British Voting Systems (uk)

Voting Systems

There are numerous voting systems in place and available for use, ranging from FPTP to the Party List System.

FPTP: First Past The Post

So, the UK is split into 64 ‘constituencies’, each of these constituencies elects one member of parliament.
To vote, a voter simply outs a cross (X) beside the candidate who they wish to elect, they can only select one. The outcome is simple, whoever gets the most votes wins! Each candidate has a ‘seat’, the party (I.e. Labour) with the most ‘seats’ becomes the government.
However, the FPTP system is not 100% fair as it is not proportional. For example…
5 parties; Labour, Conservative, SNP, Liberal Democrats, Green Party.
Labour = 30%
Conservative = 25%
Liberal Democrats = 30%
SNP = 10%
Green Party = 5%
Labour has the most votes, but… 30% want Labour - 70% don’t! So it isn’t proportional.

Proportional Representation System

This system works on the basis that the number of seats should be proportional to the number of votes won. It can be split into 3 different systems; party list, additional member, single transferable vote.

Party List System:
Each party induces a list of candidates, ordered by preference
The electorate (voters) vote for a party, not for a candidate
If a party gets x% of votes, then x% of their party candidates are elected
This system can be used both regionally and nationally

Additional Member System:
A member of the electorate gets two votes, one for the constituency MSP (FPTP) and one for the regional MSP using AMS
73 seats are allocated to the constituencies and 56 to the regional party list
*8 regions > 7 members each
The % of votes obtained in the party list vote decides how they are represented in the region

Single Transferable Vote:
Country divided into multi member constituencies
Voters rank their candidates; 1 (for the first choice) and so on
The vote (1) is the main vote, but secondary (and further) votes will be used when needed
The secondary (and onwards) votes are ‘transferred’

Hopefully this will give you a clearer idea of how British voting systems work!
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