In 2026, Britain is witnessing the replacement of two-party politics under Labour and the Conservatives with a multiparty system, as was demonstrated during last May’s local elections. Reform won two-thirds of seats on Barnsley Council with only 43% of votes cast, and 92% of seats on Wakefield Council with only 44% of votes. With this June marking 50 years since the Hansard Society Commission on Electoral Reform published its report, it is worth revisiting this document to see how the debate over electoral reform has changed.
How the commission came about
The general election called for 28 February 1974 returned a hung parliament, with no party having secured the 318 seats necessary for a majority. After the Conservatives (with 297 seats) refused a coalition with the Liberals – themselves dependent on the confidence of the combined 11 MPs of three Northern Irish Unionist parties – over electoral reform, they were succeeded in office by Labour (with 301 seats), who formed a minority government. This election also saw the Scottish National Party (SNP) increase their seat and vote shares, while Plaid Cymru achieved their first general election victories.
A second election was called for 10 October 1974 with the aim of securing a working majority for the Labour government. Labour secured 319 seats, the narrowest single-party majority in modern British history. It was this loss of majority in 1977 that, through by-election defeats and defections, ultimately led to the government’s defeat in a no-confidence vote in 1979.
In response to these two general elections, the Hansard Society Commission was launched in October 1975.
Status quo vs. change
Chaired by Lord Blake, Provost of Queen’s College, Oxford, and comprising Conservatives, Liberals, Labourites, Ulster Unionists, academics and business leaders, the commission laid out the arguments presented for and against first past the post (FPTP), whereby the candidate with the most first-preference votes wins, whether or not that amounts to a majority.
Testifying FPTP defenders asserted that it “has on the whole worked well” in providing stable majoritarian government. However, the commission found this stability “more apparent than real”, citing that since 1945 new elections needed to be held within 18 months on three occasions: 1950 and 1951, 1964 and 1966, and 1974.
FPTP’s “built-in ‘unfairness’”, commended for allowing strong governments “capable of taking bold initiatives”, was doubted by the commission for suppressing “sizeable minorities”, permitting “flagrant minority rule” and encouraging contrarian opposition and tit-for-tat policy reversals. The commission also noted that three post-WWI elections – 1929, 1951 and February 1974 – saw the most seats secured by the party that won the second-most votes, and growing support for parties other than Labour or the Conservatives.
The “relationship between MPs and their constituents” under FPTP was defended as “an accepted and useful part of the British political tradition”. While the commission did not question this, it noted “widespread disaffection” with FPTP, with 60% of respondents to a Marplan survey preferring a hypothetical proportional result in the October 1974 election over the one produced by FPTP. The commission also noted that prior to 1950 some Westminster constituencies such as the University seats were multimember and elected their MPs through systems other than FPTP.
What did the commission recommend?
Rejecting FPTP, the commission believed that a suitable alternative system needed to meet the following criteria:
- a bias towards single-party governments that would require winning as close to 50% of the vote as possible.
- a threshold that would exclude very small parties except those with strong, geographically concentrated support (eg the SNP and Plaid Cymru).
- allowing the major parties to obtain representation in areas where they have sizeable but not majority support.
- maintaining a constituency link to MPs.
- simplicity with few changes.
- enhancing the role of individual voters.
Based on these criteria, the commission recommended Single Transferable Voting (STV) or Additional Member System (AMS) for Westminster elections.
With the UK having become a member of the European Economic Community and the Labour government considering devolution for Scotland and Wales during the 1970s, the Commission also recommended STV or AMS for European and devolved elections.
While then Home Secretary Roy Jenkins affirmed that he would “give serious consideration to the report” during a debate on electoral reform on 15 June 1976, the government’s opposition to implementing electoral reform or holding a referendum was voiced during a Lords debate on 6 October.
It all sounds rather familiar
The report may invoke a sense of déjà vu: the case for ‘strong and stable’ government presented by FPTP retentionists, political dissatisfaction under that system, and the fundamental arguments about fairness. Even the results of the Marplan survey mirror those of the 2025 British Social Attitudes survey, finding that 60% of respondents favoured a proportional voting system.
Since the commission published its report, Britons have experienced using both proportional representation in devolved elections (and European elections until Brexit), and the distortive consequences of FPTP at general elections.
A hung parliament was returned in 2017 despite the governing party increasing its national vote share, and the 2024 election saw a landslide parliamentary majority for a major party despite record 42.6% support for smaller parties.
There is seemingly a cycle where electoral reform is briefly afforded due consideration before being stymied or abandoned.
The commission was launched after three or four decades of inaction on electoral reform, with materials related to efforts in 1910, 1918 and 1931 serving as its major sources of evidence. In the 50 years since this report, we have seen missed opportunities for change in the ‘busywork’ Jenkins Commission and the Alternative Vote referendum of 2011 whose ‘No’ result has been misrepresented as a rejection of proportional representation.
Those who do not learn from history …
The all-party parliamentary group for fair elections is currently the largest such group in parliament, at 159 members. An overwhelming majority in the Commons is controlled by parties supportive of electoral reform. There is an amendment to the government-sponsored representation of the people bill – about to receive its third Commons reading – proposing the formation of a National Commission for Electoral Reform. This amendment is sponsored by over 100 MPs from different parties.
Considering the highly disproportionate results of national and local elections held under FPTP and a palpable public desire for change, we should avoid repeating the mistakes of the past and take this rare opportunity to move towards a fairer, more constructive democracy with proportional representation.
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