Labour won, but what if Britain used proportional representation?

I'd love to hear your thoughts!
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[@81percent]

The North doesn't hate you 2x as much, being a Londoner and an American cancels out.

[@gileswilliams3014]

Agree. America's awesome, London is worse than everywhere but Paris.

[@anonymous-zg7wh]

France* and germany and maybe italy

[@matercan5649]

@@gileswilliams3014 Are you american perchance?

[@lord_scrubington]

@@gileswilliams3014 paris is rank, amen

[@-YELDAH]

​​@@gileswilliams3014if you don't walk with your feet lmao Everything about america is horrifyingly unhealthy

[@ItsDeffoScott]

Also Evan, on how people would vote under PR, there is a YouGov poll which shows how people would have voted if they voted non-tactically. Most right wingers voted for who they wanted, left wing voted more tactically, with Greens damaged most with tactical voting in order to keep the Tories out.

[@gileswilliams3014]

Don't think this can be done with any degree of certainty though... Seems like dodgy stats to me.

[@evan]

It's difficult to gauge the math behind the estimate, but it'd be cool if we test it out for real!

[@SlowhandGreg]

Reform aren't Conservative thier vote share is highly demographic Libertarian economics + Nationalist and wouldn't vote Tory if you paid them

[@EngineerRunner]

link?

[@ralphsearing7892]

PR encourages more people to vote (the vote counts) and more compromise between parties in coalition, with those parties more able to block the more extreme views of their coalition partners.

[@nataliec6041]

I definitely voted against the conservatives. If Count Binface had a good chance of winning in my area, I’d have voted for him.

[@stephengraham1153]

Under PR Count Binface, the Dalek Empire and the OMRLP could conceivably win if voters choose protest candidates. Can you imagine these three running the country? Under PR we have a responsibility as voters to vote for sensible candidates who we are certain will be capable of running the country.

[@lordofuzkulak8308]

@@stephengraham1153the protest candidates getting seats would at least be incentive for the serious parties to pull their socks up and start doing a better job rather than being a novelty act like they are now with no chance of getting in.

[@gileswilliams3014]

I might have done the same ngl.

[@nataliec6041]

@@stephengraham1153 under PR I would have voted differently. As it is under FPTP I voted tactically.

[@charlottehardy822]

Think he’d have got votes wherever he stood.

[@tomydude11]

I can't stand the fact 'tactical voting' is a thing, the idea citizens have to play mind games with the government based on where they live - instead of just, yknow, voting based on your beliefs and views - is just absurd to me

[@ArtyFactual_Intelligence]

It's smart though. Single Transferrable Vote is the way to go.

[@CzornyLisek]

It is mathematically impossible to create a voting system that would meet all criteria. Some things must be sacrificed for other.

[@Kingofthenet2]

Agreed

[@matthewcook9404]

You put an X in a box. That’s a tactical vote.

[@Thurgosh_OG]

I just vote for the party I want. I don't think about who to block, or to support against another party I have no interest in.

[@Magic__7]

If you are only happy with the system when your side wins you don't like the system you like winning

[@evan]

Truuuuue

[@DavidJohnston877]

Personally I prefer the single transferable voting system. You mark in order of which you prefer from best to worst. The lowest number of votes gets removed and their votes get changed to the next up on the list. This removes the need for tactical voting and gives local representation and large majorities so the winning party can carry out their plan instead of no direction and nothing getting done.

[@simonhart2186]

I’m all for the STV

[@archwombat9250]

Agreed. It also gets rid of the really extreme fringe choices. I think our current system keeps our two main parties closer to the centre. They can’t move too far right to chase the Reform vote as they will lose the centre vote. Probably the reason why when most of Europe is getting more and more right wing governments the UK is bucking the trend and going for a left of Centre Labour Party.

[@brooza664]

Shame we voted against it 😢

[@simonhart2186]

@@brooza664 no we didn’t. The referendum was for the Alternative Vote. It’s nowhere near proportional. So much so, they invented AV plus to make it a bit more proportional.

[@daleykun]

@@archwombat9250 left of conservative sure, but labour are not left of centre by any stretch of the imagination. they're still very much right of centre

[@afrocomber]

Complete PR eliminates the idea of local representation. What you need is partial PR. Instead of dividing the country into 650 constituencies, each represented by one MP, divide it into, for example, 65 constituencies each represented by 10 MPs, selected by PR within that constituency. At least this means a party still needs around 10% of the vote to gain an MP, but allows broader representation and means you will probably have at least one MP in your area from the party you support.

[@gileswilliams3014]

This would be acceptable to me. My only objection to PR is the lack of local representation. I'd not considered this before. may I suggest we do it by county, instead of just 65 artificial constituencies, though? This way, we get to see some of the benefits of the American federalist system, whilst maintaining our political tradition.

[@d_dave7200]

There's another way that's even better for maintaining local representation. Have 325 constituencies, doubling the size of each one, and then have a party list that additional candidates are added from to make the result as proportional as possible. It won't be as proportional as full PR, but it can get pretty close. This is the system they use in Germany I believe. Obviously this is a sliding scale -- the larger the constituencies, the more proportional the outcome, but the less local your representative. So it doesn't have to be 325 -- that's just my suggestion.

[@hypotheticalaxolotl]

Mixed Member is an easier way to gain a proportional chamber while maintaining local representation.

[@cyrilthefish]

"local representation" With the party whip system, we have no local representation currently, they're not allowed to represent us. So seeing as we're effectively voting for one unit of a party, we might as well use PR.

[@katrinabryce]

Another option is what they do in Scotland, where you have local constituencies which are 1st past the post, and regional top-up lists, which which are elected proportionally with the parties represented in the constituencies taken into account.

[@TadeuszCantwell]

For all the people saying that PR doesn't give you a single local representative, it depends what version of PR is used. Under STV I have 5 representatives in my 'district', so instead of having hope I have an active local person to go to, l have some choice in who to bring my concerns to.

[@MsPeabody1231]

So you have to contact up to 5 people to get something done? Sounds like the local council system and it's hell if people don't value their constituents.

[@xVancha]

@@MsPeabody1231 It sounds more like if someone doesn't value you as a constituent, you have four more chances at finding someone who cares.

[@TadeuszCantwell]

@@MsPeabody1231 No I can pick one of the 5 to get help with my issue.

[@phueal]

Also, why does it matter.... MPs shouldn't be there to be your personal representative, they're there to pass laws and run the government. If we want people to have special advocates for their issues (like was indeed helpful during the post office scandal) we should create those as a separate role and elect them using STV or AV or something - we shouldn't combine those personal representatives with legislators.

[@andyinsuffolk]

@@phueal -- Yes -- but why would they need to be elected; having an 'official ombudsman' doesn't need an election it's just a bureaucratic role - it could be a side-line for councils, lawyers, accountants etc ?? We could then choose from hundreds who have most expertise in the area we need help. Having MPs and their spouses running support centres is ludicrous.

[@Mr9ig]

The only reason our 2 biggest parties want to keep the first past the post system is to keep the power in their hands only.

[@PaulMcElligott]

“You’re biased” = Just a disingenuous way of saying “I disagree with you.” When you accuse someone of bias when they’re openly stating their opinion is basically a passive-aggressive way of bullying that person into being biased in your direction instead.

[@lemurwrench6344]

It's still good to eliminate as much bias as possible from your perspective.

[@finneogan]

@@lemurwrench6344 Yes, but it is even better to then be aware of and acknowledge that you still have a bias.

[@anoukk_]

​@@lemurwrench6344'elimination' of bias is just changing your bias every body has a different view of what non biased supposedly looks like.

[@lexruptor]

Facts

[@wernerviehhauser94]

"I'm a bipolar transistor. I need to be biased to operate properly"

[@Alex-cw3rz]

I think one thing that has to be pointed out is Labour would not have used the same tactics they used if it was proportional representation. This election they did zero canvassing in areas they didn't think they would win, or if a Lid Dem or greens had a larger chance.

[@APAG]

Not entirely true - They threw the most resources out of any seat at bristol central and brighton pavillion, precisely because they are scared of the greens. They also did a fair amount of campaigning in waveney valley. They would rather mean more tories because they know that the greens are threatening them from the left.

