Change voting system before next election, Davey urges Burnham

Sir Ed Davey has called on the soon-to-be prime minister Andy Burnham to implement proportional representation (PR) prior to the next general election, advocating for this change to happen without holding a referendum first. As the leader of the Liberal Democrats, Davey expressed his party’s readiness to collaborate with Burnham on reforming the electoral system. He emphasized that if Burnham is “serious about changing the way we do politics,” then “my door is open” for discussions.

In a recent speech, Davey warned that if Labour postponed making changes to the voting system until after the upcoming election, it might be “too late” to enact meaningful reform. Burnham is expected to officially become Labour leader on Friday and prime minister on Monday. Last year, he highlighted the growing momentum for PR, stating, “There is nothing more unstoppable than an idea whose time has come, and PR’s time has come.”

However, during his recent by-election campaign, Burnham indicated that he would not move immediately to alter the voting system upon taking office. More recently, in a Reddit forum interaction, he mentioned plans to “seek to persuade my own party” to include a pledge for electoral reform in Labour’s next election manifesto. He explained his support for reform by saying, “I am a strong supporter of electoral reform, partly because I believe it will enable the change to a more collaborative politics, and one that is less about point-scoring and more about problem-solving.”

Currently, the UK’s electoral landscape is fragmented, with a mixture of different voting methods in use. Despite this variety, the first-past-the-post (FPTP) system remains in place for elections to the Westminster Parliament and local authorities within England and Wales

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