The electorate should not have punished the Liberal Democrats

For those who don't know, the UK General Election this year resulted in a Conservative-ruled government of 330 seats, succeeding a Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition.

"If it is the case, that a party does what it believes to be in the national interest, and gets a result like that last night, whoever is going to dare to act in the national interest again? If it is the case that by working with others in the national interest, in order to - yes, make compromises - but drag this country out of a terrible existential economic crisis, the consequences of last night, whoever is going to do that again? If it is the case that, by trying to put forward a policy of hope, based on those values of respect and tolerance, and fairness, and working together, we get what we got last night, and the politics of grievance and fear win over hope, whoever is going to try and do that again? The question is very much for the Liberal Democrats we suffered last night - but my guess is British politics suffered, too." - Paddy Ashdown, Question Time 08/05/2015

First Past the Post system

To understand the results of the election, you first need to know how the election system works. The United Kingdom's election system is not the best. In a general election, MPs of the House of Commons (lower house) are elected. Within the Commons, there are 650 seats, one seat for each MP of the 650 constituencies of the United Kingdom. There are several ways to form a government:

• Majority government - 326 seats or more for a single party (meaning there will always be more MPs of the winning party than all other parties combined). This is the most common form of government
• Coalition government - Less than 326 seats for a single party, but the biggest party "allies" with a smaller party to get the combined seats over the 326 threshold. This was the case for the 2010 - 2015 Con - Lib government.
• Minority government - Less than 326 seats, but still the biggest party. This is the most unstable form of government, as the opposition can call and win a vote of no confidence.

To become the MP for a constituency (and thus gain a seat in parliament), you must win the most votes in that constituency, regardless of how many votes there were for other parties. This means you can be MP for a constituency with less than 50% support. For example, if there are four candidates in a constituency, there could be a vote of 40%, 20%, 20%, 20%. More people will have voted not to have the first candidate, but as they received the most, they will become the MP.

This system means that, even with a large national support for a party, and many votes nationally, that party might only get one or two MPs. This happened with the Liberal Democrats and UKIP in the 2015 general election.

Conversely, it means that if a party has little national support, but huge local support, they can get a large number of MPs with few votes. This was the case with the SNP in the 2015 general election.

Vote share (above) compared to percentage of seats (below)

As you can see, the Conservatives were able to gain a majority of seats even though they had just over a third of the votes.

The Liberal Democrats acted in the national interest, and not the party's interest

 

2010 election

Surrounding the general election was Britain's financial situation. The economy was still in deep recession follow the 2008/9 market crash.

Election Result

 So the results of the 2010 General Election had no clear winner. No party had received a majority. The three biggest were:

1. Conservatives - 306 seats (10.7 million votes)
2. Labour - 258 seats (8.6 million votes)
3. Liberal Democrats - 57 seats (6.8 million votes)

Labour, being the previous ruling party, were given the choice of minority or start negotiations for a coalition. Seeing as they would have been voted out by way of a no-confidence vote, they went for coalition negotiations with the Liberal Democrats. However, even with the Liberal Democrats, a Lab-Lib coalition would not have gained enough seats to form a majority, and could still be voted out by the Conservatives and a few other parties. Despite political similarities between Labour and the Lib Dems, a coalition would have been unstable, and could have caused more turmoil for Britain.

The Conservatives were also given the opportunity to negotiate a coalition. The numbers worked - a Con-Lib coalition would give 363 seats, well above the 326 majority.

The third option was to force another general election later in the year. This was controversial, however, as there would be no government, and Britain was on the brink of economic collapse.

From what I understand, the Liberal Democrats didn't want to go into coalition with the Conservatives. The Liberal Democrats didn't have to go into coalition. They had always been centre, leaning towards the left - and similar to Labour in many more ways than the Conservatives. But had they not gone into coalition, the economy would have become worse, dragging down the rest of the country. Had they not gone into coalition, another election would have been called, with the Conservatives most likely getting a majority.

Tuition fees

Due to being the junior party in the coalition, the Liberal Democrats did have to drop some of their policies. The most notable one was the pledge to vote against a rise in tuition fees (from £3,000 pa to £9,000 pa). After seeing the state of the economy, it became obvious that a rise in tuition fees would have to happen.

However, the Liberal Democrats did negotiate for a fair payment plan. As such, no student will have to start paying back their fees unless they earn at least £21,000 pa. Furthermore, they will only pay 9% of what they earn over £21,000. This means that if a graduate gets a job which pays £30,000 per year, only £810 will be paid back per year (£67.50 per month).

