October 2021
Dear Constituent,
As you may already know, I'm a strong supporter of First Past The Post (FPTP) as the voting system for General Elections here in the U.K.
I completely oppose the initiative outlined in the ‘Open Britain’ campaign email that you sent me for a so-called People’s Assembly to decide, peremptorily, that FPTP is to be abolished and to decide, equally peremptorily, what form of PR our country should have instead.
We already have a proper People’s Assembly; it’s called Parliament! All adult citizens - all 47,500,000 of us - are invited to elect a U.K. Parliament every few years. The U.K. Parliament then chooses a Government and decides which laws to pass.
If some Parties want PR, or whatever, and they think that people support this/might support this - then why not put it in Party manifestos and try to obtain votes for it in a General Election as part of a governing programme?
Any major proposed change to the voting system for General Elections should also be subject to a proper national Referendum, of course. I note that the last such Referendum, just ten years ago, preferred FPTP to the Alternative Vote by two thirds to one third.
With best wishes.
Kind regards,
Jonathan Lord MP
Member of Parliament for Woking