It's Time for Real Electoral Reform

Westminster's voting system is broken. Millions of votes are wasted, seats don't match votes, and voters are forced to vote tactically. There are better ways.

This site explores two modern, approval-based voting systems that could transform UK democracy—without the complexity of ranked-choice voting.

The Problem: Westminster Elections Are Broken

The UK uses First Past the Post (FPTP) for Westminster elections—a system designed in the 19th century for two-party politics. In a multi-party democracy, it produces results that don't reflect what voters actually want.

34% Labour's vote share in 2024

→

63% of seats won

📊 14.8 Million Wasted Votes

In 2024, nearly 15 million votes had no impact on the result. If you live in a safe seat, your vote effectively does not count.

⚖️ Seats Don't Match Votes

Labour won 63% of seats with just 34% of votes. Reform UK got 14% of votes but only 0.8% of seats. This is not democracy.

🎭 Forced Tactical Voting

Millions vote against their true preference to "stop the other side". Voters should vote for who they want, not against who they fear.

🏚️ Safe Seats = Ignored Voters

Most constituencies never change hands. Parties focus all resources on marginal seats while ignoring everyone else.

Data from the 2024 General Election. For more on these issues, see Make Votes Matter and the Electoral Reform Society.

Want to see FPTP's problems in action?

Try the FPTP Challenge → Test your intuition about vote shares vs. seat results.

Good Ideas, But We Can Do Better

Reformers often propose STV (Single Transferable Vote) or MMP (Mixed Member Proportional). Both are genuine improvements over FPTP—they deliver proportional representation. But both could be made simpler and more effective by changing how voters express their preferences.

✓ STV Gets Proportionality Right

STV elects multiple candidates per constituency, ensuring proportional representation. It's used successfully in Ireland, Scotland (local elections), and Northern Ireland.

⚠️ But It Uses Ranked-Choice Voting

The ranking aspect creates unnecessary complexity:

Cognitive burden: Ranking 10+ candidates requires knowledge voters often don't have
Ballot errors: Higher spoilage rates from skipped or duplicate rankings
Slow counting: Complex transfer calculations can take days
Strategic voting: "Later-no-harm" concerns can discourage honest ranking

The fix: Replace ranking with approval voting. Same proportional outcome, simpler ballot, faster count.

✓ MMP Gets Proportionality Right

MMP uses party lists to ensure overall proportional representation. It's used in Germany, New Zealand, and (as AMS) in Scotland and Wales.

⚠️ But Constituencies Still Use FPTP

The local vote keeps all of FPTP's problems:

Tactical voting: You still can't vote for your favourite if they might "split the vote"
Wasted votes: In safe constituencies, the local vote still doesn't matter
Negative campaigning: Candidates still win by attacking opponents rather than building support

The fix: Replace FPTP constituencies with approval voting. Keep the proportional list, fix the local vote.

🎯 The Core Issue: How We Express Preferences

Both STV and MMP deliver proportional representation—that's good! The problem is the voting method used to express preferences:

FPTP forces you to pick just one candidate, even if you'd be happy with several
Ranked-choice asks you to order all candidates, even when you don't have clear preferences beyond your top few

Approval voting is simpler: just mark which candidates you find acceptable. No forced ranking. No single-choice restrictions. And it works with both mixed systems (like AMS+) and fully proportional systems.

A Simpler Way to Express Your Vote

Whether you want a mixed system or fully proportional, there's a choice about how voters mark their ballots. Approval voting offers a simpler alternative to both "pick one" (FPTP) and ranked-choice systems.

✓ Approval Voting

Tick all candidates you approve of:

✓ Candidate A

✓ Candidate B

Candidate C

✓ Candidate D

Candidate E

Simple: just tick the candidates you like
Fast to count: add up ticks per candidate
Low error rate: hard to spoil your ballot
No strategy needed: vote honestly
Finds consensus: winners have broad support

Ranked-Choice Voting

Rank all candidates in order (1st, 2nd, 3rd...):

1 Candidate A

4 Candidate B

? Candidate C

2 Candidate D

3 Candidate E

Expressive: full preference order
Complex counting: multi-round elimination
More errors: duplicate/skipped ranks
Some strategy: ranking unfamiliar candidates
Used in STV systems worldwide

Why We Prefer Approval

Both methods are improvements over FPTP's "pick one" restriction. But approval voting is easier for voters, faster to count, and has lower ballot spoilage rates. For most voters, the question isn't "who is my 7th choice?" but simply "who do I find acceptable?"

The key insight: You don't need to rank to achieve proportionality. Approval voting can power both single-winner elections and proportional multi-winner systems.

Choose Your Path to Reform

Both solutions below use approval voting (rating) instead of ranking. The question is: do you want to keep local constituency MPs, or prioritise maximum proportionality?

Click a card above to explore that system in detail

↑ Select a system above to learn more

Take Action

Electoral reform is possible. The UK already uses proportional systems for Scottish Parliament, Welsh Senedd, and London Assembly elections. It's time to bring fair voting to Westminster.

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