Ministers must be “bold” and establish a national commission to help reform the “unrepresentative” voting system used for UK parliamentary elections, according to a Labour MP. Alex Sobel (Leeds Central and Headingley), who supports proportional representation, said the first-past-the-post (FPTP) system is “not working” and is “desperately in need of an upgrade”.
He said a national commission for electoral reform would act as a “first step” to finding a consensus on the system to be used in future, amid concerns that 85% of MPs were elected by less than 50% of the voters who turned out in 2024. Under the existing FPTP system, voters select their preferred candidate and the candidate with the most votes wins.
Alternatives include the single transferable vote system in which voters rank candidates in order of preference. Opening a debate on proportional representation for general elections, Mr Sobel told the Commons: “I want to encourage the Government to be bold and to be honest about how unrepresentative British general elections have become.”.
Labour MP Florence Eshalomi (Vauxhall and Camberwell Green), intervening, noted turnout at last year’s general election dropped below 60%, adding: “That means two in every five people didn’t even participate. Does this not show that actually we need to change that so more people engage in our democratic system?”.
Mr Sobel said voter turnout and engagement should be a “matter of concern” for everyone, adding: “The truth is first-past-the-post is failing on its terms; it’s becoming less and less representative and producing more and more random results, more outliers, more MPs elected on less than 30% of their constituency votes.”.
