The Fate of the West: The Battle to Save the World’s Most Successful Political Idea

by Bill Emmott

In a first-past-the-post electoral system, if that were to happen UKIP could even, in theory, suddenly jump from one seat in Parliament to becoming the second-biggest party, or even to holding an absolute majority. The fear of that prospect might, alternatively, lead the Conservatives or Labour, or both, to adopt UKIP’s stance against cosmopolitanism and immigration. It ought also to make those two old, mainstream parties take seriously at last7 the case for two big political reforms. The first is electoral reform, to bring in a more proportional voting system, one that accommodates and provides a framework for the fragmentation of the party system rather than remaining in denial of it, as now.