- Joined
- Sep 11, 2021
- Messages
- 1,165
- Reaction score
- 1,448
Since time immemorial, the Westminster electoral system has been ‘first past the post’ and this would be the traditional system, or minor variations of it, in most democracies that ultimately derive from that ‘mother of parliaments’. In this system, ‘vote splitting’ is a very serious matter and can dramatically effect the way elections go. So a simple explanation of what we mean here:
We will say there is a fictional electoral contest in Leeds in the last UK election, with maybe a roughly 54/46 split between Conservatives/Labour, with the Conservative voters for example being heavily against mass immigration, we will say. So its all to play for and who knows who will win, but likely Conservatives on those figures. Except now if a smaller party was to emerge in the general right wing space, such as Reform, again attracting voters against mass immigration, it might split the vote. Meaning that now you have roughly 46% labour, 27% Tory and 27% Reform, hence Labour will win, but not because the voters as a whole are in favour of their policies, its because the Conservative sides vote was split.
But this very serious phenomenon has been known for centuries, and there has been opposition to the ‘first past the post’ system on that basis (and some others, particularly proper representation for minorities) for a very long time. In particular in the UK a movement was formed in the 19th century, to move away from this system towards a ‘proportional representation’ system that would be fairer all round. Because this was particularly designed to solve the question of minority representation, it was seen as a method of reassuring Southern Unionist voters in the emerging independent Irish state and so was adopted at Trinity in 1918 and Sligo Corporation in 1919, leading to its mass adoption here for the 1920 local elections.
But the Hare-Spence type of proportional representation, adopted here, was also drawn up to scientifically eliminate the dangers of ‘vote splitting’, as described here in an American newspaper from 1906 for example:
And that, by and large, is what it continues to do in Irish elections. Generally speaking (I admit there are some minor exceptions) you cannot vote split in modern Irish elections. If a ‘no hoper’ candidate goes up and does badly his votes are then transferred to the next preference of the voter, who therefore hasn’t lost out at all by voting for the supposed weakest candidate.
But somehow all of this knowledge has now been lost, particularly with respect to Nationalist candidates in the last election, we hear all the time now about ‘vote splitting’. One argument I hear anyway, as an example, is a given ballot where the first preference was to a Nationalist candidate and the second preference to a People Before Profit candidate. I was told that was a classic example of the Irish system cheating the voter, that you cannot rely on the transfers to work. But what are we to make of that voter, is this an example of vote splitting? If he votes People Before Profit (an almost anti-nationalist party) as his second preference he could hardly be described as an Nationalist voter to begin with, hence his vote was not ‘split’.
And now this argument looks set to explode on the scene of the Irish Nationalist candidates gearing up for the general election slated for November this year. If you follow their twitter feeds, you will already see Hermann Kelly of the Irish Freedom Party attacking Diarmaid Ó Conaráin for running against his candidate, and Derek Blighe of the Ireland First party has put out about two recent tweets warning off ‘no hoper’ type candidates running.
Personally I am all in favour of practical on the ground cooperation and solidarity, for example I notice Kevin Coyle and Diarmaid on twitter both talking about meeting up and presumably cooperating although both slated to run against each other as Independents in the election, which is obviously good to see. But, speaking for myself anyway, I am somewhat suspicious of this potentially fractious atmosphere where aspiring candidates might be asked to step aside: both because I think it causes unnecessary friction; and because I worry that this atmosphere could be used by intelligence agencies to wean out candidates they dislike, a phenomenon you should never rule out in the modern Irish political scene.
And whatever other plusses and minuses this viewpoint now has, it makes no sense to do it to prevent ‘vote splitting’!
by Brian Nugent, www.orwellianireland.com
Last edited:
