BBC House of Commons seat calculator shows how broken British electoral system is
If ever there was any doubt that the British electoral system is broken, a new set of figures from the BBC in its article Election 2010: Gordon Brown to claim race ‘wide open’ proves the point. Because the electoral system is a first-past-the-post ‘all or nothing’ affair, smaller parties often have no representation at all in the House of Commons, but larger parties get far more seats than the popular vote suggests they should.
With Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg faring well in the first Prime ministerial debate, his party has shot up in snap polls, overtaking Labour. It’s pretty unlikely that this will be the case come election day, but the YouGov poll from the aforementioned BBC article makes for fascinating reading when the percentages are applied to seats in the House of Commons:
1. Convervatives: 33% vote share, 245 seats (38%)
2. Liberal Democrats: 30% vote share, 100 seats (15%)
3. Labour: 28% vote share, 276 seats (42%)
It’s absurd that the party third in the popular vote would not only be the biggest party in the Commons, but that it could have almost three times as many seats as a party that came in second.
And of course we all remember how accurate the polls are, after Neil Kinnock’s stunning victory in 1992… I’m surprised the first TV debate has changed peoples’ opinions so much, unless it really is the fact that Clegg represents something different to the two main parties.
Like I said, the polls won’t be saying the same in May. If the Lib-Dems are lucky, they’ll retain their seats. I can’t see them getting any more. The point is that even in third, with the results of that poll, Labour would still be the biggest party. If that isn’t crapping on the head of ‘democracy’, I don’t know what is.
What I would like to know is what happens to the seating arrangements if it is a hung parliament and Lab and Lib join together – do the conservatives have to sit where the Libs do at the moment or do they keep their seats in front of the despatch box?
The Conservatives would (probably) still be the largest opposition party in that instance, and so would keep the same seats and have a Shadow cabinet.