1. First Past the Post How representative is it?

2. What is FPTP  It is a, simple, voting system used in the UK general elections  The voter puts an X next to the name of the candidate they want to be their MP  Basically, the candidate with the most votes wins

3. Is it actually fair?  Yes and No  Yes because in the constituency, the most popular candidate in the area is voted as the MP  However, other people’s votes for another candidate who did not win, their vote is wasted  In the 2010 general election, Conservatives had only 36% of the vote, but had much more than 36% of the seats (307)  Liberal Democrats were affected the most. With 23% of the votes in 2010, they only won 57 seats (8.7% of the seats)  On the other hand, FPTP keeps out extremists parties, such as BNP, but other non-extremist parties e.g. Green Party don’t get seats either  And FPTP (usually) turns out with a majority win for a party but In 2010, this did not happen.

4. What difference would PR make on the 2010 election 2010 election (FPTP) 2010 election (PR) PartySeats% of vote Con23536.1% Lab18829% Lib Dem15023% Other7711.9% PartySeats% of vote Con30736.1% Lab25829% Lib Dem5723% Other2811.9% We can see that the results between the actual election compared to another voting systems possible outcome that FPTP does not seem fair…

5. In conclusion  Although FPTP has been used in UK elections for years, it is very disproportionate to the opinion of the UK voters  Therefore it tends to lead to a government that doesn’t tend to represent the UK as a whole, as the winning party tends to get less than 50% of the vote  And in 2010, only 61.5% turned out to vote, so the remaining 38.5% did not have a say

6. An alternative?  A PR system seems to be a fairer system  It tends to lead to a government that is more representative of the country  Although it does have it’s critics, as PR usually tends to lead to a coalition government- In Scotland a PR system is used and for 4 elections in a row the result caused a coalition  However, FPTP in 2010 lead to a coalition in the UK and PR lead to a majority government in Scotland