Cameron could have woken up to a decent working majority today if he hadn’t made one big mistake in the last Parliament.
David Cameron did much better than anyone expected last night. He beat Labour and won dozens of seats from the Liberal Democrats, but he must now govern with a vanishingly small majority. And the record of Conservative governments with tiny majorities being torn apart over the question of Europe is not promising.
Cameron could have woken up to a decent working majority today if he hadn’t made one big strategic mistake in the last Parliament. The error wasn’t going into coalition with the Liberal Democrats, or agreeing to hold a referendum on Britain’s EU membership, or cutting the top rate of tax. It was opposing the introduction of the Alternative Vote electoral system in the 2011 referendum.
Britain’s political architecture was designed for the 19th century, not the 21st. It’s not just the florid Victorian Gothic parliament or its arcane procedures that are anachronistic. The UK’s electoral system was built for an era when two political parties dominated Parliament: first the Conservatives and Liberals, then the Conservatives and Labour.
When Britain moved to a two-and-a-half party system in the 20th century, the system strained like a poorly fitted suit. Now, with nine or ten parties in contention, the system no longer produces the strong majority governments and political stability that used to be its defining advantage.