SDP-Liberal Alliance Wins UK Election 1983

That always annoys me - that one of the main given advantages of FPTP is always that it 'provides strong government.'
... with the assumption being
a) this is a good thing. Because, you know, having a 'strong government' is what people ned. Rather than the ridiculous idea of recognising that a majority of people voted for someone else.
b) by implication, PR systems provide 'weak' governments. You know, like, say, the German or Swedish or Danish governments after WWII - totally indecisive, constantly collapsing, elections every few months, doomed to 'weak' coalition governments... oh, wait - THAT ISN'T WHAT HAPPENED.

[wishes there were a 'makes exasperated huffing noise and grimaces at the stupidity of it all' smiley'.]

I agree with you that lots of the criticisms of PR are totally false, but I was just saying what a lot of people (especially politicians) say.

Personally the system I prefer most of all is the preferntial alternative vote system. It's the system used in Australia for lower house elections. As I'm Australian I'm probably biased in favour of this one. It doesn't prevent two-party domination but it does allow third parties to get some of their agenda on the political map, by trading preferences on their 'how-to-vote' card.

For instance in 1983, the Alliance could have gone between Labour and the Tories and offered to preference the party 2nd which compromised most with their policies. My feeling is that the Tories would have been more willing to compromise; probably the Alliance would have allowed Thatcherite economics to continue, but with more education and health spending.
 
ATL 1983 Election

Thanks for the comments to my earlier contribution. I don't agree my final figures of 423-169-35 are fanciful. They are based on the Alliance getting about 44% of the vote, Labour about 26% and the Conservatives 24%. That didn't look entirely fanciful after Crosby and Croydon NE and might have been the case had the Tories presided over a disastrous Falklands campaign.

Second point is that while early 1982 marked the nadir for the Conservatives, there was some evidence of an economic upturn. Had the Falklands War not happened and the polls remained poor for Mrs Thatcher, she would have simply delayed the election until 1984.

I think an election in 1984 would have left the Conservatives largest party in a Hung Parliament with the Alliance gaining seats from both Labour and Conservatives.
 
Top