Proportional Representation

Can anybody explain to me why anybody would be opposed to pursuing this? I took an entire course on voting systems this last semester and I am at a loss as to why some people (who are very well educated, mind you) would stick by SMP.

Congratulations from across the pond to the Brits. You'll get your referendum; so don't screw it up (like we did...)!

It's not likely to happen due to it eliminating the two-party/two-man-con system we've got going here. Canada's a bit better in that regard, but we still have FPTP.

PR generally leads to coalition government, and coalition government is generally less stable than single-party government. Stability is good for economies. Furthermore, an argument often used to support PR is that the seats to vote-share ratio is usually closer, and that as a result your vote 'counts more'. However, if it leads to coalition government most of the time, then that means manifesto compromise between parties, so that the policies which lead you to vote for a given party may end up being dropped altogether, which leaves many people feeling robbed. For example, there are a lot of people who voted Tory on the basis of their taxation plans, and who now find those plans essentially scrapped as a result of the coalition deal. There is more than one way devalue someone's vote.


Bear in mind that I live in Ireland, where we use PR and nonetheless have generally had quite stable government. I'm certainly not wholly against PR, as in some respects it has significant advantages over the current UK electoral system. However, the fact is that looking at traditional and current voting trends in Britain, if PR were introduced there would be coalition governments for the forseeable future, bringing with them the above problems. The current system tends to deliver majority government, and that has advantages of its own. Neither system is 'better' than the other, they simply have different pros and cons.

I think the Irish STV system is impeccable.

It's a good system, but its success and stability has a lot to do with Irish political geography. The fact is that Irish voting patterns really haven't changed since the 1930s, and there aren't that many swing voters. The main party, Fianna Fail, has only been in power for about 60 of the last 80 years. Every now and again there's a term of coalition government, but basicallt FF dominate the Irish political landscape, which ensures stability. On the few occasions they haven't won a majority, they've only needed a handful of seats, which put them in a very strong bargaining position and ensured their policies were not sacrificed on altar of coalition government. In other words, the Irish system is good, but the nation's political landscape allows it to avoid some of the pitfalls mentioned above.