 

The Liberal Democrats implemented policies to promote social and financial equality

 

Pupil Premium

The Pupil Premium is a grant given to schools to spend on pupils from low income families. It is money that can be used to pay for their meals, school trips, school uniform, books, and other equipment a child may need to aid their learning. This stops the social segregation

Alternative vote referendum

The Liberal Party, and subsequently the Liberal Democrats, have been campaigning for proportional representation since the latter half of the 20th century. Many newspapers and media outlets speculated what the 2015 election result would have been with PR, and many of the smaller parties
wanted it.

During their term in office, the Liberal Democrats pushed for electoral reform. Due to negotiations, they were unable to push for the desired PR, but instead a better form of FPTP, which was called the Alternative Vote. Both Labour and the Conservatives campaigned against it, and as such, it failed.

Apprenticeships

The Liberal Democrats pushed hard for apprenticeships as an alternative for university. Where universitiy is mainly an academic qualification, and follows on from other, lower academic qualifications (mainly A-Levels), it does not suit all students.

BTECs are vocational qualifications that people can start when they're 14, instead of academic GCSEs and A-Levels. They are generally more hands-on and practical, and usually apply a certain field of learning to a field of work. Apprenticeships largely follow on from these, allowing people to earn money while they learn a trade they wish to take on, and may then even be able to be employed by the company that offers the apprenticeship.

And others, including:

• Raising the tax threshold to £10,000. This took 3 million low earners out of income tax
• More than doubled government spending on dementia research
• Invested £400 million into mental health research and help for people with mental disabilities

The Liberal Democrats blocked many controversial Conservative policies

 

We are only just starting to see the horror of some of these policies

The Snoopers Charter

Theresa May, the conservative Home Secretary, has been pushing for more regulation of the internet. More notably, she has been pushing for companies to implement "back doors" to encryption and security, so the government can view communications they desire to. However, we appear to be forgetting something. Every single online communication is encrypted. That between you and your bank, your private details, you health records stored by the NHS so your doctor can view them. Add a back door into this all, and people who aren't meant to be there will have access. Who stopped that from happening? The Liberal Democrats.

Fox Hunting

The Conservatives are now trying to push through changes to the fox hunting ban to make fox hunting allowed in more situations. This essentially is trying to allow fox hunting, while still under the pretense that is it banned.

Re-introduction of O-Levels/CSEs (or similar qualifications)

We all remember Michael Gove's want to introduce an O-level like system to replace GCSEs. It would have been an absolute disaster, replicating the divide seen before the introduction of GCSEs in the mid-to-late 1980s. Who stopped it? You guessed it - the Liberal Democrats.

Scrapping the Human Rights Act

This has come back to light in recent weeks - the Conservative plan to scrap the Human Rights Act, and replace it with a "British" Bill of Rights (of course, because putting "British" into it automagically makes it better). Not only would this have allowed the Conservatives to change Human Rights to suit them at the time, but it would waste everyone's time when we have a perfectly good one now. Of course, this is the Conservative master plan to pull out of the EU. But who stopped it from happening before? You guessed again! The Liberal Democrats.

Yet...

The electorate will still say that the Liberal Democrats betrayed the public by going into coalition with the Conservatives. Most people will still cite the tuition fees, and not see anything else, as if nothing else mattered.

What I really don't understand is why people say that, then punish the Liberal Democrats and allow a purely Conservative government to take the lead. A Conservative government, whose idea it was to increase tuition fees in the first place. Not only that, but all of the policies which the Liberal Democrats blocked for 5 years are now being put into law. All the policies that the Liberal Democrats put into place are now slowly being revoked.

A good quote from Paddy Ashdown on the whole thing:

"If it is the case, that a party does what it believes to be in the national interest, and gets a result like that last night, whoever is going to dare to act in the national interest again? If it is the case that by working with others in the national interest, in order to - yes, make compromises - but drag this country out of a terrible existential economic crisis, the consequences of last night, whoever is going to do that again? If it is the case that, by trying to put forward a policy of hope, based on those values of respect and tolerance, and fairness, and working together, we get what we got last night, and the politics of grievance and fear win over hope, whoever is going to try and do that again? The question is very much for the Liberal Democrats we suffered last night - but my guess is British politics suffered, too." - Paddy Ashdown, Question Time - 8th May, 2015