through the “psychological effect” and choose to cast their votes for a party with a chance of winning. But in the UK, it seems that voters cast their ballots based on whomever they wish for the most part, leading to more parties than one would otherwise expect.

     The disproportionate results that are inherent to the FPTP system have led to widespread frustration among the electorate, and a sense that the system is broken. This frustration was clearly expressed by Douglas Carswell, UKIP’s sole minister elected to parliament with his statement that “[a]cross the country about 5 million people will have either voted for Ukip or for the Green Party. Those 5 million people will be lucky to get a tiny handful of MPs in the House of Commons”, and further “[t]hat failure to translate those 5 million votes into seats is less a reflection of how my party or the Green Party campaigned, rather it tells us how dysfunctional our political system is” (Warroll, 2015).  Under a system of Proportional Representation, BBC’s Channel 4 estimates that UKIP would have received 83 seats in the parliament. Under the current system, even though UKIP received some thirteen percent of the vote in the latest election they only sent one minister to parliament (1/650th of the House of Commons)! (Warroll, 2015).

     The fact that the FPTP system has such disproportionate results have inevitably led to calls for electoral reform. But not everyone is dissatisfied with the current system. The Tories received a majority of seats in the House of Commons even though they only received thirty-seven percent of the vote, and this was considered to be a resounding victory! While the minor parties such as the Greens, UKIP, etc… may be calling for a system of proportional representation, the two main parties the Tories and Labour seem quite comfortable with the current system that heavily favors them at the expense of the minor parties. Regardless of one’s ideological bent, the inevitable results of the FPTP system of voting fly in the face of most principles of fairness and democracy. How can one justify such disproportionate results, let alone espouse such an electoral system as being democratic and worthy of emulation?

     The United Kingdom seems primed to undergo something of a political revolution. The meteoric rise of the Scottish National Party and overall dissatisfaction with the current regime have resulted in growing calls for electoral reform. The last time that such calls were made, it resulted in a failed push for the “Alternative Vote”.  Although a system of AV would address the issue of wasted votes, it would do little to change the overall disproportionality of the electoral system as a whole, because such a system tends to favor the largest parties just like FPTP.  The problem with reform lies within the fact that there is little-to-no incentive for the largest parties that benefit greatly from the current system to enact reforms that would lead to a loss in seats.

     The most-recent election in the UK clearly illustrates the advantages of the FPTP system for larger parties. The Tories for example, won some 51% of seats in parliament, while receiving some 37% of the vote. Only in a FPTP system (as far as I know) can less than 40% of the vote translate into a majority of seats in parliament. The Labour party’s results were somewhat more in line with its share of votes, 36% of seats on 30% of the vote. But when you compare the Liberal Democrats results with those of UKIP, or SNP with those of UKIP, the difference are stark. The Liberal Democrats received a paltry 8% of the vote nationally, but received eight seats, whereas UKIP received about 13% of the nationwide vote and only received a single seat!

     The disproportionate results that arise from the FPTP system are sure to continue to cause frustration among those parties whose representation in parliament is not commensurate with the amount of votes they receive. As UKIP leader Nigel Farage said following the election "[p]ersonally, I think the first-past-the-post system is bankrupt…It is bankrupt because one party can get 50% of the vote in Scotland and nearly 100% of the seats, and our party can get 4 million votes and just one seat" (BBC, 2015).  Such are the travails of the FPTP system.

Works Cited:

BBC. Nigel Farage resigns as UKIP leader as the party vote rises. May 8, 2015. http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-32633719

Warroll, Patrick. FactCheck: what would parliament look like under Proportional Representation?. BBC Channel 4 News. May 8, 2015. http://blogs.channel4.com/factcheck/factcheck-parliament-proportional-representation/20893 .