PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION

Evening Star, Issue 18034, 31 July 1922, Page 4

PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION

CASE AGAINST THE SYSTEM. r “THE FALLACY OP THE SNAPSHOT.” • ““ • The case for Proportional Eepresenta- ; tion has been given at some lengthjin ' o«r columns. The case against it \ as given as follows m a recent article of tlie . British Radical journal, the New btates- . m Tlic" advocates of Proportional Bepwsentatioa are very active just and , pear to have been gaming a c «‘ a S®“ oll of support on what we may, “ m-' tending offence, describe as false putences—that is, to say, by .advancing then scheme as a _ remedy for the | unrepresentative charactsi of the Parliament; and’as a safeguard against the possible; results of an unprecedented num ■ ber of three-cornered contests in the next election Wo call these “ false pretences Wise’the problem of the three-cornered contest can bo very simply solved by the introduction of the Jo and has no real connection at all with the essential character of the change ivhich Proportional Representation would bung about; and,, as for the present House of Commons, its unrepresentative character is due primarily and fundamentally not to the system by which it ' v f h ® to the circumstances of the pniticu ai moment at which it was elected. L we had had Proportional _ Representation m ' 1918 (with constituencies returning from three to five members each), fdo Coahtron maioritv might possibly have been dUd of 400, but any theoretical or ■■ moral advantage which the Opposition might have derived from being rathei hss heavily outnumbered m the division lobbies would have been far more thimcffset by the fact that, ns there would have been no , by-elections, by which bs ®' : overt swing of public opinion could bo ' unmistakably recorded, the present policy of the Government would probably be , even less in accord with the wishes of the electorate than it actually is. To fit the point in a quite concrete fashion it is not unlikely that if the present Parliament had been elected by Proportional Representation, it would have adopted " me ®' : quarters instead of only a thud of the educational “economies” proposed by the Geddes Committee. If more people would only realise that " the essential test of an electoral system is not its static efficiency, but lts d^! a ™ c - efficiency, the system of Proportional Representation would very soon, wo be- ■> U eTO bo left with none but Conservative r supporters. It is an intrinsically antidemocratic device. We do not sugges ■ that its principal advocates are actuated bv Machiavellian motives: on the con- ■ trarv, we believe that their attitude towards ' tho question is determined rather by shortsightedness than by far-sightedness, and : that they have allowed themselves to bo blinded, by its superficial mathematical attractions/ to its probable effects upon ' the practical working of the democratic machine. It may bo noted that they m- " > variably begin their expositions of Proporv tional Representation with a statement. ox ' this kind: “Tho purpose of an election is ■ to produce.a House of Commons which is a numerically accurate reflection of the opinions of the electors. _ They regard this as a truism, and so m a sense it is; but ib is a truism which covers a profound - -fallacy. -If,dt w&e practicable-.(and, otherwise desirable) to elect a fresh Parliament, evetv sis months! there would* be u grent deal'to be said for Proportional Represcu- • tation; bub so long as our Parliaments are . quinquennial, or even triennial, what we require of the House of Commons is that ■ it should bo not a snapshot of the electorate at a particular moment, but a movini; picture.! By all means let the picture : be as ‘accurate as possible ; but it is infinitely more important that it should . , move, and if we obtain a greater momentary accuracy,. by any sacrifice of its ‘ ‘ capacity to reproduca subsequent developments'of public opinion, we shall have made a very bad bargain Jet that » exactly the bargain which advocates of Proportional Representation aro asking us : point of fact, periodic General Elections, as such, can never provide a really ' satisfactory means of making the popular will effective, partly because it is impossible to prevent a Government choosing xfcs own moment for a snapshot, and gainimr long terms of power by “ khaki elections,” but still more because it is quite impossible', for the individual elector to express Ills views on a dozen different subtecta by a single vote, no matter now many candidates he has to choose from, especially as neither he nor the candidates can foresee half the issues that will arise before another Parliament is elected, -that is why it is more important, and will always be more important, that the Representative Chamber should be sensitive >, rather than that it should be a mathematically accurate reflection of the electorate at a given moment. The great advantage of pur present system of jinglemember constituencies is that it gives us : a peculiarly sensitive machine. _ Advocates of Proportional Representation aiways argue that it tends to exaggerate changes and movements of public opinion. That is partially true, but what could be better? We wish ib exaggerated tnem still ' more; for the danger is never that Parliaments and Governments will ho _ too frightened of the electors and too sensitive . to'their wishes, but always that they will , , not be nearly sensitive enough. More- - over, there is tie further point to bo re- - membered that when a turnover of opinion ‘ occurs it is never accurately reflected,_ but ■; always minimised, by the ensuing turnover of votes, because so many electors stick to their party through thick and thin. . . . A House of Commons elected by Proportional Representation would be im- - measurably less “sensitive” than a House ’elected by single-member constituencies for two reasons—first, that something like two- - thirds of its members would probably have ', safe seats for life, and, second, that there / ' would be no 'by-elections which could serve as reliable -indexes , of the movements of public opinion. The second part is admitted by the advocates of Proportional Representation to he a disadvantage, . though they seek to minimise its im-port-anoe; but the first is often claimed as a positive.merit. Able and experienced politicians, they argue, ought not to bo ox- * posed to the vicissitudes of fortune at the , hands of a fickle electorate. With this ", view we most emphatically disagree. It is perfectly true, of course, that the nation - is not. so rich in political talent that it ■ - can dispense with the ‘ services of any of / its leading statesmen. ‘But when, under the present system, -has it had to do so? Mr Gladstone, Sir William Harcourt, Mr Balfour, and Mr Asquith all suffered per- ■ sonal defeat, but all soon returned to the ' House. Statesmen of such eminence might certainly, with advantage, be given safe . seats, but it would be an advantage very dearly purchased! if more than half the House of Commons were to secure safe seats at the same time. Moreover, human . nature being what it is, even a Prime Minister is likely to keep his ear a little .closer to the ground if his own seat, os ’ - well as those of his supporters, depends upon hia faithful interpretation of the will of the country. Mr Balfour’s defeat in i 1906 was thoroughly well deserved. There aro many people who honestly desire to see a great many more “Independent” members in tho House of Commons, and- 1 who advocate Proportional Representation on that ground. They ‘ believe that it would be better if Parliament were less •apt to bo influenced by “the appetites and opinions of the mob.” _ This belie! embodies a perfectly intelligible and! respectworthy ideal, but it is essentially a Tory ideal. If Parliament is te> be a trtdv and sensitively representative body we should seek not to increase but to re- ' duce the number of safe seats. _ As for the question of by-elections, advocates of Proportional Representation, as - we have said, deliberately underrate its importance. A system of five-member constituencies would make the by-election, os ■ we kpow it to-day, impossible, because there would be no General Election figures with which its -results could be compared l .

