Why doesn’t Labour support a Proportional Representation System?

During the election, there was considerable discussion over what form a coalition of left-wing parties might take, had the Tories failed to secure a majority. There was confidence that a deal would be made swiftly and easily, the impression that a relatively small amount divides the left, paling into comparison with their differences with the Conservatives. Such comments almost naturally lead to expressions of frustration, with the fact the Conservatives have won a majority with less than 50% of the vote. Many call for not just the electoral pacts that have been organised in a small number of seats, but proportional representation, thus allowing the left-wing parties to lock the Tories out of power forever. Most of Britain’s left-wing parties are signed-up to this agenda, but Labour is notably not. This comes as a surprise to many since they feel Labour would be assured of victory at every election and would be the leading party in each coalition government, so what’s not to like? 

Labour remains opposed for two key reasons; one is historical voting results, and the second is an understanding that the electoral landscape is constantly shifting, and the electorate reacts and comes to reject the governing party of the day. 

Labour’s awareness of historical electoral results is key to its opposition to proportional voting. Labour understands that it has, on the whole, benefited from our First Past The Post system (FPTP). However, the benefit has not been consistent, after all, it was the Tories who benefited in 2017, with Labour just 2 points behind but unable to form a government (even in coalition with the other parties). But if you go back to the 2015 and 2010 elections the benefit to Labour is clear. Although they lost both, FPTP did much to stem the loss of seats, in 2015 Cameron was a just shy of 7 points clear of the Labour Party but achieved only a modest majority. In 2010 the FPTP Labour bias was even more decisive, it prevented a Tory majority. The Conservative lead of 7% would have granted the Labour party a solid majority, but not so for the Conservatives, they fell short of a majority and were forced to seek a coalition with the Liberal Democrats. A party who were only 9 points behind the Labour party and yet had 201 fewer seats than them. 

To see just how strange this result is was we have to compare it to earlier results, in 2005 the gap between the Tories and Labour was a mere 3%, half that of the gap in the 2010 and 2015 elections, and yet Labour got a majority of 60 seats and the Conservative’s couldn’t get more than 200. This result clearly demonstrates why Labour doesn’t, and will likely never, support the end of the FPTP system because it keeps them in power and hurts their chief rival, the Conservatives. Why would they share power when our current system means they can still achieve power, and on a much smaller vote share than the Tories need? It simply doesn’t serve their interests to do so. This is why one of the key reasons Labour opposes the end of FPTP, it knows it’s history. 

Many may expect this election to shift Labour opinion, but the truth is it probably won’t. Despite the Conservative party winning the election with 11% more of the vote than Labour, their majority doesn’t reflect the scale of their lead in the polls. As Channel Four have noted in their post-election coverage, on a similar share of the vote in the 1997 election Tony Blair won 50 more seats than the Conservatives. Once again FPTP has lessened Conservative gains, whilst the Labour result would have been almost identical under a Proportional Representation system. 

The second reason Labour is opposed is harder to quantify with facts and figures and is born more of calculation than history. Labour believes that should there be a propositional system, their electoral coalition will splinter and strip them of their premier status, as THE party of the left. For in a proportional system a major reason to vote Labour is stripped away, a fear that to not do so is hand power to the Conservatives. Something that has been seen in this election as the Lib Dem’s vote share folded into Labour’s, as the only party that stood a chance of preventing a Tory majority and with it Brexit. 

Whilst many Labour voters are tribal and will vote for the party through thick and thin (even if this election has shown a substantial number of defections from the party) a considerable part of the coalition is not. They rally to Labour’s banner in spite of their greater sympathy with other parties of the left, because they want to keep Tories out. Once this can be achieved by simply voting for any party other than the Conservatives then they will flock to the party with whom their loyalty truly lies. This will strip the Labour Party of a substantial part of their coalition. Very quickly they would go from being the premier left-wing party of Britain to being just one of the leading left-wing parties, with the Lib Dem’s likely surging to match their vote share, as they have threatened to do for decades. In this scenario, Labour could become a junior partner in a coalition with a party it previously saw as little more than a cause of electoral inconvenience. 

Labours desire to retain its dominance of the left in the UK compels it to support FPTP, even if a proportional system could propel them into power. The party knows that the idea of them being in power of perpetuity is false. Just as some of their voters would drift from their ranks to those of their leftists’ rivals, so to would voters eventually move towards right-wing parties. People get tired of a governing party, they resent them, they see only their flaws and come to reject them. In this vein Thaterism was followed by Blairism, the big-spending under Brown was followed by austerity under Cameron and the cold mechanical nature of May was followed by the dishevelled energy of Boris. The electorate (whether it be the public or Conservative members) reacts against the government and begins to pull in another direction. As such Labour know that years of a left-wing coalition would inevitably lead to the rise of a right-wing government. Whether the Tories managed to remain united as a single party or divided into the smaller political groupings that make it up, at some point the right-would return to power. In which case what is the appeal for Labour? Under our current system, they sometimes get into power, they need less of the vote than their key rival to do so and they have a dominance of the left in British politics. Why would they give this up, to have their dominance of the left undermined by their left-wing “allies” and still only sometimes attain power? Labour doesn’t support proportional representation for the same reason the Conservatives aren’t about to sign-up, it doesn’t benefit them. Labour may well have failed to enter government for the fourth time in a row and be facing years in opposition, it matters not, for Labour knows the wheel turns and soon they will return to the top and they know they need not surrender their dominance of the left to get there.