Welcome to the latest report on fair votes & voting reform from Liberal Democrats for Electoral Reform (LDER), featuring cross-party updates and news from beyond Westminster.
Peter Kellner explains why two-party Lab-Con politics is history. He writes: ‘The conditions that produced the old Labour-Tory duopoly have vanished. Despite last year's landslide, single-party governments are likely to be the exception from now on.’
The Britain Elects poll tracker puts Reform UK neck and neck with Labour, with 24.9% and 24.2% of the vote respectively. (Britain Elects aggregates all publicly available polls produced by members of the British Polling Council.) One comment from among Labour ranks LDER has picked up: ‘Anyone can win now - on as little as 25% of the vote.’
Illustrating that possibility, Electoral Calculus’s model shows the volatility of a General Election conducted under First Past the Post where four parties have 15%+ vote share. Use the ‘your prediction’ functionality to see how changes in vote share affect seat counts. (But bring a pinch and/or bucket of salt, because their model shows that if the next election delivered exactly the same national vote shares as the last one, then the Lib Dems would lose 23 seats…)
Similarly, More In Common’s latest Multilevel Regression and Post-Stratification (MRP) poll suggests Reform UK would get 180 seats; Tories and Labour would be tied on 165; and Liberal Democrats down slightly to 67.
The LDER Take: These (and other similar) polling and election result projections show the vulnerability and fragility of Labour’s so-called ‘landslide’ 2024 win; and how FPTP threatens to enable Farage to take power. Awareness of these scenarios is expected to impact Labour’s thinking; if Starmer’s administration continues to be unpopular, we can expect to see more and more worry emerge as this parliament progresses.
Professor Rob Ford underscores the opportunity First Past The Post gives Farage.
Stephen Bush calls for Labour to restore the supplementary vote for Mayoral elections, abolishing the Conservative switch to FPTP
Former Tory minister Esther McVery calls for tactical voting in the Runcorn by-election, in order to get Farage’s R-UK candidate elected.
The LDER Take: Good to see increasing awareness that FPTP is good news for Farage. Plus Liberal Democrat members have expressed concern-cum-outrage (largely at our Spring Conference stall) that planned expanded unitary authorities may well see mayors elected on ~30% of the vote if Labour sticks to FPTP. This issue of democratic legitimacy concentrated on a single individual with narrow electoral support is one we should campaign hard against.
Labour’s members are increasingly unhappy with the government’s decisions, reports Morgan Jones on Labour List. Other authors on the site in the last month have worried that Labour’s welfare reforms will alienate its voters, and that the party needs to tell a better story.
The LDER Take: Cracks are beginning to show in the Labour party’s support for their leadership’s blocking of voting reform. Evidence of many Labour MPs backing PR, plus general unrest at the Government’s performance, is being noticed and the Fair Elections APPG’s push for a National Commission seems increasingly the likeliest opening. The Elections Bill (slated for the next session of Parliament) is the likeliest battleground.
This APPG (our vice-chair is Lisa Smart) continues to grow in membership and momentum. It is still seeking new members, so Lib Dem MPs should please email joe@fairvote.uk to express their desire to join.
May 13, 2025 - 6.30pm Churchill Room, Portcullis House
Manuela Perteghella speaks about the need to cap political donations in a Fair Elections meeting on: ‘Strengthening Democracy In An Age Of Volatility’.
June 3, 3025
Details to be finalised - but there will be an on-line zoom event to take the APPGs work to the widest possible public.
The LDER Take: we are working closely with the APPG secretariat (Fair Vote) alongside Labour reformers (Labour for a New Democracy). There is great energy and leadership in this cross-party group - a strong complement to the Liberal Democrat leadership on Fair Votes spear-headed by Sarah Olney. We urge MPs who have not already done so to join - we need the strongest possible Liberal Democrat presence and the more members the more weight and influence the APPG will have.
The Electoral Reform Society (ERS) previews ‘random’ first past the post results in the upcoming May local elections.
Unlock Democracy’s Shaun Roberts has been making the case for electoral reform in Left Foot Forward, as one of three steps needed to ‘make democracy great again’.
Young Make Votes Matter (MVM) members make the case for change - by saying they support FPTP…
The LDER Take: Inspiring work by young MVMers, using irony to make their point. Voting reform is expressly an issue for young people.
The Institute for Constitutional and Democratic research have produced recommendations on how to combat the overdue influence of big money.
The Institute for Government will be hosting an event to look at wider elements of possible change to the electoral system - a possible fore-runner to the Government’s upcoming Elections Bill.
We hope this report is relevant and useful to you. If you would like to discuss these updates, or unsubscribe, please mail info@lder.org.
If MPs want to join the APPG on Fair Elections, please mail joe@fairvote.uk or mark@fairvote.uk. The APPG website is at
https://www.fairelections.uk/
To join LDER please go to https://www.lder.org/join-us or to get our regular newsletter updates, go to https://www.lder.org/sign-up-for-updates
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