[@IceClawz.]

the thing with the lib dem / green areas is that those mp's are more likely to stand with labour than against. lib dem has become a lot more left leaning in recent years , a long way from their coalition government.

[@katrinabryce]

Same with the lib dems. I live in a Labour seat surrounded by former Tory seats that were Lib Dem targets. I saw absolutely nothing from the Lib Dems other than the name on the ballot paper, and the Lib Dems won all their nearby target seats.

[@OntarioTrafficMan]

I assume that the opposite is also true. In Canada parties that are pretty much guaranteed to win a particular seat (e.g. the Conservatives in a rural area) don't campaign much either. Similarly when governing, investment will primarily be directed toward 'swing ridings', so places where many parties have a chance of winning. Which in practices is often the suburbs around major cities. The city centres will never ever vote Conservative, so there's no point in a Conservative government investing there. And the rural areas will vote Conservative regardless of what the government does so no point in investing there either.

[@bombaymolotov]

​@@IceClawz. not entirely. The Greens are quite disruptive and despite the Lib Dems and Labour leaving each other alone, the Greens went out to win and in some cases split the vote and lost a seat to the Tories

[@Duncan23]

The amount of people who are suddenly against PR because reform did well is so disappointing.

[@doyle8711]

It's always the same people are in favour of PR but when First past the post works for them PR takes a back seat.

[@OntarioTrafficMan]

I used to be a strong supporter of proportional representation until I moved to the Netherlands which has it. While in Canada and the UK each election just boils down to two parties and "lesser of two evils" voting, the Netherlands has the opposite issue which they call "splinterpolitiek" (splinter politics). Anytime there's a disagreement within a political party, the dissidents just leave and start their own party, which will probably still get enough supporters somewhere in the country to get some seats. Which is fantastic for accurately representing the opinions of the populace, but is a nightmare for actually governing. For some reason, the tradition in the Netherlands and Belgium is to form a coalition that contains the majority of seats in parliament, which is a logistical nightmare and leaves the country with no government for many months (or even years) while politicians bicker behind closed doors. Then once they finally agree on a coalition, they sign a party agreement that basically binds all the members of the coalition to vote in a particular way on particular issues. Which makes the parliamentary debates largely meaningless since the outcomes of votes is already decided in advance. My current preference would be a voting system that produces a result somewhere between the two, where the results are much more accurate to popular opinion than first-past-the-post, but not so much that you end up with a bajillion parties in parliament (the Netherlands currently has 15 parties in the House of Commons which has 150 seats total). For reference Canada's House of Commons currently has 5 parties among 338 seats.

[@ChristiaanHW]

in those situations the country isn't without a government. the previous government keeps governing while the coalition talk go on. so while the new coalition gets formed the previous government just keeps on doing their thing and keep the country going. but yes the "splintering" is something that should be acted against. maybe by having the seat go to the party instead of the person after a person leaves the party. but often those "splinter parties get barely any votes (only people really liking the person leading those parties vote for them) and the 2nd election after they split of people vote for "normal" parties, because the "splinter party" wasn't able to do anything so they rather vote for someone that can really influence things.

[@catomajorcensor]

Perhaps using PR with a threshold, blocking parties that are too small?

[@CzornyLisek]

​​@@catomajorcensor That creates the exact same problems that FPP have. Actually even worse it's easier to get even small voices heard in FPP than it is in PR with threshold (which by the way no longer really is PR anyway)

[@OntarioTrafficMan]

@@ChristiaanHW My understanding is that although the basic governmental functions continue during the coalition talks, the government isn't supposed to make any significant decisions. I don't think it would make a difference if one's seat stays with the party or with the person, because the dissidents can just splinter off at the next election either way. Splinter parties can absolutely get a lot of votes. The PVV was originally created in 2005 when Geert Wilders splintered off of the VVD, and they're currently the largest party in parliament. The current governing coalition also includes the NSC which was created when Pieter Omzigt splintered off the CDA.

[@ChristiaanHW]

@@OntarioTrafficMan common courtesy is that the "caretaker" government isn't supposed to make too drastic decisions, but they the still have the right to do so. after all the country still has to function properly. like the previous government promising funds for several things that will have to be transferred by the new government. they kinda wrote checks that the new government either has to pay or has to take back. that's not really nice to the new government, but it is part of governing so it was within the rights of the caretaker government to do that. yes those parties started as splinter parties. but they started because the party gradually shifted away from their promises and those politicians decided to take those promises and start their own parties to (try to) make those promises come truth. and you could argue that because those parties are now (some of) the biggest parties, apparently they did a good thing in splitting off. because a lot more people think their vision is a better one than the party they originally splintered away from.

[@daveayerstdavies]

In 2017 Labour got 40% of the popular vote and still lost. In 2024 they got 34% and a landslide win. Why? Reform split the right wing vote.

[@lesleylamy]

Reform only got votes from Tory’s, when Tories get their act together they will flock back, where will the reform be then.

[@robk2167]

Tories betrayed their votes big time and they are not conservative anymore and they are not even on the right side of the political scene.

[@MillenniumGaming1014]

​@lesleylamy You're actually wrong about that assumption, Boris Johnson wouldn't of won by a landslide in 2019 had Nigel Farage not stood down his candidates in 2019, otherwise, you would'v seen something similar to what has happened on July 4th. The right wing voters have always been there, and it's only growing at a rapid rate, hence why the Conservatives now identify as a Right-Wing party rather than Centre-Right.

[@clarkeysam]

We can say the same about the Cons wins; Lib Dems, Greens, etc split the left vote. Also, some Reform supporters identify as politically left and for some reason believe Reform are on the left!

[@rouib]

⁠@@clarkeysam I voted Lib Dem’s. This was my first time voting as I am 18 and so many people my age I spoke to said the Green Party was their favourite however reading their manifesto I realised how idealistic they were. It was nice in theory but seemed like the economy would be funded by borrowing but nothing else, however Lib Dem’s their manifesto to me was more for people and more realistic and had somewhat of a plan. I wish more people would give Lib Dem’s a chance, I sometimes wander what the country would be like if Reform, Lib Dem’s or Greens would be in power.

[@Alex-cw3rz]

Keep in mind Reform had more coverage than the Lid Dems, Plaid, the SNP, all indpendents and Greens combined, even when they were polling at 1 percent of the vote a year and a bit ago. Yet got 14% of the vote, where as they got a combined 22% of the vote. Reform at times having equal air time to the tories and labour, there was talk of them being a 3rd party in the debates. In context reform did very poorly for their disproportionate media coverage.

[@auldfouter8661]

Just because the SNP didn't get much coverage in England and Wales doesn't mean that our ears weren't deeved with them up here.

[@davesy6969]

Reform are being backed by wealthy interests that want deregulation, private healthcare insurance, more fossil fuel use, and low taxes for the rich. These backers also have a lot of media influence.

[@bigfisher4354]

implying that the lib dems didn't get much coverage when for the last two weeks all you heard about on the media was about Ed Davey dancing about is insane. SNP got a lot of coverage in Scotland. The only party that didn't get much coverage was the Greens.

[@gileswilliams3014]

A lot of that coverage was very negative though...

[@James-H84]

Reform was also referred to as a new party. Given it's just rebranded UKIP one could argue it's gained 1% popularity since they last run.

[@aks7698]

I know for certain that all three members of my household would've voted differently if proportional representation was in effect. A few friends have said the same.

[@eurovision50]

Same...

[@evan]

Yes! I'd say 90% of my friends voted tactically ie not for who they wanted. It'd be so interesting to see what parliament would look like with PR

[@Eikenhorst]

Well, coming from a country that does have a fair voting system (proportional), tactical voting is still a thing. Although technically there is nothing that states that the biggest party must be in the government and deliver the next prime minister, they do have the lead in trying to form such a coalition and in all but extreme cases do lead the next government. Thus, people still vote tactical to try and make sure their least desired party doesn't become the largest. This is mainly a recent thing, since the center parties (that everyone can sort of get along with) aren't guaranteed to be the biggest and the parties on the edge of the spectrum are far more controversial.

[@aks7698]

@@evan More Greens, Tories, Reform and SNP, and less Labour this election would be my guess. No idea about Lib Dems though.

