Democracy? What Democracy? We need voting system reform!

Its election season. The whole country is obsessed about the privatisation of the NHS, immigration, trident amongst many other issues but there’s one thing that British politics still refuses to address..

Our unrepresentative voting system. We use a first past the post system in the UK :

In this system each area (constituency) elects one MP from a choice of candidates. Voters can only vote for one candidate and the candidate that gets the most votes becomes the MP.

Not very democratic is it?

I think its astonishing the fact that we still persist with a voting system which blatantly reduces our democratic vote to a mere participation and not an actual influence.

When they ask us to vote and get our voice “ HEARD “ I wonder if they really mean, make up the numbers so the country looks better publicly.

The only votes that truly matter are those in swing constituencies, the areas which aren’t quite decided which way they are voting, so the parties target these areas more to gain votes they know will affect the election.

Take me for example, I live in a Labour safe seat. My borough will probably always vote Labour. Labour started here, but I thing i realised is, The conservatives never seem to campaign here and why would they?

They already know its not worth it. Which is why I think voting isn’t as democratic as it seems. If there was a voting system which meant 1 vote = 1 vote then maybe it would push politicians more to actually CONNECT with those outside their comfort zone.

It’ll teach them to stay in touch with society, not to just cater to their “ voters “ after all, nothing is promised forever.

In conclusion, we need a representative voting system. We need a system that portrays the will of the people individually, after all they do say every vote counts.

So make it count!

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By: Politricks Media, Young people in love with Politics

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