Following on from this, the result of the system being dominated in favour of the two main parties causes the problem of wasted votes of the electorates who vote in support of the smaller parties who have limited or no opportunity to win a seat in parliament or in turn win the election. This means that their votes are ‘wasted’ as the votes they cast do not equate to anything. This is a cause for the next argument as to why the Westminster electoral system should be reformed, tactical voting. Tactical voting is a term used to describe a vote cast in favour of a party, which is not the voters first preference, because the electorate does not wish for the most likely party to win to represent them, so the electorate will vote for the party they think has the best chance in beating the leading party.
Lastly is the argument that under the current system of the Westminster parliament, governments may be established without an absolute majority of the votes but because they have an absolute majority of seats they effectively have a mandate to rule. An example of this is in 2005, Labour won the election with an absolute majority of seats but only 35% of the votes cast. This shows that the majority of voters in the UK did not want Labour to win.
Although there are arguments in favour of reforming the current Westminster electoral system, consisting of disproportionality, choice for voters and legitimacy. The arguments in favour of the retaining FPTP are much more prominent and convincing.
Firstly, FPTP is very simple to understand in comparison to other electoral systems. In FPTP voters only have to select one candidate whereas in other voting systems, for example AV, voters have to select many preferences, which over complicates the process of voting. A complicated electoral process is problematic, as the majority of electorates may not understand. This may lead to voters not voting, as a result of embarrassment or frustration, or may fill in the ballot incorrectly.
Secondly, the First Past the Post system normally results in a strong and decisive government, which cannot be said about other majoritarian electoral systems. This means the government is more stable, less likely to collapse and most importantly has a legitimate mandate to rule. It also causes less dissent from the general public on the government. An exception to this is the Conservative Liberal Democrat coalition formed as a result of no party achieving an absolute majority in the 2010 general election. Even though this contradicts the argument of FPTP forming a decisive government, it is still argued that they hold a legitimate mandate to rule with a decisive 59% of seats in the House of Commons.
Lastly, the current electoral system maintains a strong constituency link between voters and their MP’s. This is important as it means MP’s are more able to understand the issues of the people in their constituency and, if appropriate, help them. This constituency link is a result of small constituencies with only a single MP for each. The constituency link is not as prominent in other electoral systems such as the Party list, which have multi member constituencies.
In conclusion the FPTP system, currently used as the Westminster electoral system, is the most appropriate in terms of simplicity, government stability, government legitimacy and a strong constituency link. Therefor the Westminster electoral system should not be reformed.