[@phueal]

@@aks7698 definitely not more SNP, they're finally back down to where they should be. Lib Dems it's very hard to say - they're probably at about the right level now. They used to do very well in European elections which were PR, getting something like 20-25% of the vote I think from memory, but some of that could well have been protest voting. They also normally do very well in local elections, but those tend to be on local issues. I suspect when people are voting for national parties, on their national platforms, and to form national governments, the Lib Dems would probably be getting about 15% of the vote most times. But also it's worth noting that both Tories and Labour would almost certainly split under PR, making it even harder to say...

[@tnsquidd]

I'm a firm believer in a ranked proportional voting. I know it has other names, and there a few way of doing it, but what I mean is everyone gets to vote for 3 parties/candidates. Your first choice is worth 3 votes, your second choice 2, and third choice 1. The seats in parliament are distributed proportionally to these votes, with the prime minister being the leader of the party with the most votes. In other words, we all make a political party tierlist

[@evan]

Political party tier list should be the name

[@TheBrowncoatcat]

This guarantees the winner in each constituency gets at least 50% of the votes which I approve of. There is something basically wrong when all the votes for all the other candidates add up to more than the winning candidate.

[@simhedgesrex7097]

@@TheBrowncoatcat STV will also do this, but results in a more proportional result across the country, and a better chance that smaller parties will have MPs elected.

[@topcat8804]

No no no, You can't assume that people would just vote the identical same way under a different system.

[@sammy8270]

I just happened accross this video because coming from Australia we have a robust democracy. First past the post is bad. If people dont think there voices can be heard they wont participate hence the terrible turnout, It breeds political apathy.

[@bryn494]

I think that might be the general idea... :D

[@billyhills9933]

Of course, the UK could fix the terrible turnout simply by making voting compulsory, right?

[@evan]

are you coming from the algorithm of legend

[@ArtyFactual_Intelligence]

The right wing press causes that negativity.

[@gileswilliams3014]

You have a proper republic in Australia, though, don't you? So the head of the winning party isn't the executive, right? Works slightly differently in the UK, so if we went full PR, we'd have an absolute democracy which sounds terrible! I personally think executive power should be reserved for the king and that the House of Lords should return to the aristocracy, then have PR or not, I don't care.

[@carolbrookes5748]

Although most voters would prefer proportional representation, politicians are happy with things as they are (less chance of a coalition government). Just out of interest, how would proportional representation impact US politics?

[@gillfox9899]

Was thinking the same thing. How much in favour of PR would you be for America?

[@Dagan81]

The two parties have always entertained several factions who, in the end, still settle on a 'Yes' or 'No' vote in coalition building.

[@gileswilliams3014]

US insanely complicated though, do you have PR for senate and congress? What about the local representatives? Can't really have PR for president, can you? Electoral college would have to go, or some sort of hybrid system? I think federalism is a good improvement on the UK constitution (obviously America has the size to pull it off better than we). America would be tough.

[@t.a.k.palfrey3882]

Regrettably, this isn't true. As part of the coalition agreement between Cameron and the Lib Dems, Cameron agreed to a national referendum on introducing a form of PR in place of FPTP. The vote was held in 2011 and 68 percent of voters wanted no change. Only 32 percent supported PR.

[@carolbrookes5748]

@@t.a.k.palfrey3882 Recent YouGov UK poll (Jan 2024) show a 45% preference for PR with a 26% preference for 'First Past the Post'. The rest of the people polled 'didn't know'

[@Ben31337l]

I am a reform voter and I agree with you. Ever since the election, I feel that we live in an echo chamber of people who are of like minded people. Birds of a flock fly together. Even though I may disagree with your opinions, I respect you for standing up for what you believe in.

[@NikolaHoward]

I'm a Green Voter - have been for 20 years or so. I voted tacticaly in this election, as the seat I currently live in was Blue "forever" - It flipped Red this time, and yet given the leader of the party I had to choose is transphobic, I'm deeply uncomfortabl with that. I really liked the Lib Dem policies, I hoped against hope that they might form the opposition... PR causes "messy" more representative collilition governments... We aren't used to that - 2010 being proof of it. It wasn't a collilion, it was the Tories railroading the LibDems

[@Ketraar]

The problem with strategic voting is that you don't know really how other will vote and so you get skewed voting because everyone thinks there is no point. You should always vote what you like and what you think and not worry what others may do, you are only responsible for yours. Imagine if you get to a point where your vote would have been needed to elect the people you actually wanted, how heart braking would that be? I know pollsters tell you different, but people should vote the policies they like.

[@evan]

It's so awful that the current system makes these situations happen where you have to vote for someone that has policies (transphobic) that you are so strongly against tho

[@wasdwasdedsf]

how is he transphobi?

[@Eikenhorst]

Yea, coalitions are terrible :D People with different opinions having to find compromise with other parties is hell. There is one serious downside to this, and that is that such a coalition inevitably ends up somewhere in the center of the political spectrum, even if everyone is sick and tired of the center parties, they are pretty much unavoidable and no major change will take place, making some believe that voting is pointless anyway.

[@cillianennis9921]

I think the problem with PR is that it starts to remove the whole voting for a person idea with the MP way of working. That's why I think its better to vote for the STV system which helps create a system where voting for a party like green is viable without having to risk letting the Tories take the seat.

[@craggle6929]

There is a few reasons people vote Reform, from near where I live heres a few of them, Bradford, Dewsbury, Chapeltown, Rotherham. The disconnect between London and the rest of the country is so vast now to be almost immeasurable.

[@evan]

Yeah we see Nigel Farage who enjoys being buddy buddy with Trump for who he is.

[@thescrewfly]

Living in a country with full PR, it's clear to me that, apart from reducing your dependence on tactical voting, the need to form coalition governments after each general election actually promotes stability. Political parties cannot afford to be as adamant or abrasive about any extreme or fringe views they may hold, if they want work together successfully. In time this works out. Change is relatively slow, which at least limits the degree to which each new government has to spend its time and taxpayers' money undoing the previous government's legislation every few years. Admittedly this makes politics relatively boring, somewhat less adversarial and not so blatantly farcical, but then entertainment is not what you really want from government (unless you just want to see the world burn).

[@TheBadVideoMaker]

Yougov polling data shows 54% in favour of PR and 16% against.

[@evan]

ooooo

[@abcdef-uc1rj]

@@evan Very similar to the number who supported brexit and look how that turned out. People think it will be all sunshine and roses until they actually experience the downsides themselves. While PR has a lot of merits, it can often lead to unstable coalitions making governance difficult.

[@katrinabryce]

@@abcdef-uc1rj The most stable time in the previous 14 years was when the Tories were in coalition with the Lib Dems. The least stable was when they were in coalition with the DUP, and the previous 5 years when they had an 80 seat majority weren't particularly stable either. I don't think you can say that First Past the Post delivers stable government, or that coalitions don't.

[@harryishatless]

I wouldn't pay too much attention to a single poll. As recently as 2011 we had a referendum to make a minor change to our voting system to make it slightly more proportional (Alternative Vote method) and it was overwhelmingly rejected 68%-32%.

[@TheBadVideoMaker]

@@harryishatless Every expert opinion that I have read on AV (the system that was on offer) has stated that it is not a proportional system. In fact, some opinion states its it can give less proportional results in certain circumstances. Why the Lib Dems agreed to a referendum on it is beyond me.

[@ianz9916]

The problem with proportional representation is it would require the people who are currently winning using the first past the post system to change the rules. Turkeys don't vote for Christmas. The dreaded Brexit is a constant source of division but that actually was a PR vote as it was a binary choice.

[@donmac7780]

@@ianz9916 Actually, Brexit itself was a case of turkeys voting Christmas! The communities that voted the most for Brexit suffered the most from its inevitable consequences.

[@jonharvey6277]

Being happy about being able to complain about a different party being in charge should be part of the citizenship test moaning about any all outcomes is peak Britishness

[@sbjchef]

single transferrable voting is the best way to maintain the personally representative part of our mp's remit

[@MattGrayYES]

A wise person once told me “Opinions are like arseholes. Everyone’s got one.”

[@evan]

But some people are one too ;D not u bbz

[@bobm4378]

it depends whether the speak out of it!!!♨🌋👺

[@briiree]

Also, people votes strategically assuming the first pass the post system. They would have voted differently if the system was different.

