Local elections exposed voting system unfairness - Yorkshire Post Letters

I AM a supporter of Make Votes Matter, a cross-party organisation promoting Proportional Representation for our elections.

The recent Kirklees elections illustrates the unfairness of the present electoral system. Labour and the Conservatives received a similar vote share, being 34 per cent and 32 per cent respectively.

However, under the present First Past the Post system, Labour has been allocated 11 seats while the Conservatives received only five.

The Liberal Democrats and the Labour and Co-operative Party were both awarded three seats each when the former received 13 per cent of the vote and the latter seven. The Green Party received nine per cent of the vote share, but the present unfair system has only awarded them one seat.

The reason for these anomalies is because the only votes of value are for those voters who happen to vote for the winning party. Because so many votes are wasted, usually more than half, the representation of the electorate is greatly distorted.

Having a system with wasted votes means that, at a national level, the Conservative Party, gaining only 43 per cent of the votes received 56 per cent of the seats and, therefore 100 per cent of the power.

It is only fair that the electoral system be changed to one where seats match votes.