Talk:Multi member constituencies in the British Parliament

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[edit] Single Transferable Vote and the universities

As only one constituency had as many as three seats, the trial of STV was not very satisfactory, but it did loosen the traditional Conservative Party grip on most of the University seats and encouraged the election of Independents.

Was it STV that caused this? Looking throgh F. W. S. Craig's volume of election results for this period:

• Cambridge elected an Independent Liberal in 1922 but both he and one Conservative candidate got quota from the outset - hardly an STV impact here. Otherwise the Conservatives always won both seats until the 1940 by-election when no official candidate stood and instead an independent Conservative won. In 1945 only one Conservative stood, topping the poll.
• The Combined English Universities never elected more than one Conservative at a time. The Conservative seat was lost in the 1937 by-election on a straight vote and no Conservative stood in 1945. The Conservatives did, however, gain Eleanor Rathbone's seat in the 1946 by-election.
• Oxford elected two Conservatives continuously until 1935 when A. P. Herbert captured one of the seats (he was second in the first preferences). The other seat was lost to an independent in the 1937 by-election and no Conservative stood in 1945.
• The Combined Scottish Universities elected two Conservatives and a Liberal consistently from 1918 until 1935, with it seems an agreement between the two parties not to contest each other's vacancies. The Liberal elected in the 1934 by-election became a National Liberal. In the 1935 to 1945 Parliament it began with two Conservatives and one National Liberal, but the Nat Lib seat was lost to an independent in the 1945 by-election. One Conservative seat fell vacant and a National Labour candidate was stood instead who won; when he died a non-party National was elected. In 1945 only one Conservative stood, along with the sitting Independent and non-party National MPs. However the Conservatives took the Independent seat in the 1946 by-election.

Of the single seats:

• London elected a Conservative until 1924, when the sitting MP died close to the election. An independent was elected and he held the seat until abolition. From 1931 he was counted as a National Government supporter.
• Wales consistently elected a Liberal, with the exception of 1923 when a Christian Pacifist was elected. (In Parliament he joined Labour - their only University MP ever - and lost the following year in party colours.)
• Queen's University, Belfast always elected a Conservative - and was only contested in 1945.

Frankly all this suggests that perhaps at most one or two individual seats were won by non-Conservatives because of STV. Most of the time seats were lost to independents in by-elections or single member seats and it's possible that this, along with the row about defeated politicians like Ramsay MacDonald seemingly using the University seats as an easy way into Parliament, led to a revival of the desire for University MPs to be independently minded specialists rather than party men. Timrollpickering 15:42, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

I accept that the impact of STV was not dramatic or necessarily immediate, but if you compare the post 1918 results with the 1885-1918 results at Oxford and Cambridge (where only Conservative or Liberal Unionist candidates won) it is pretty clear that there was a change, which I would attribute to the new electoral system. Similarly the two single member Scottish University seats in 1885-1918 only returned Conservative or Liberal Unionist members. London had been a Liberal constituency before the split over Irish Home Rule, but was solidly Unionist after that.

It is of course possible to argue that, as in the case of the single member London University seat where the first past the post system continued to apply after 1918, changes in the composition and views of the graduate electorate were the sole cause of the weakening of the Conservative (and allies) grip on the University seats. However, the historic Conservative tradition at the older Universities was much stronger than in London, so I would need to see some evidence before being convinced.

The electoral system theorists, R. Taagepera and M.S. Shugart, in Seats & Votes: The Effects & Determinants of Electoral Systems do provide support for the idea that changing the electoral system alters voters behaviour. --Gary J 17:05, 12 October 2006 (UTC)