[@simhedgesrex7097]

Yes. I voted Labour. Under PR, I would have voted LibDem.

[@Julia-es4cw]

I’m really enjoying your recent videos where you’re commenting on current events or doing a bit investigative journalism. Your critique is very insightful. I’ll always love the variety of videos you make as you’ll never know what’s next, so I hope you keep it varied, but just wanted to acknowledge that you’re clearly in your element with these.

[@apjtv2540]

One of the main problems with proportional representation is it's harder for people to have MP's that represent their individual constituency, instead just choosing the number of members each national party sends to parliament. A benefit with something like FPTP, or the two round system that France uses, is that it allows for the individual communities to have their voice in central government (in theory, at least). Now, I still don't like FPTP, don't get me wrong, but I've seen the debate get oversimplified a bit online, so wanted to give my thoughts.

[@svartmetall48]

MMP in New Zealand gets round this somewhat.

[@llblumire]

There are more proportional systems, like MMP and STV, that keep the local constituency link!

[@APAG]

You can have both! look at the GLA for example.

[@alyssashady]

Why do you people freakin care about constituency link so badly 💀💀

[@Ketraar]

This is a wrong way to look at it. It snot mandatory that you would just create one electoral region and then just divide things up in proportion. Normally you divide the country up and instead of having say 10MP being elected in 10 small counties you make 1 electoral region that elects 10MPs and divide those up proportionally. Most countries then even apply a slight skew to parties with more votes to favour majorities, its called the D'Hondt method. Alternatively, if you really want to use the more direct option, you could do the French version of FPTP which requires a majority vote to elect an MP in the first round. If a majority is not obtained a second election takes place requiring parties to meet a certain percentage to be eligible. Still saying that FPRP saves you from having parties just decided who they send to parliament is a weak argument, because its the parties decide who they run in any election anyway and once in parliament they follow party rule just the same.

[@GazilionPT]

If Britain used proportional representation, campaigning would be different and a big chunk of the population would also vote differently, because "tactical voting" would not be a thing (or it would be a totally different thing). So, extrapolating MP allocation if the system was different but the votes were the same is nonsense, because the votes would not be the same.

[@helenwilkes9447]

Exactly I'm finding media comments about this really annoying and I'm not against changing to PR I'm just concerned about what version to use

[@Alfonso162008]

Of course the votes would be different if the system was different from the start, and I do believe there would need to be a more extensive research to do a proper comparison between the two systems, but, all in all, I don't think it's useless to make this sort of comparisons, saying "this is how the Parliament would look like if we used a different voting system". Now, whether or not you can draw any meaningful conclusions regarding how the Parliament or the government would actually look like, or if it would be a cause for concern or relief for each party, that's up for debate and open to interpretation, but at the very least, I think it would be educational and informative on how different voting systems affect the constituency of a government using the same votes.

[@Jwm367t]

Proportional Representation is getting a lot of attention lately, but I actually think Alternative Vote proposed in the 2011 referendum is better (yes, we had a referendum on voting reform, which FPTP won comfortably). This is essentially similar to a single transferrable vote like we used to have in London Mayor elections, and I think its a great system of allowing both the local representation and finality that FPTP has and a greater say in your choices. I personally don't think PR actually works all that well. Often just leads to stagnation with votes being too split up for any party to actual have initiative and removes that local representative aspect as you have to allocate MPs based on national vote instead.

[@d_dave7200]

AV would still be very non-proportional in a lot of cases. The best system is likely one like Germany's. We would increase the size of our local constituencies, and then the rest of the MPs would be selected from a party list based on the popular vote to get the final result as close to PR as possible. In terms of stagnation, it just means parties have to form coalitions sometimes, which works very well in some countries. Considering the UK public's like of stable government, I think they'd be incentivized to not let chaos reign.

[@Jwm367t]

@@d_dave7200 coalitions don't work. It almost always ends up with the largest party dictating what to do. We have evidence of that from 2010 and I have seen it happen in other countries too

[@utha2665]

I like the system Australia uses, preferential voting, or ranked choice voting. If a >50% majority isn't achieved, the lowest candidate is dropped out and their 2nd choice is counted, this process continues until one candidate has more than half of the votes.

[@d_dave7200]

@@Jwm367tThe largest party should mostly dictate, but they have to give up something to form the coalition, even if it's only small concessions. Better than what we have currently where there are no concessions at all. I don't agree with a lot of what Lib Dems did, but they got multiple good policies passed in that coalition that the Tories would never have done

[@nahi.03]

The comment about a prime minister not outlasting a lettuce really got me 🤣🤣

[@finndriver1063]

I like AAD (approve-approve-disapprove), which gives you two +1 votes and one -1 vote. But the main idea, really, is that pretty much anything done halfway well, be that AAD, AV, STV, PV, is better than FPTP. I would vote for any of those, and Cameron's failure to cooperate with lib-dem on AV/PV will always make me furious. Also, fun fact: fair voting is impossible, and it's provable via a bizarre topology problem. That doesn't mean fairer voting isn't to be strived for, but it's interesting.

[@ashm4938]

Have to agree, I am in no means a Reform UK supporter, but it doesnt sit right that a party that got 14% of the voter share only gets 4 seats, where Liberal Democrats got 12% and 72 seats. In the same way Labour got 34% of the votes but 63% of the seats. Breaking it down, that means of all potential voters, 75%% of the country didn't vote for Labour.

[@graveperil2169]

63% percent of the voting areas preferred Labour than any other party

[@nigelanscombe8658]

Using the same logic 90.7% of all the potential voters in the country didn’t vote for Reform UK. 100 * (1 - (3,726,224 / 40,426,736)) 100 * (1 - (Reform UK votes / Total electorate))

[@graveperil2169]

@@nigelanscombe8658 and because me and most of the the rest of the UK voting public are to thick to follow your maths we like FPTP no math needed just the one with the most votes wins

[@highpath4776]

IF there was PR of some kind then the number of , and distribution of votes, could well differ,

[@highpath4776]

Similar stats when Thatcher was elected

[@divid3d]

I'd be interested to see how preferential voting would change things in the UK. it seems like very few people there are confident voting for the candidates and parties they actually align with the most, because they have to consider whether or not their vote would be 'wasted' by doing so.

[@GeekySquidoo]

your video on the manifestos was actually really helpful, so thank you! the night of the election our friendhsip group had some fun reading through one of the stratford upon avon independant candidates, their top manifesto items, "teachers dont work enough" and " we're not prepaired for alien contact."

[@evan]

ExCUSE ME?

[@gileswilliams3014]

The proper argument in favour of First Past the Post is that each constituency gets its own representative in government, who is then obligated to bring to attention the concerns of his constituency. (A bit like the senate system in the US, although I know you have FPTP too). Under a PR system, the country just ends up with a bunch of parties who represent the country vaguely and each region isn't represented individually.

[@pmas1]

The MMP system used by Germany or New Zealand solves this by having constituencies elect their local MPs using FPTP and then "topping up" parliament with candidates put forward by the parties themselves such that proportionality is ensured.

[@katrinabryce]

@@pmas1 The same thing happens in Scotland.

[@hucklebucklin]

You can just use AV though... or if you want multiseats you can use PR-STV like in Ireland which is well known for its very local politics (called "parish pump politics"). I don't even think FPTP is that bad (Irish people are obsessed with it like you can't do a simple election with 3 people running and 20 votes with FPTP nope people want PR STV for everything even though it takes forever to count. AV or PR-STV is the only voting system for ANYTHING in Ireland you're basically seen as a democracy hater). I don't think you're very versed in PR if you think localism doesn't or can't exist in PR 😂 you seem to think PR = list system

[@gileswilliams3014]

@@hucklebucklin What's AV, please? What I'm talking about isn't local politics, I mean I get to vote for a local candidate, whom I can get to know before the election. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but under PR, since you don't know the proportion of votes before the election, you can't actually vote for a candidate, just a party, right?

[@gileswilliams3014]

@@pmas1 I'll loop into it. What does MMP stand for, please?

[@metalmad89]

Meh, call me an idiot, stupid or whatever you want for as long as you want, I'm still going to vote based on my opinions and beliefs rather than anyone else's.