1 You could not poll the whole of Manchester because,ono of its .five or seven members' happened to have died or resigned, and even if you did tho result would have no clear relation to that: of the .preceding General Election, when : |Crhaps' fifteen or twenty candidates were itt the field. In short, the by-election as a distinct clement in our political system would disappear, and with it would go the most important and effective means that tho electors at present possess of forcing the Government from time to time to recognise their, views and modify its policy -accordingly. It is almost impossible, wo believe, to overestimate the practical value of the byelection as an instrument of political democracy; and the fact that the advocates of Proportional Representation have been able ! to devise no substitute .for it has .always jbeen one of the weakest points in their propaganda. Wo have enlarged an the question of tho “sensitiveness” of Parliament'as an instrument of dynamic representation, because that, in our vic-w, is the vital problem ; and we .have not left ourselves space here to consider -adequately certain other objections to the • doctrine of Proportional Representation. In practice,- as might bo expected, , Proportional ‘ Representation vastly increases the power of the party machine, since it ig virtually impossible for anyone to fight the enormous constituencies which the system involves without tho aid of a. highly-elaborate and expensive, organisation. This, indeed, was the main ground upon which Proportional Representation wasadvocated and eventually adopted) in France, where party discipline was very generally felt to be too weak. At the same lime Proportional Representation tends to decrease the influence of active ihinoritics. Under our present system a well-organised minority—the -Sabbatarians, for instance, in the L.C.C. elections, or the Prohibitionists in many American States—may be able to turn the scale in a score of constituencies, although in the aggregate they might not be entitled to, and under Proportional Representation would not obtain, more than one member out of tho twenty. As it is, in tho absence of nu equally strong organisation on tho other side, they succeed in controlling, on the particular question in which they aro interested, perhaps fifteen of tho twenty elected members. Wo do Pot cite this point as a disadvantage of Proportional Representation—on the contrary, wo regard it as one of its very few real advantages—but merely, to illustrate the misleading character of much Proportional Representation propa-. ganda. A far more important question is tho effect of Proportional. Representation in promoting and crystallising the group system of parliamentary government. - We have seen something in this country during the last year or two of the results of _ tho group system, the shifts and bargains and incalculable reversals of policy which it tends to involve; and most of us are only too anxious to get, back, if possible, to the two-party system. Many people hold that the group system has in any case come to stay. We do not believe it. "We believe that the two-party eystem is a fundamental premiss and tendency of British political thought, and that, though it has been temporarily upset by the advent of tho Labor Partyl it will inevitably be re-established ’ very shortly unless the natural course of events is diverted hi’ some such electoral system as that of Proportional Representation. The advantages of the two-party system axe obvious. The most important is that it provides automatically, in normal circumstances. for a really effective Opposition—which the group system never does —and the value of an effective Opposition, which opposes and criticises for the sake of opposing and ..criticising, ~ is ./precisely comparable to the’-Value ..of ■ counsel in a hard-fought action. Organised, able, and deliberate Opposition affords the best practical guarantee that it is possible to obtain of efficient popular government. It keeps the Government alert, an-d increases that “ sensitiveness ” which wo have already emphasised. Two or three separate Opposition groups, facing two or three Government groups, cannot, as we. have seen of late, or as may bo seen by observation of French politics at any time, effectively perform this essential function, lit may!'Be, of .’course, iliahV.wb, Taro’too sanguine, and that the group system will not disappear an this country m easily and quickly as wo imagine, but at least we can avoid tho adoption of electoral methods which will positively increase its chances of survival. There arc, no doubt, many people who, when they thoroughly grasp all the issues and tho profound changes which will be involved in the substitution of multiple-member for singlemember constituencies, will still bo in favor of Proportional Representation, but .wo do not believe that they will ever bo a majority. The danger-we anticipate is that tho "proportional system may be adopted without any general realisation of even its calculable effects, and that tho country may be unintentionally committed to an essentially reactionary course. Our purpose here at any rate is less to convince the reader of the soundness of our own view than to persuade him to consider the problem realistically as well as mathematically. Would tho perfect snapshot, even if it were perfect, be worth tho price we should have to pay for it?