Author Archives: Samuel Jackson

Samuel Jackson

Britain’s party system under Proportional Representation: where should the Liberal Democrats be placed?

By Samuel Jackson | Wed 2nd March 2022 - 3:01 pm

The Liberal Democrats and Labour have entered into an informal electoral agreement to prevent anti-Conservative opposition being split at the next election. Giving Labour a free hand to rebuilding their Red Wall, they will give us equal freedom to dismantle the Blue Wall. With major trade union opposition to Proportional Representation having been removed, it might be possible that the replacement of First Past The Post with PR will be adopted by Labour as party policy and enacted by the next government.

Change to the electoral system will inevitably result in behavioural changes amongst those operating within the political system. With PR, voters can vote as they wish and expect to get their desired representatives rather than having to vote tactically for the lesser of two evils. And, politicians would be required to be more conciliatory and cooperative in order to win votes and form governments, the negative campaigning typical of FPTP likely being a liability. PR will also change the party system.

A Conservative- and Labour-dominated two-party plus system has naturally resulted from FPTP, the British electorate’s desire for a true multiparty system being long frustrated with the seat shares of third parties being unfairly suppressed. With Single Transferable Voting being our party’s preference, and hopefully that of Labour in the future, the British party system under PR is likely retain two major parties but would grant greater (proportional) influence to smaller parties. STV would allow the Liberal Democrats to reclaim our rightful position as Britain’s third party, with a fair and considerable seat share (fifty-nine if STV had been used at the last election, based on votes cast under FPTP). Within such a system, we should consider the role our party should play.

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Samuel Jackson

A Liberal Democrat Case for Universal Civic Duty Voting

By Samuel Jackson | Mon 14th February 2022 - 11:29 am

Liberal Democrats are staunchly opposed to the Conservative government’s Elections Bill currently moving through Parliament. Its provisions of mandating photo ID at polling stations and imposing the use of First Past the Post for mayoral and police and crime commissioner elections are actively harmful to democracy and solely for the benefit of the incumbent government.

It should go without saying that this bill is diametrically opposed to our own party’s constitutional and electoral reform policies including the adoption of single transferable vote and removing barriers to exercising the right to vote. However, in the face of undemocratic legislation, we as a party should contemplate advocating for stronger protective measures, namely universal civic duty voting, otherwise known as compulsory voting.

Turnout for British general elections during the twenty-first century has never surpassed 70%. This contrasts sharply with the 90%+ turnout rates in Australia and Belgium, with the former having adopted UCDV in response to low turnout of under 60% at its 1922 federal election. With FPTP skewing results and breeding voter dissatisfaction, no party in the UK having won more than 50% of votes cast since the Conservative did in 1935, governments are formed or decisions made via referenda that reflect the will of only a plurality of the electorate. For government to be more reflective of the will of the people, greater turnout should be encouraged, with UCDV probably being the most effective method of achieving it.

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Samuel Jackson

How we could solve technical difficulties with STV

By Samuel Jackson | Mon 31st January 2022 - 11:55 am

Our party is proudly committed to the replacement of archaic First Past The Post with Single Transferable Voting, an electoral system which satisfactorily balances proportionality, local representation and voter choice.

However, a major roadblock to the introduction of STV for Westminster and English local elections would be quizzical or apprehensive attitudes amongst a sizable section of the British electorate over its precise technical details, which our party currently fails to address. As a party, we should develop our position on electoral reform by adopting more specific policies regarding technical details for STV.

Firstly, we Liberal Democrats should consider adopting as policy the requirement for a minimum number of candidates to be ranked, as currently mandated in elections for the Australian Senate and the Tasmanian House of Assembly. This would mean that voters would be required to rank at least as many preferences for candidates as there are available seats for their ballots to be deemed valid.

Whilst STV is designed to encourage split-ticket voting and foster political cooperation and moderation, FPTP would likely cast a long shadow for several parliamentary terms after being replaced. Some voters would probably vote solely for candidates from just one party, or even just for one candidate, with FPTP having imprinted upon them either a deeply engrained partisanship or an imperative to vote tactically, both of which are intrinsic components of said system.

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Samuel Jackson

Swedish-style fixed term Parliaments

By Samuel Jackson | Thu 16th September 2021 - 7:40 pm

The 2011 Fixed Term Parliaments Act (FTPA) established fixed quinquennial parliamentary terms, transforming the means of dissolving Parliament from a prerogative power exercised by the Prime Minister to a parliamentary process requiring two-thirds support in the Commons.

The major criticisms of the FTPA are chiefly about its shortcomings and the politics surrounding the act, namely for supporting the Conservative-Liberal Democrat Coalition, propping up the lame duck Second May Ministry, and its argued status as a dead letter due to the 2017 and 2019 elections with the latter being held by circumventing the FTPA via a simple-majority one-line bill. Such criticisms are bad faith arguments against the FTPA, merely stated ulteriorly in favour of the restoration of the prerogative power to dissolve Parliament.

One of the reasons that our party supports proportional representation for Westminster elections is that it would prevent early elections from being called for the governing party to benefit from an incumbency advantage and strong poll numbers as under First-Past-The-Post. However, this does not mean that PR should replace the FTPA entirely, an act that is not flawed in of itself but because its measures do not go far enough. If anything, complimenting PR, additional measures should be taken to strengthen the FTPA.

There may be an approach to fixed terms that has not before been considered for this country. In Sweden, quadrennial fixed term elections using part list proportional are held for the Riksdag. Sweden’s Prime Minister has the power to call an election part-way through a parliamentary term, but it would be an extra election, not an early election. Hypothetically, with the last Riksdag election being held in 2018, if an extra election were to be held now in 2021 due to the collapse of the current government, an election would still have to be held in 2022 instead of the election cycle being reset, the next election due for 2025.

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Samuel Jackson

Affirmed None of the Above Options

By Samuel Jackson | Mon 23rd August 2021 - 5:39 pm

The Liberal Democrats and others endorse Proportional Representation as a panacea to the problems inherent with First-Past-The-Post. FPTP is designed to discourage electoral participation, whether due to the spoiler effect of voting for minor parties, the adoption by major parties of fringe policies simply to win votes, smear campaigning supplanting positive campaign promises, or the disconnect between vote and seat shares. Is it any wonder that at the last five general elections, more than thirty per cent of eligible voters abstained from voting, not wanting to make unsavoury compromises or believing that their votes did not matter?

Our current electoral reform platform of adopting PR, and improving ballot access and voter participation, may not go far enough to repair the damage done by FPTP to public trust in politics, already materialising as depressed electoral turnout. The endorsement of any additional precedented reform measures, such as compulsory voting or holding Election Day at the weekend or on a bank holiday, would fail to take this into account.

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