British voters seem to be overwhelmingly keen to abandon the first-past-the-post system of voting and are keen to switch to proportional representation. The Liberal Democrat party, the junior partner in the coalition government, had promised in its manifesto to switch to proportional representation, a policy it dropped during its negotiations with the Conservative party, which wants to maintain the status quo.
The coalition will instead hold a referendum on the alternative vote system. Under the AV system, voters have to rate candidates in a single-member constituency in numerical order and votes are redistributed until one candidate has more than 50 per cent support.
The ComRes survey of 1,000 Britons found that more than three-fourths of respondents support proportional representation. Seventy-eight per cent people want the first-past-the-post system to be replaced with proportional representation to “reflect more accurately the proportion of votes cast for each party”.
The LibDems now face the tough task of maintaining distinct identity in minds of people as 65 per cent of voters said that it was difficult to know what the party stood for.
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UK PM faces questions in Parliament
AGE CORRESPONDENT
London
British Prime Minister David Cameron had a very easy time at his first Prime Minister’s Questions, which has now been delayed to 3 pm instead of 12 o’clock under the Labour government.
Mr Cameron, who had very vicious and personal exchanges with his predecessor Gordon Brown during Prime Minister’s Questions before the general election, had a tame introduction on late Wednesday afternoon to sparring with acting Labour leader Harriet Harman.
Flanked by his Liberal Democrat partner and deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg and foreign secretary William Hague, Mr Cameron made a few digs at the Labour government during the 30-minute Question Time, but they were rather tame compared to the blows he used to trade with Mr Brown.
He also was not using notes for his answers, unlike Mr Brown.
In a dig at Mr Brown, who is not seen in the House of Commons, Mr Cameron said: “I am going to give accurate answers rather than make them up on the spot.”
Mr Clegg, as the leader of the Liberal Democrats, used to ask two questions at the Prime Minister’s Questions, but he was silent and did not participate at all. Mr Clegg will hold a questions session in the House of Commons once a month.