First Past the Post
ADVANTAGE
DISADVANTAGE
SIMPLE, TRIED AND TESTED SYSTEM
FPTP is a very straightforward voting system
– whoever gets the most votes in an area
wins.
NOT PROPORTIONAL
The seats a party wins are not reflected by
the votes each party gets. The biggest parties
tend to dominate and smaller parties gain little
or no representation.
For example, in the 2010 UK General
Election, Margaret Curran was elected the
MP for the Glasgow East constituency as she
gained more votes than any other candidate
(61.6% of the vote). Simple.
LEADS TO MAJORITY GOVERNMENTS
WHICH IS GOOD
The nature of the FPTP system means that it
tends to lead to majority governments. This
means that one party has overall control and
so can rule without having to “water down”
its policies to get support from other parties
– strong governments.
Currently, the Westminster Government is
dominated by the Conservatives, Labour and
the Liberal Democrats. In addition, parties can
win a much higher percentage of seats
compared to their share of the vote. For
example, in the 2010 General Election, the
Conservative Party gained 36% of the vote and
gained 47% of the seats in the House of
Commons – not proportional…not democratic.
LEADS TO MAJORITY GOVERNMENTS
WHICH IS BAD
FPTP usually leads to majority governments
which are arguably not a good thing since the
views of other parties can be largely ignored
by the ruling party – not democratic.
From 1997-2010, the ruling Labour Party
could effectively ignore the views of the
From 1997-2010, the Labour Party had a
main opposition party, the Conservatives.
majority in Parliament and so was able to
This was in spite of the fact that one third
introduce various policies with little
of the British public voted for the
possibility of them being voted down. Labour Conservative Party – this means that the
had more than half of the seats in Parliament views of one third of the country are
so they did not need the support of other
ignored. Not democratic.
parties.
First Past the Post
ONE REPRESENTATIVE PER
CONSTITUENCY
FPTP leads to one representative being
elected to represent one constituency. This
means there is a direct link between the
representative and the constituency.
LESS VOTER CHOICE
Although in a FPTP election there may be
several candidates on the ballot paper for a
constituency, realistically it is only the big
parties that have a chance of being elected,
meaning that voters have less real choice.
The UK is split into 650 constituencies; each
has one MP so there are 650 in total. If a
person has a concern in their area, they can
approach their MP. For example, Margaret
Curran is the MP for Glasgow East. Simple.
A candidate needs to win a majority in a
constituency to gain a seat and so parties
like the Greens have next to no chance of
gaining MPs. In proportional systems like
AMS and STV seats are awarded based on
the percentage of votes meaning that voters
have more real choice as all parties have a
greater chance of winning seats. This is
arguably better than FPTP.
SMALLER PARTIES HAVE NO VOICE
FPTP makes it virtually impossible for
smaller parties to gain any representation as
they are highly unlikely to win a majority in a
single constituency.
LESS CHANCE OF EXTREMIST PARTIES
Under FPTP systems, bigger parties like
Labour and the Conservatives dominate. This
is good as it prevents extremist parties from
gaining representation.
Parties such as the BNP which have racist
policies have less chance of gaining success in
UK elections because they use FPTP. In
other European countries which use
proportional (PR) voting systems for
elections, far-right parties have had some
success. For example in Austria which uses a
PR system, the far-right anti-immigration
Freedom Party currently has 40 seats in the
Austrian Parliament. Under FPTP they would
be lucky to have any.
In 2010, UKIP gained almost 1 million votes
across the UK but gained no seats. For years
the Green Party regularly polled hundreds of
thousands of votes across the UK but gained
no seats (they did win one in 2010 in
Brighton although this was under exceptional
circumstances).
First Past the Post
CHOOSE CANDIDATES RATHER THAN
PARTIES
In FPTP elections, voters choose a candidate
rather than a political party which is the
case under some PR systems. This means that
the voter rather than the party gets to
choose their preferred candidate which is
arguably more democratic.
In FPTP elections, candidates can focus on a
constituency like Glasgow East and persuade
voters why they should represent the
constituency – there is a real attachment to
the constituency. Under PR systems, the
voter cannot usually pick the candidate.
Instead parties do this which is arguably
undemocratic.
WASTED VOTES
Under FPTP, votes cast for candidates who
do not gain the most votes in an area are
wasted. This means that millions of votes
essentially count for nothing.
Under FPTP, in constituencies where there is
big support for different parties or
candidates, there can only be one winner. For
example, in 2010 in the Fermanagh and
South Tyrone constituency (Northern
Ireland) the Sinn Féin candidate won the
seat with a majority of just 4 votes…a
majority of just 0.01%! Michelle Gildernew
of Sinn Féin gained 21,304 (45%) votes with
her nearest rival gaining 21,300 votes.
Essentially votes cast for other candidates
count for nothing so 55% of votes in this
constituency were wasted.