Electoral systems

Question 1

STV case studies

Answer 1

• Scotland (2017)
  = 40,000 invalid votes
  = 1.95% of all votes cast
• 2017= DUP won 28.1% of the vote, so won 28 seats, Sinn Fein won 27.9% vtoe share and 27 seats in the Northern Ireland Assembly

Question 2

extremist party under FPTP

Answer 2

• 2010 GE= BNP won 563,743 votes and 0 seats

Question 3

3rd parties under FPTP

Answer 3

• 2015 GE= UKIP won 3.9 mil votes and only 1 seat

Question 4

wasted votes under FPTP

Answer 4

electoral reform society said that 74.4% votes cast in 2015 were wasted
1987 general election, Thatcher won a strong majority of 376 seats in the HOC, yet only won 42% of the vote share

Question 5

AMS case studies

Answer 5

• Green won 1.3% constituency votes but 8.1% top up votes
  = won 6 seats overall in 2021 Scottish Parl election
• 1999-2003= Scottish Labour and Scottish LD coalition
  = 73 collective seats
• 2003-2007= Scottish labour minority
  = only won 39.9% vote share and only 50 seats out of 129
• 1999 scot parl election= tories won 0 constituency MPs despite 15.6 vote share
  = but won 18 AMS seats= 14% seats overall

Question 6

Describe STV

Answer 6

The voter votes for candidates in order of preference, any candidate who has gained his “quota” of votes on the first choice is elected, a candidate with more than the necessary quota of 1st choice votes has the surplus redistributed to the 2nd choice, so there is no “wasted vote”
- Northern Ireland Assembly
- Scotland and NI local government elections

Question 7

Describe AMS

Answer 7

voter gets two votes - One vote is cast for a constituency MP, under FPTP rules, the other vote is cast for a party
- Scottish Parliament Elections

Question 8

adv refs

Answer 8

• if politicians can’t agree= more power to public to unite disagreements
• helps educate public on important issues
• makes gov listen to party and the ppl e.g. 2014 Scot ind ref

Question 9

2024 multiparty system under FPTP?

Answer 9

• combined Conservative-Labour vote share was 57.4 per cent, the lowest total since the 1922
• 4/10 voters didn’t vote for 2 major parties
• 27.1 per cent of the votes cast in the 2024 general election were for candidates who did not represent any of the five well-known major and minor parties (Conservative, Labour, Lib Dem, SNP and Plaid Cymru)
• Reform UK and the Greens were disadvantaged by FPTP since they secured vote shares of 14 and 7 per cent respectively but received only 1 per cent of the seats each (5 and 4 seats)