User:RodCrosby/QPR2: Difference between revisions

The fanatical attachment to the sacred single-member district by FPTP supporters is strange on many levels.

* The single-member district is a relative new arrival on the British political scene, only uniformly used since 1950. For over 600 years, until 1885, the double-member system was the norm, and its junior equivalent still exists in many places at local government level. A return to the previous constituency structure could hardly be described as radical or revolutionary.

* The supposedly sacred constituency is dismembered about every 10 years, at the behest of the Boundary Commissioners. Constituencies disappear, are created, or may have their political complexion transformed beyond recognition, without a single vote having changed. The irony of course is this havoc is wreaked because of the very existence of FPTP constituencies in the first place, and the unavoidable problem they create - creeping ''malapportionment''.

* The voters themselves are clearly indifferent. Survey evidence reveals that only about 20% of voters can name their MP, or their constituency.

* The contortions undertaken to "preserve" the constituency-link in hideous hybrid systems such as the German system, which eventually spun out of control as a credible system. "Preserve" them by ''halving'' their number and making them ''twice'' as large? Sounds logical.

It might seem that these exclusive imaginary turfs exist more in the minds of the MPs themselves, appealing to their vanity, and the satisfying discovery that the long-term trend has been for these principalities to become safer and safer for incumbents.

But suppose a change was actually agreed upon and PR-squared or a similar small district magnitude (>1) system was adopted. There would naturally be excitement and understandably some apprehension as the first election under the new system approached. A period of transition to adjust would naturally be required.

So why not permit the first-elected in the new two-member constituency to choose what could be re-imagined as his or her "home constituency", for example the northern part. S/he almost certainly knows where the most votes are. The runner-up gets the other part.

Would the voters care, or even notice?