Draft Speech by David Lipsey for House of Lords debate on

electoral system 26.05.05

My Lords, a Martian visits London. "Take me to your leader" he

says, but he is immediately told it is not as simple as that here,

and whisked round to this Parliament to have explained to him,

perhaps by the noble Lord Lord Norton of Louth, the

distinguished chair of your Lordshipsâ€^TM constitutional committee,

the wonders of our democratic election-based governance.

Now being by definition an intelligent being, the Martian is of

course much taken by this. In particular he wants to know all

about our recent general election. So he googles the Internet

built into his brain, and comes across an analysis of the results

from the admirable Electoral Reform Society.

This is what he learns.

- Of the total electorate, just three in five chose to vote. Of

those, a little under 35.2% voted Labour, by far the lowest

share of any winning party in the last century and this. So

Labour won the votes of 21.6% of the electorate. It was

rewarded with 55.1% of the seats in parliament.

- If the Conservatives had polled the same vote-share as

Labour they would nevertheless have 116 fewer seats.

Labour would still have had an overall majority of 26. To

get as many seats as Labour they would have needed 7.5%

more votes.

- Only around two-thirds of MPs got 50% or more of their

constituency vote. No MP got the support of half their

electorate.

- - Every million voters who voted Labour secured 37 MPs;

every million Tories 22, every million Lib Dem 10.