UK Politics - Electoral Systems

Question 1

What is First Past the Post?

Answer 1

It is an electoral system where the candidate with the most number of votes is elected - victory is achieved even by having one more vote than other candidates. This can be known as the plurality system

Question 2

Why was FPTP system in the 2024 general election regarded as disproportionate?

Answer 2

Labour was the main beneficiary of

Question 3

How did labour benefit the most from FPTP in 2024?

Answer 3

• they received just over 9.7 million votes, more than half a million votes down on 2019, yet their seat total more than doubled from 211 to 412
• labour’s vote share climbed just 1.6% in 2019 to 33.7%. In 2017 under Jeremy corbyn, the party’s vote share was 40.0%
• Keir Starmer’s own constituency support in Holborn and St Pancreas fell by more than 17% to 18,884

Question 4

How did tories fair under the FPTP system in 2024?

Answer 4

Their vote share collapsed from 43.7% and 13.9mn votes in 2019 to 23.7% and 6.8mn votes and although their votes didn’t quite halve, the number of seats won fell to 121 which was under one-third of 2019s total of 365

Question 5

What did reform UK do against the conservatives in 2024?

Answer 5

They decided to stand candidates in all constituencies meaning nationally, 14.3% of votes went to reform and in 170 of the 244 seats that conservative lost such as Poole, the vote was larger for reform than the margin of conservative defeat

Question 6

What are the arguments for FPTP?

Question 7

What are the arguments against FPTP

Answer 7

• unequal votes
• suppressed political diversity
• only marginal seats matter
• misrepresentation
• wasted votes & tactical voting

Question 8

Why is there a pragmatic reason for the Conservatives to keep FPTP?

Question 9

Why do the Labour Party favour FPTP?

Question 10

Why do smaller parties oppose FPTP?

Question 11

What are examples of FPTP hindering democracy?

Answer 11

• 29.2% voted for Plaid Cymru in Ceredigion in Wales but they won the seat in 2017
• 44% voted the the conservatives in Putney, who won on sub 50% of the vote
• Clapham and Brixton hill in 2024 was at 56.5% for the labour winning candidate

Question 12

What were the 2024 results in Hendon?

Answer 12

David Pinto of Labour won 38.43% of votes , beating conservatives Ameet Jogia who got 38.39

Question 13

How does FPTP work?

Answer 13

It operates on the basis of simple plurality - the UK is split into 650 constituencies and 1 MP is allowed per constituency

Question 14

To form a majority government what must a party acquire?

Answer 14

326 seats out of 650 in the House of Commons

Question 15

How are the arguments for FPTP discredited?

Answer 15

• it isn’t decisive as two of the last four elections have been a hung parliament
• it isn’t stable - in the last fifty years, UK governments have only last on average 60% of the time they could have which is less than PR-using countries e.g. Sweden

Question 16

What are examples of votes being unequal under FPTP system?

Answer 16

In 2024, it took only 23,500 votes for labour MP’s to win a seat compared to over 820,000 per Reform UK MP and the Conservatives gained a seat for every 56000 votes per Tory Mp

Question 17

How is the FPTP system misrepresenting?

Answer 17

In 3/5 last genreral elections, at least 50% of votes went to losing candidates and at the 2024 general election, a record high 58% of voters did not get an MP they voted for e.g. in constituencies such as Montgomeryshire and Glyndwr, the MP was elected with less than 1 in 3 votes

Question 18

How have votes been wasted under FPTP system?

Answer 18

• In 2024, 74% of votes were wasted which is the joint highest record with the 2015 election meaning that only 1 in 4 voters had a vote that made a difference
• in 2019 71% of votes were wasted and 68% in 2017