[@evan]

Hell yeah

[@BenDBeast]

Personally I'm strongly in favour of ditching FPTP in favour of single transferable vote but largely opposed to PR. STV (also know as alternate vote) eliminates tactical voting by allowing for you to choose multiple candidates and order them by preference thus negating the need to vote against a candidate instead of voting for your favourites. This system allows small parties to grow gradually without allowing for rapid shifts to either extreme in a single election which gives more moderate parties the time to address the root cause of any populist movements. With PR however populist movements can gain power quickly and cause irreversible damage to democratic systems (this is partly what happened to the Weimar Republic). While PR is more democratic it is too destabilising in the long run to last imo especially as the world begins to enter a new period of growing tension and instability not seen since the interwar period such a global environment puts democracies around the world at risk and PR would act as an open door for those forces. This is not simple conjecture either there is historical precedent during the build up to the UK's fascist party under Oswald Moseley was beginning to gain large amounts of support under PR he would almost certainly have gained enough power and influence to either win an election or overthrow the government such a timeline would have disastrous global effects. PR also eliminates local representation which would be very unpopular. Ultimately the main argument in favour of PR is that it is inherently more democratic but while good in theory there are plenty of other aspects of governance that could be more democratic but simply wouldn't function for example a direct democracy is inherently more democratic than a representative democracy but in the modern world such a system is simply unviable. Another great video as always I always love your camera work and deeply admire your consistent ability to remain both logical and humorous on your approach to such subjects.

[@elfemem]

Surely STV ends up with a similar situation to now though - IE: reform voters will probably put reform 1 and either labour or conservatives 2 or 3 depending on which side of the aisle they're on. Greens and lib dems will eventually put labour as their choice as 2 or 3. Or the voters for those smaller parties won't put any further parties and their vote will be discarded. All the votes still get transferred over to labour or conservatives in the vast majority of English seats, unless people tactical vote which smaller party they put first which is one of the things I despise about the current system. This means if you're truly a proponent of one of the smaller parties, you aren't getting any more representation than you are at the moment, you've just had more hurdles to jump to get to the least-worst option, which is essentially what people are voting for under the current system. Not sure what I'd say the best option is really. But I don't see STV as being any better than FPTP except that it allows people to pretend the country had more of a say than they do at the moment for the same final result.

[@xVancha]

Not sure why I'm seeing multiple people in this comment section conflate AV with STV. AV elects a single representative. STV elects multiple per constituency. Under STV with three MPs per constituency, if the three most popular parties came in at 33%, 30% and 28%, you'd end up with an MP from each. A constituency that had 60% for 1 party and 25% for another would end up with 2 MPs from the former and 1MP from the latter. The more MPs you have per constituency under STV, the smaller the share of the vote a party needs to get an MP. Basically it tries to achieve proportionality within the constituency rather than the country as a whole. AV is simply FPTP with ranked-choice voting.

[@zak3744]

The other thing that PR does, which often isn't mentioned, is that as well as breaking the local constituency link, it also formalises political parties within the consitution and changes a voter's relationship from being with an individual who they vote for (even if that individual has a party label) to being with a political party. Now, that's not to say that these are good or bad things necessarily, but they are both fundamental changes in the constitutional arrangments and assumptions of our system, assumptions that a lot of constitution is buit upon. Single-member constituency STV, for instance, would be an election system that gave voters more power and choice, without changing either of those principles. STV with multi-member constituencies would weaken the constituency link to some degree, but the personal representative would remain intact: you'd still vote for individuals, not parties. PR would both break the constituency link and formally insert political parties into the constitution. We could currently have a House of Commons of 650 independents, in theory, and nothing would break constitutionally. In PR the "proportional" bit is the proportion of _party_ votes, so that parties are no longer optional collaborations between individual citizens and political representatives, they're necessary for the system to even work! (STV with multi-member constituencies is actually really neat in terms of the role of parties, because obviously what I've said above is what is constitutionally true, and is important, but in reality lots of voters actually want to vote for parties, rather than specific individuals. With multi-member STV, if voters, as a general mass, decide that they don't particularly want to pay much attention to political parties, and vote for individuals without taking any notice of their party label, then you get a result which does not have any link to proportionality in terms of parties. If voters decide, as a group, that parties are the only important thing, and only vote based on the party label, you get a result which is proportional to the party vote shares. And on a sliding scale in between those two end points, the more and more voters make their choices based on party labels rather than individual candidates, the more and more party proportionality will be enforced by the electoral system. The voters get to choose, by the sum of their individual actions, whether parties should be the basis of the electoral calculus or whether parties should be irrelevant to it. Who could argue with that?!)

[@nealjroberts4050]

@zak3744 I like the way you think!

[@GCOSBenbow]

@@elfemem You're correct up until you start to take into account Labour and Conservative voters. Those will also start ranking the smaller parties in some cases leading to the smaller parties picking up more seats. As an example you could see most Labour voters putting Lib Dems at 2, Green/Reform at 3, with Conservative voters putting Lib Dems/Reform at 2/3. Those smaller 'populist' parties will then naturally get more seats. Personally am not a fan of removing FPTP from national elections but for local council elections this is such a brilliant system to ensure a good balance of strong government while allowing for more representation (favouring the smaller/middling parties).

[@donmac7780]

Considering that there have been 5 Tory Prime Ministers in the last 8 years, the idea that FPTP creates stability is laughable.

[@tobeytransport2802]

The parties are sitting on the wrong side on that diagram. They bother to place the speakers chair but they put the government (Labour) on the left of the chair, when it sits on the right of the speakers chair.

[@ArtyFactual_Intelligence]

A Single Transferrable Vote is the only way forward.

[@coolbanana165]

That's still not democratic and representative. What we need is Proportional Representation.

[@ChristianJoseph-zi7ut]

@@coolbanana165 Agreed. Stupid comment from @ArtyFactual_Intelligence.

[@nealjroberts4050]

STV works best with multi member constituencies. No reason we can't go back to the 2 member ones we used to have.

[@mdtauk]

The main thing that will be lost using more proportional representation, is that a local area, no longer has a known representative that got a majority of support in that area.

[@James-H84]

There is PR systems with seats for example MMP.

[@Ketraar]

This is a fallacy, while in theory its accurate, in practice it doesn't make a difference, MPs are party members and as such will follow party rule.

[@dominicskelton3031]

That's kind of lost already though - very few MPs actually have a majority of the votes in their constituency any more. A hybrid system where, say, votes are done on a regional basis and then the region's MPs are assigned to constituencies would allow most of the benefits of pure PR, while retaining constituency MPs, who I agree are for the most part a very good thing.

[@cyrilthefish]

With the party whip system, we have no local representation currently, they're not allowed to represent us.

[@dominicskelton3031]

@@cyrilthefish that's overlooking the tons of constituency work that most MPs and their offices do. Yes they're whipped to generally vote on party lines, but huge chunks of their job are dealing with their constituency, intervening in council screw ups and the like, handling petitions from the public in their area and more. The constituency office is an often overlooked foundation stone of British government.

[@stu4488]

Hey Evan, both this video and the previous one was really helpful and I shared it with some of my friends and family to help with knowing a little more on what the parties were standing for. I do agree with the points on representing voting but it was very scary that so many voters chose reform. Great that you had the chance to vote and came to live in the UK.

[@imsoboredhahaha]

To be honest, tactical voting depends on the constituency. I know my constituency is very Labour and has been for pretty much as long as Labour has been a thing and the seat is occupied by a senior Labour cabinet member so it would have been very unlikely that my local Labour MP would have been replaced by another party. I felt that I didn’t need to actively get a Tory out with my vote (you could perhaps say I was privileged in that way) so I voted for the party that I preferred and would hope that my vote would contribute to the Labour government having more left wing, socially liberal and green policy. Voters would have only really opted to tactically vote if there was a real threat of Tory continuation or Tory/Reform UK takeover in their area. If you’re left wing and live in a consistently Labour constituency, you wouldn’t feel the need to vote tactically.

[@waragh]

And the USA also uses almost the same system.

