Currently, there is a good deal of debate in this country surrounding the appropriateness/adequacy/fairness (pick your preferred descriptor) of the various electoral systems that operate in both the Federal and State jurisdictions.  Much of this has been prompted by the claimed obstruction of the incumbent Federal Government’s policy mandate by “feral” Senators who have been elected not as a result of the public’s democratic preference but rather as an outcome of “behind closed doors” preference swaps orchestrated by professional electoral system gamers.

Some observers, frequently not without a party political axe to grind, contend that this unintended representational outcome would, at least to some extent, be overcome by the introduction of a first-pass-the-post (FPTP) voting system under which the candidate having the most votes after the first count of ballot papers would be declared the winner.

To a considerable extent this position was prompted by the experience of the recent Queenland State election where after the first count the then LNP Government led on FPTP terms in 51 of the 89 seats but after the distribution of preferences lost sufficient of those first preference leads to other candidates to lose the ability to form government, which enabled the ALP to do so, albeit with the support of an Independent.

Many LNP supporters considerd this unfair and suggested that an FPTP system would have better reflected the will of the voters.

With respect, this is nonsense.  Consider for a moment the situation where in a particular electorate there are five candidates contesting a tight contest.  One of the candidates receives 22% of the vote with the other four sharing the remaining 78% in roughly equal proportion but with no one candidate receiving more than 20%.  It should be obvious that there is nothing fair about the declared successful candidate being elected with 22% of the vote when fully 78% of the elctorate was against that outcome!

There is a another possible outcome under FPTP that suggests its suporters should be careful about what they wish for.  In making this point I am indebted to Prof Patrick Dunleavy, of the Institute for Governance and Policy Analysis at the University of Canberra and Professor of Political Science at the London School of Economica and Political Science  (see UK election spells the end for the biggest ‘law’ in political science) and also to The Conversation (see  https://theconversation.com/au) where his article was published.

In his article Prof Dunleavy suggests that in a number of western democracies FPTP voting systems are increasingly producing multi-party outcomes; that in very few electorates in tomorrow’s UK election will the successful candidate secure more than 50% of the votes cast; and that this progressive move way from the electoral dominance of the two major parties in favour of smaller parties (in the UK the Scottish National Party, the UK Independence Party and the Greens) may well persuade the incoming Government to consider elctoral reform that could incorporate some form of proportional representation.

Proponents of FPTP in Australia, beware!

I will review the UK election outcomes and consider whether Prof Dunleavy’s predictions prove to be correct and what that might mean for those promoting electoral reform in Australia.