Hung parliaments can be made to work. Just ask the Scots and the Swedes, but not the Belgians, whose Government collapsed, yet again, yesterday.
We have become so used to the winner-takes-all politics of the first-past-the-post system that anything else is regarded as inferior and dangerous. This week, the Tories stepped up their warnings about an inconclusive result to alarm voters, claiming it could threaten the economy. But, like it or not, we may have to live with it.
“Hung Parliament” has been used as a catch-all term. However, there are a wide variety of situations in which no one party wins an overall majority. Some can be recipes for indecision, but others have produced effective coalitions and minority administrations that have tackled tough fiscal problems.
If you look away from Westminster, single-party governments are the exception. Apart from Britain, there are only three in the EU: France, Malta and that paragon of good governance, Greece. Many countries most highly rated for good government, such as Germany, New Zealand and the Scandinavian nations have multi-party rule. Many have proportional electoral systems which ensure that no single party wins a majority.
Read Full Article »