Tories just days away from leading Parliament

by Clifford F. Thies

The United Kingdom, like the United States, has a first-past-the-gate system, reflecting that it is one of the older democracies in the world. Most of the newer democracies have some form of proportional representation voting or, in the case of France, have run-off elections. In seeking to make a deal with the Liberal Democrats, it is possible the Conservatives will agree to a national plebiscite on replacing the U.K.’s first-past-the-gate system with some alternative.

No voting system is without flaws, but proportional representation can be shown to be relatively robust. In its pure form, as in Israel, where voters only choose among parties (not individual candidates), and where the threshold for representation is merely one seat, we seem to wind up with excessive fractionalization. Various hybrids of proportional representation seek to gain the advantage of robustness while avoiding excessive fractionalization.

In a one hybrid form of proportional representation, Germany’s, voters choose among individual candidates on a district basis and additional seats are awarded from party lists to approximate proportional representation subject to a significant threshold. In such a system, we seem to get a good mix of results in terms of the number of parties, with a small, first tier of major parties and a small, second tier of minor parties that gain representation.

A contrasting hybrid form of first-past-the-gate voting involves run-off elections where no candidates received a majority or perhaps something close to a majority in the first round. In the French system, which involves run-off elections, it is typical that the conservatives and liberals (i.e., the non-socialists) coalesce about whomever from the center-right finishes in the top two, and the various Trotskyites, progressives, socialists, communists, radicals, Greens, secular humanists, pagans, utopians, and others of the left coalesce about the Socialist candidate.

In the U.K., a German-style system of proportional representation would result in several large nationwide parties (the Conservatives, Labour and Liberal Democrats), and several smaller national parties (UK Independence and Greens) and regional parties (Scottish and Welsh nationals, Irish Republicans and Unionists). That is, I suspect the UK Independence and Green parties would gain supporters from those who, from a tactical basis, currently vote for their second choice candidate. I also suspect the radical-left and market-liberal wings of the Liberal Democrats would eventually fracture. Aside from the regional parties, the resulting configuration of parties might look very much like the configuration of parties in Germany; i.e., large parties of the center-right and center-left, and smaller market-liberal, left-socialist and Green parties. This reform would align the country's national system of voting with the EU system for representation in the European Parliament already practiced, as a parallel voting system, in the UK.

Contrariwise, a French-like system of run-off elections would work to the advantage of the large parties (who will be the ones fashioning the deal) at the expense of the minor parties such as the UK Independence and Green parties, and might keep the disparate wings of the Liberal Democrat Party from fracturing. Furthermore, it would be a relatively simple reform to implement. The only real consequence is that, when elections are held, the current government would remain in place for another two weeks or so, during the conduct of the run-off election. The only problem with this reform is that it’s French.