Firstly it favours the major parties both labour and the conservatives have won a disproportionate amount of seats compared to their shares of votes. E.g. in the 2001 election, Labour won 412 seats which is 62.5% of the seats but only won 40.7% of the popular vote. Conversely if Labour were at an advantage in this election then some parties must have been disadvantaged. This is one of the largest criticisms of FPTP because smaller parties do not often win seats despite gaining a reasonable share of the vote. As in the 1997 election the protest/referendum party won 2.6% of the vote but no seats, whereas, under some PR systems this party would have received seats. It is not only small parties that suffer as Liberal Democrats in the 2001 election, won 18.3% of the vote and only 7.9% of the seats.

Since it favours the big parties it leaves little choice for the voters to vote e.g. in the 2001 elections many people did not vote as they were uninterested in the topics being discussed by the Conservatives such as the issue of Europe. Also as well a

FPTP makes some votes more valuable than others as 75% of votes are known as “safe seats” which means that they do not change hands between elections. Therefore 25% of seats are marginal and that it is the “floating voters” in these marginal seats that will determine the outcome and the results of an election e.g. Springburn has a Labour “safe seat” and Ayr has a marginal seat. As in 2001, the Ayr seat switched from SNP to Conservatives. Therefore, many votes are wasted in areas with safe seats, as they do not go towards the election of any candidate. Safe seats can also make people not vote, as they do not see the point in voting as they feel that the party they want to win will e.g. only 45% of voters in Shettleston voted as a result of “safe seats”. This problem has been put forward as the reason why voter turnout is falling. In the 2001 elections the average turnout in 100 seats with the smallest majorities was 63.6 but in the 100 seats with the largest majorities the turnout 53.9%. The other problem with the marginal seats where the result is in doubt literally every vote counts. E.g. in 1997 election the Lib Dems candidate won by 2 votes.

First Past The Post does serve the political needs of the British electorate. Firstly as it usually delivers a majority government. This means that the government will be able to do the job that they are supposed to be doing i.e. running the country. Since 1922, 18 out of 22 governments have been majority government under FPTP.

Too many votes are wasted in FPTP This perhaps explains falling turnout; wasted votes can sometimes come in the form of all votes cast for defeated candidates. Conservative votes in inner city Glasgow or Labour voters in the home country’s southeast England. Ironically you can analyse wasted votes by including all surplus votes fro wining candidates e.g. if a candidates wins with a majority of 30,000, in theory, 29,999 of those votes were not needed and did not in effect the result.

Some topics in this essay:
Past Post, National List, Liberal Democrats, Annabelle Ewing, Liberal Democrat, SNP Conservatives, Lib Dems, , Conversely Labour, England Ironically, 2001 election, labour won, eg 1997, 2001 elections, people vote, eg 2001, election labour won, safe seats, seats people, majority government, means government, past post serve, 2001 election labour, system easy understand, eg 2001 election,