FPTP vs Proportional Representation
How Britain's first-past-the-post electoral system shapes its politics, why smaller parties demand proportional representation, and the 2011 referendum that settled nothing.
How FPTP Works and What It Produces
In the UK's first-past-the-post system, the country is divided into 650 constituencies, each electing one MP. The candidate with the most votes wins, even without a majority. In 2015, the SNP won 56 of 59 Scottish seats with 50% of the Scottish vote, while UKIP won 3.9 million votes nationally but only one seat. The system systematically rewards parties whose support is geographically concentrated and punishes those whose support is spread thinly.
FPTP tends to produce single-party majority governments, which supporters consider a strength. The winning party can govern decisively without coalition negotiations. But this efficiency comes at the cost of representativeness. A party can win a commanding parliamentary majority with well under 50% of the national vote. Tony Blair's Labour won a 167-seat majority in 2001 with just 40.7% of the vote. Margaret Thatcher never won more than 43.9% but governed with large majorities throughout the 1980s.