[@mickylee82]

True, only the electoral college system used in the states is even less proportional than ours

[@Ketraar]

US is even worse because not only do they not use representation voting, they also have stupid gerrymandering which is akin to cheating to get elected. Its bonkers. @mickylee82 Its actually the exact same system in most states, more votes = win. With some exceptions where the electoral votes are split proportionally, think Main does that and some other are doing it too. But for House and Senate its FPTP with some cases of runoff elections if you didn't get 50%.

[@alexandru5369]

yes and no that's only for federal elections and that's not too screw over small states and alienate them as the population of America is overwhelmingly on the East and West coast the middle of America is basically empty. So I get what you're saying but the electoral college makes sense FPTP doesn't. Like how does Reform get 500k more voted than the Lib Dems yet only get 5 seats but they get 72? It's maddness

[@Jabid21]

@@mickylee82and that’s barely scratching the surface. There are other things that make things less ideal. 1. gerrymandering- ruling party within a state draws district boundaries to favor themselves. 2. Party primaries- only allows extreme, well-funded party candidates to actually be on the ballot, filtering out moderate candidates within the party. 3. Voter suppression laws, regular purging of voter rolls, number of polling stations disproportional to population density, elections held on a working day (UK also does this one) instead of a holiday or weekend.

[@patty4349]

Primaries were used to change the Republicans from a staid conservative party into radical populists.

[@tf9888]

Look up the 2011 United Kingdom Alternative Vote referendum. The public voted against it. "The proposal to introduce AV was rejected by 67.9% of voters on a national turnout of 42%." -wiki

[@ZadenWoW]

What you also didnt care to read that it was put forward by the lib dems who broke their manifesto promise of not increasing uni fees. It was a protest vote nothing more. By your logic here 100% of people who voted for brexit wanted it fully because that was the result.

[@desertels5119]

Yes that's when the Nick Cleggs Lib Dems proposed it, it's been 13 years now, things have changed. The you gov poll suggests 54% in favour and 16% against. Both right wing Reform voters and left wing Green party, lib dem, Plaid Cymru, more left leaning Labour voters now want the change.

[@simhedgesrex7097]

@@desertels5119 The LibDems actually proposed STV. But the Tories ruled that out, and said that they could have a referendum on AV.

[@ModeratorFriendly]

I think a lot of people would vote differently if we had PR, I'd probably vote Green.

[@maddyl6988]

I wanna say thanks for the manifesto video. Haven’t watched your channel since I was a teenager but the algorithm decided to show me that video and it was really helpful. I made a score chart like yours and gave my own points for each policy, I even added some policies you didn’t cover and read those sections of the manifestos myself. I really appreciate you creating and sharing that structure of comparing and scoring key policies, and that you took the time to explain and show the policies in the video. I was very torn who to vote for and you helped me decide, even though our personal opinions and priorities differ slightly. 🙂

[@lostboy3080]

The path to hell is often paved with good intentions. Everyone is so up in arms about proportional representation, but a pure PR system isnt compatible with parliamentary system, where people elect their representatives from a particular constituency and not directly elect the PM. Maybe a system like Germany or that used in Australia would work, which is a combination of people electing their representatives and each party getting an additional representative based on their vote share, as long as they clear a threshold percentage.

[@d_dave7200]

Yes I think a Germany style system is the way to go. Agree

[@ThePirateParrot]

Or leave it alone and elect the house of lords proportionally. Let the parties pick the upper house based on there vote share then require a 3/4 majority for the commons to overrule them.

[@Eikenhorst]

As someone that comes from a country where we have no representatives for each district, I do wonder what you think that such a thing adds. Say in my city party A is the biggest, but I personally support party Z, and don't feel in any form or way represented by whatever A does or want, how is that guy my representative? It is not like I can go and call him and say "ohhh, vote for proposition X or else I will not vote for you" since it is clear I won't ever vote for him anyway.

[@abcdef-uc1rj]

@@ThePirateParrot We will end up with a situation where the two houses battle each other and nothing gets done. For a parlimentary system like ours a single transferable vote system is the most logical. It might actually get people looking more closely at policies across parties rather than just believing the nonsesne that the tabloids spout.

[@lostboy3080]

​​@@EikenhorstAs I understand, in the UK, the parliamentary constituency is composed of roughly equal size of populations. It's not really the best system, but I don't know what you would suggest instead? There is no system which is perfect as people we are far from perfect. Maybe, there could be some sort of ranked choice based system, but I think that would be too difficult for much of the electorate to comprehend.

[@Idk-ys7rt]

I think we should use MMP (Multi-Member Proportional) or STV (Single Transferrable Vote). I think the New Zealand system or French system works quite well personally.

[@Idk-ys7rt]

I know France isn't PR... I just like the two rounds system

[@svartmetall48]

NZ and MMP is great. Would strongly advocate for it here.

[@Idk-ys7rt]

@@svartmetall48 Yeah, it keeps MPs or 'electorate' as it is in NZ and is proportional because of the "top-up seats. MMP is probably my favourite system atm alongside with single transferrable vote.

[@ColinSmith2001]

MMP as already used in Scottish elections......

[@waltersumofan]

@@Idk-ys7rt The turnout though I found way too low. Today the second round it's about 26% or something like that? The voting system is interesting and I agree the two rounds system I think is helpful but something else needs to help that turnout

[@Stratelier]

One of the problems with fighting for something _in principle_ is you have to STILL fight for it even/especially in situations where that principle is ... "inconvenient" for you.

[@evan]

Yes!

[@PeterPrestonUK]

Fundamentally, Reform wouldn’t magically have a third of Westminster. The reason they’ve done so well this time is that the Tories were so inept. Next time around they won’t be as popular… unless the Tories decide to welcome Farage as their next leader. Don’t write off them being stupid enough to do just that. If more money was put into education, more people would be able to critically assess political claims and spot the bullshit.

[@thesoreenman2498]

Hate how the graphs grouped the green party with 'Other' when they have the same amount of seats as reform

[@ellieban]

You are so right on the bundling of the greens with “other”. It’s increasingly indefensible and infuriating.

[@lindylou18]

Evan, as we had a new constituency, and i didn't know who was in a stronger position, i just voted for who I wanted to 😂. Felt strangely empowered!

[@taibabajar]

The best process would be if everyone voted for their 1st choice candidate, and the 2nd choice candidate, 3rd choice candidate etc.

[@oliverraven]

Shouldn't an American be asking "what if Britain used winner-take-all like the Electoral College"? 😉

[@barneylaurance1865]

How is the electoral college more winner-take-all than the UK system? In both countries we end up with a single head of government who can make executive decisions. President in the US, PM who can act in the name of the king (or advise the king on how to act and expect their advice to be followed 100% of the time) in the UK.

[@ltpinecone]

I wish we had Ranked Choice and no electoral college here in the states.

[@crae_s]

Some US states have changed this right? Where if 1/3 votes democrats, 2/3 vote republicans, then 1/3 of the states electorals will be democrat? Or something? I guess most states still have winner takes all

[@fayesouthall6604]

Exactly what I thought.

[@oliverraven]

@@barneylaurance1865 If you can't see the difference between winner-take-all and simple plurality in single-member districts then I'm not sure what more I could do to explain it. @ltpinecone I wish the US kept the college but introduced PR for it, but it's not my country so feel free to campaign for whatever system you like.

[@Azeria]

if UKIP and the Brexit party had been fairly represented in 2015, 2017 and 2019 we wouldn’t be in the mess we’re in, because the Tories wouldn’t have had to move so far to the right to adopt their polices in the first place, and Brexit would still be a fringe idea

[@JECastle4]

Under PR, not only would people vote differently, the campaigns would be very different. Lib Dems very much focused their resources on target seats, most of which we won. Labour did the same, eventually. Only Reform went for broad appeal and the result is what it is.

