Electoral reform is even more overdue

Western Daily Press, 10 July 2024, p. 19

Following the outrageous General Election result last week, when Labour attracted a paltry 22 per cent of the registered voters, and yet 'won' an unbelievable 63.4 per cent of the seats in the Commons, ever more people are realising that our current electoral system is utterly broken, and is not a 'democracy' in any meaningful sense. It makes Third World tin-pot dictatorship elections look fair and proportionate in comparison.

Note also that Starmer's 'new' Labour Party attracted less votes across the UK than did Corbyn's 'old' Labour Party in both the 2017 and 2019 elections. And yet the propagandists continually delight in telling us that 2019 was Labour's 'worst election performance since 1935'. What utter poppycock. What they really mean is that we have the worst electoral system imaginable.

The two main parties, Conservative and Labour, share a common vested interest in continuing to ensure that they have the current system stitched up between them. In their Faustian pact, each party is prepared to accept that it will sometimes be out of power, as a small price to pay for knowing there are only two parties that can ever gain dictatorial political power.

On BBC Radio 5 Live’s breakfast show on Monday, presenter Rachel Burden asked Chief Secretary to the Treasury Darren Jones the following question: 'There are lots of people talking about Labour's low vote share over the weekend – this is the most disproportionate election result ever. Keir Starmer did campaign in his leadership campaign for the Labour Party on a message of electoral reform that he seems to have now dropped. Is there any chance that your party will look at this within this government?'

Jones gave the following answer that was extraordinary in its evasiveness: 'Well we've pledged to extend votes to 16 and 17 year olds but I would just point out we had an historic victory last Thursday and an enormous majority in the House of Commons, which we're all very very grateful for having been given by the British people.'

So all Jones could refer to was his party’s intention to skew the system even more in Labour's favour, while completely ignoring the outrageously distorting electoral system and his own leader's previous commitment to reform it

So there we have it. An 'elective dictatorship', as Lord Hailsham famously called it, pretending it has a mandate when it has no such thing; and a dishonest Prime Minister who reneges on previous commitments on electoral reform that he's made just to win power.

Hang on to your hats, folks; this is what we have to put up with for the next five years.

Dr Richard House

Stroud, Gloucestershire