[@AdamGaffney96]

I like Scotland's version (being biased since I am Scottish) which is AMS. Essentially when we vote, we vote via FPTP for a local MP, who is a named person that will represent our specific constituency and tackle local problems. However you also have a second voting sheet where you choose a party, and this is distributed proportionally. The party gets told how many seats they get from this and then they essentially decide who they're going to send. Hence you see in Scottish elections, Greens will typically get close to, if not none of the FPTP seats, but get about 12-18 seats from the second section and be a pretty big chunk in parliament. It means that you get to vote for a local candidate you agree with enough and think might win (e.g. I was usually 1st vote SNP, 2nd vote Green), then with your second vote you get to choose the party you actually agree with the most. It's a bit complicated for some people when they're only used to FPTP, but once you get used to it it's nice to have proper representation, and parliament is usually only a few percent off the actual vote share. The one thing to note is that this usually leads to coalitions and hung parliaments. Which personally I think is fair and represents what people want, however some people don't like that because they believe nothing gets done. I think a forced coalition to work together and compromise is good in general, and should be encouraged rather than allowing one party to do whatever they want. Cause that's fine when you like what they're doing, but what happens when someone you don't like gets in? Then you feel like you've essentially got no presence.

[@kenhobbs8565]

In your party manifesto video you made it very clear you were comparing based on what's important to you.

[@JohnStowers]

When will you learn these lame "OMG reform voters be like this lols" comments will be what sinks this government and everything left of centre for a generation. Did you learn nothing from "basket of deplorables"

[@jevonperkins7760]

To be fair, I think the risk we've got is that 1; if the Tories lurch to the centre, a sizeable number of right wing Tories will just defect to Reform, and 2; if the Tories lurch rightward, Tory voters will switch to reform because it'll likely be Braverman who is 1; unpopular and 2; would be decimated given the clip of her talking down to a holocaust survivor.

[@17thcentury_girl]

Glad Plaid got 4 seats, 1 from where I live.

[@evan]

Hell yeah

[@rogoth01themasterwizard11]

the thing that underpins your rant about 'under a fairer voting system reform would get more seats', and why that's actually a problem, I'll use a well known example to paint the picture: Is equivalent of saying, 'with proportional voting that gives the Nazi party more seats and more power to influence law making, therefore it's fairer, so should be used' everyone agrees with the PRINCIPLE of the system, but there needs to be checks and balances in place to prevent another Hitler event from occurring, and if we use the most recent election data then 'Reform UK' would have more seats than the out going conservative government, and I don't know about you, but I'm generally not a fan of radical far right bullshit leading to insulationism and isolationism policies becoming mainstream in a world that is so open and diverse now, but hey if that's what you wanna see more of, who am I to judge you on that. that whole first 2 minutes or so of this video is your naivete and general American ignorance of the recent past lived by hundreds of millions of people in Europe and for the most part not wanting to see a return to such things.

[@HSE331]

I don't understand why you think migrants & the rich aren't both equal threats to this country.

[@chrisdale5443]

The only reasonable system that I can think of is the Australian system, where you rate your choices 1,2,3 etc. after all the first choices are counted if no candidate has more than 50% then the candidates with the least votes get eliminated and the second choice of the people who voted for them get allocated to the remaining candidates. This continues until a candidate reaches 50%, so you end up with a local candidate who has a majority of votes, I cannot see a downside.

[@thegroovetube3247]

We had a referendum on that in 2011? and it was rejected.

[@MrMartinSchou]

Proportional representation has the disadvantage of letting very popular extreme parties get into power - if they want it. And they don't always want it. And if they want it, they might not be able to wield it in a satisfactory way. Denmark has proportional representation. It's so proportional, that the % of toves per seat in parliament was within 0.2% for the largest and smallest party in parliament. Denmark has also had extreme right wing nationalist parties in parliament for a long time, and in the 2015 election one (The Danish People's Party) of them ended up as the second largest party with 21.1% of the vote. And despite the right wing in parliament having a majority (90 out of 179 seats), they CHOSE to not be in government. They claimed that they would be able to have MORE influence on policy by NOT being in government. Personally I was wondering why ANYONE who voted for them in the 2015 election would want to vote for them again? Why vote for someone if they reject the opportunity to be in government when it presents itself? In the 2019 election they saw a drop from 741,746 votes in 2015 to only 308,219 votes. A 58.4% reduction in voter support. In the 2022 election they dropped to 93,428 votes. A total reduction of 648,318 votes or 87.5% in just two election. It's not that those 650,000 voters jumped to left wing parties. They didn't. They moved to other right wing parties, because the core issues weren't fixed (hateful people, hateful rhetoric, ignorance, poorly perceived living standards etc.). But it certainly showed me that the extreme right wing electorate (at least in Denmark) is fickle enough that they demand action from their elected politicians, and if they can't deliver, they won't get reelected.

[@coolbanana165]

They only get into power if the people vote for it. Which probably only happens if normal parties don't address peoples problems.

[@ericveneto1593]

CGP GREY covered this YEARS ago

[@nealjroberts4050]

Still valid today. I think he did after the Coalition was needed?

[@Eurobazz]

It's a pity Evan that one former British colony, the USA, didn't adopt PR and I don't mean Puerto Rico. The USA is stuck with a two party tribal system that practices FPTP but relies on an archaic electoral college system to rubber stamp the result. Furthermore, what would you rather have? A convoy of removal vans in 10 Downing Street on the day after the election or a long wait from 5 November 2024 to 20 January 2025 for the new occupant of the White House to start work. I know what I prefer. P.S. I don't know how Nigel will find the time to work in Clacton, Westminster and Mar A Lago. Busy man!

[@simhedgesrex7097]

"and I don't mean Puerto Rico". which is not known for being a former British colony. But then neither was the USA: it was 13 former British colonies. 🙂

[@ekidd79]

I have enjoyed how much of the coverage about the transfer of power at No. 10 has been about whether Larry the Cat & Starmer's pet feline Jojo are going to get along 😂😺

[@eagle_rb_mmoomin_418]

Think about how the last government tore itself to pieces trying to satisfy centre right politics which is where the bulk of the country sits and the much further to the right position of Reform, ERG etc....That's what PR would result in, inability to construct a functioning government out of multiple very ideologically opposed parties. This happens in Europe. With FPTP each of the 650 seats has between 69K and 77K seats. The General Election is 650 smaller local elections focused on local issues with roughly the same numbers of voters and the leadership of the country then takes care of itself.....however everyone thinks we're voting for the Prime Minister....we're not. Actually getting everyone voting in each seat on the local issues would make a difference. I suspect even after the whining Farage did about FPTP it's clear with a better network of less whack a doodle activists on the ground and a bit of policy moderation they could quite easily have had a lot more seats by focusing on the politics of the areas that align more with Reforms viewpoint. I'd be worried about 2029 IF Reform approach the next election as Labour did and focus on the seats they could win and the marginal swing seats.

[@cainsmyth53]

say what you want about reform but 4 million people being represented by 4 people in parliament is crazy. one man speaking for a million

[@no_name4796]

Yup. Reform shouldn't be allowed to be a party for the crazy things they want, but since we are in democracy, it's unbelievable that a party with so many votes gets so many seats

[@Sixty4Horses]

Even with the 5 seats they won, that translates to ~800,000 Reform votes per seat. At that rate they'd need 328.8M Reform votes to get the same number of seats as Labours 9.7M. Ridiculous.

[@wasdwasdedsf]

@@no_name4796 what crazy things do they want?

[@Zomerset]

It was worst for ukip when they had 3.5m votes and one seat.

[@cainsmyth53]

@@Zomerset terrible system. 2/3 of the population didn't vote labour yet here we are

[@Journey22405]

the issue with this is it assumes that people would vote the same with pr rather than first past the post. They wouldnt so this is entirely inaccurate even if it is theoretical.

[@JamJam0189]

Good points the right-wing populist Reform UK alongside with left leaning greens and Lib Dems all want change in the voting system, it would mean more coalitions but it would be fairer if over 50% support was needed to rule on your own. The USA system saw Trump elected despite getting more than 2 million less votes than Hillary and third party candidates in the US and third parties in general don't have a hope in hell at elections, too much is about money in the USA.

[@aimee1569]

We did get a vote on changing the voting system under the tory and lib dem coalition government, and 67% voted to keep this sytstem (not me). Like it or not, this is the system the majority wanted.

[@xVancha]

Okay, but we were given a choice between eating sand or gravel and opted to keep with the sand. That doesn't mean people wouldn't prefer cake.

[@nealjroberts4050]

The problem with UK referendums is the rules on honesty and misrepresentation are laxer. That's why both major ones we've had were screwed over.

[@colinseeney471]

I'm in a very safe Labour seat, which has been Labour since 1945. I voted for my personal preference, given it wouldn't change anything. Turnout was less than 50% and they still had a thumping majority.

[@joshc-dev]

this video comes in segments and I'm here for it

[@john_smith1471]

Evan Edinger couldn’t wait to tell us he doesn’t like the Reform Party, maybe they’ve got good policies like first £20k of income is not taxed, maybe critical thinking Evan, can tell his audience who’s really been running the White House the last four years, because it’s definitely not the elderly man reading the teleprompter.

[@sueflynn9886]

I am a Labour supporter who had to vote Liberal Democratic to get the Tories out!!!

[@lynettesherburne]

Ditto 😁

[@nealjroberts4050]

I'm a Lib Dem supporter who would have done if the Labour candidate wasn't bound to win anyway.

[@vivienclogger]

In 2011 we were given the chance to vote for PR. Of the 42% who bothered to vote, 67% said no. Starmer will use this as a reason not to bring the idea forward again - at least not in this parliament.

[@abcdef-uc1rj]

In all fairness to him, none of the Tory governments in the past have done that. Why would he want to be the turkey voting for christmas?

[@hucklebucklin]

Yes exactly. People act like it is pie in the sky to change it when it was put to the people only 14 years ago. The Libdems did make a genuine effort and no one cared. Crazy there have only been 3 ukwide referenda since 1973 and this is the one I'd say most people couldn't even remember

[@rockyallen5092]

I think the 2011 offering was AV, which is not classed as PR. Definitely a much better system than FPTP though. I believe it failed because the conservatives sabotaged it.

[@rogerphelps9939]

@@hucklebucklin There was not enough publicity. The alternative to FPTP was not very good so FPTP won by default.

[@egris00]

Hear hear Evan!! I'm totally for expressing your self thoughtfully, with respect to the differences of opinion of those around you but at the same time being your authentic self. Thanks for demonstrating to us what that means. Especially with the respectful way you handle those more negatively reactive members of the community. Bravo! You'd make a great uni professor.

[@myribunt5261]

I really appreciate your videos and admire your way of being yourself. I respect it! Thank you. You're open to being wrong if someone shows you that (not about this just in general) and that just is so great to see. ❤

[@britishgaminglivingthedrea5148]

Not true I voted Reform because I like Reform.

[@rogerphelps9939]

Deluded. Bet you didn't read their manifesto.

[@melitajay]

​@@rogerphelps9939what about it do you disagree with?

[@charvais]

Facts are interesting but your opinions are vapid! You leave me feeling you are irrelevant.

[@MikeThePianoPlayer]

I do wonder what country-wide PR (how many votes a party got as a percentage translates to the percentage of seats they get) would mean for the SNP and Plaid since at a UK-wide level they would get ~1% of the total vote each and would likely not get any seats despite having strong showings at an individual nation level. Would PR have to be applied at a nation/Northern Irish level so that parties who don’t field candidates in more than one nation still likely to obtain representation? Or would PR have to be applied in another way?

[@M1CAE1.]

The worst part about the voter turnout is that while Labour did indeed get ~34% of the vote, they only got ~34% *of the people who actually voted.* With a ~60% voter turnout and using round numbers for simplicity's sake we get: 0.34 * 0.60 = 0.204 This means that the amount of votes Labour actually got corresponds to only about 20% of the total voting population. So only 20% voted for Labour, and 80% either voted for somebody else or did not vote at all. Therefore a not completely ridiculous conclusion can be drawn that is that 80% of the population didn't want a Labour govt. (assuming that all non-voters abstained because they didn't feel represented) and yet we have a Labour govt. with a 172 seat majority. This is a comment on the system we have and misrepresentation of votes within the House of Commons. If proportional representation more accurately represents voters and increases voter turnout then I'm all for it, regardless of the parties involved.

[@MkVenner1975]

First Past The Post also allows parties that won’t get into power to promise unrealistic things that they would never do if they were realistic contenders. Labour under promise and they will over deliver. In any case a true form of Proportional Representation is a must.

[@James-H84]

Hmm yes and no. Very similar issue in PR as know the bigger and harder policies are ones they can conveniently compromise on as part of coalition. Very hard to have a reason not to follow though with super majority. I should add on balance I would prefer PR despite the 'stability' of super majority being unlikely.

[@captainbuggernut9565]

Im quite happy with FPTP. Changing it so a couple of fringe parties can get more seats is unappealing. Personally I think you can have a little abit too much democracy. Its morally great but massively inefficient. You vote tory, you get tory. You vote Labour, that's what you get. Under PR, you frequently get a compromise. Nobody gets what they want. Look at the Liberals in 2010. An unhappy result for everyone.

[@Diego-pc4rc]

People will say they are not political, or to remove politics from things. But everything is political you just don't think of it like that because it is what your used to and it doesn't negetavily affect you.

[@john43397]

With proportional representation, you need to find a solution to one area having a representative, who represents unilaterally and unbiasedly the concerns of the voters in the are who voted them in. Members of parliament are required to be open to all voters in their area. Meaning a right wing reform voter or a left wing labour voter, can visit said elected MP with their local concerns and their MP has to represent them, that means ask questions for them in the house of commons. They can't legally say sorry you did not vote for me. I won't be taking up your complaint or concerns.

[@ItsDeffoScott]

Living in a PR country now I realised Britain is not a real democracy. How can you have a democracy when voices are invalidated? Also you have to less to fear from parties like Reform as even if they win it's likely they need negotiation and coalition, tempering their extreme position.

[@Benson...1]

Not an out right democracy but a constitutional monarchy with elements of democracy.

[@IceClawz.]

if we had pr then the entire country would be governed by the votes of people living south of the watford gap. this would lead to the north and less populated areas being left behind.

[@ItsDeffoScott]

@@IceClawz. They already are under FPTP? And that's democracy, most people live in the south east.

[@sangfroidian5451]

We had a referendum in 2011 with 67% of voters rejected PR, so it looks like Reform and Greens will have to keep struggling!! PR is often claimed to be 'fair', but it amplifies the voice of the minorities and suppresses the majorities, so not something that I can get behind. PR can also lead to coalition governments and consensus politics, which is a nice theory but we saw how well that went for Liberal Democrats last time they were in a coalition or the current Israeli coalition government providing a moderating influence?? There may be a way of PR working effectively, but straight PR doesn't quite address some of the above concerns, so we'll have to keep on looking for something more viable. Maybe House of Lords as a PR variant house with House of Commons as first past the post? I don't know, just putting something out there. 😄

[@AnonYmous-fk7gm]

The 2011 referendum was over switching to AV, not PR.

[@James-H84]

I want pr and voted against av in the ref as disagreed it was a stepping stone to PR. It would have just have been bias in another way and risked making reform to PR less likely. As an aside I hate the word reform is now associated with the biggest grifter in the uk and racists.

[@pmas1]

PR doesn't "amplify" the voice of minorities, it gives them the representation they deserve.

[@sangfroidian5451]

@@AnonYmous-fk7gm indeed, I was out of the country at the time and missed that detail. Thanks for the correction ;)

[@gzk6nk]

FPTP is a self-sustaining system. It ensures either Labour or Conservative get voted into power, ergo neither of those will change to a PR system.

[@strodey123]

It is kept purely because it guarantees a Labour or Tory majority government (ignoring the odd hung parliament), if they changed it, they wouldn't. And because they are the only two parties that can get in power, neither will change it.

[@IceClawz.]

if the system was changed then the south of England would be deciding things for everyone else. Proportional representation doesn't work because the population isn't spread equally across the country. every constituency should have an equal voice in the house of commons.

[@Zomerset]

Very good point

[@beccasalt8960]

Not exactly. The south of England (south east, south west, & London) make up about 35% of the current UK population, but that doesn't mean all of them are eligible to vote, and it doesn't mean they are all like-minded. I think proportional representation is the fairest system we could feasibly implement

[@JimmyJr630]

That’s no true at all, there is a huge amount of people in the area around manchester, liverpool, bolton, warrington, leeds, bradford etc. The south has a wealth advantage not a population advantage

[@IceClawz.]

@@JimmyJr630 mate London has more people than all the areas you just named combined....