Sandy Martin reflects on the May 7^th vote in East Anglia and explains why it means electoral system change is vital for democratic politics

On 7^th May, voters in Norfolk, Suffolk and Essex went to the polls.  10% of the votes in Suffolk were cast for Labour candidates – 3 were elected.  33% of the votes went to Reform UK candidates, and 41 were elected – 14x the councillors on 3x the votes.  Reform UK now theoretically runs Suffolk County Council – “theoretically” because most have no experience of local government nor any idea how it works.  Their Leader was a previous Tory councillor, but after he said they all needed training, they dumped him in favour of someone new.

The picture was similar in Norfolk and Essex. The Rupert Lowe-supporting Great Yarmouth Independents denied Farage’s supporters 9 councillors in Norfolk, but  Reform have 40 of the 84 seats, while the entire Labour vote across the county was only able to elect a single councillor. In Essex, Reform won 53 of the 77 seats on a turnout of over 46% – the highest for a local election in decades.

East Anglia is not a regional anomaly.  Reform is picking up voters who have never voted before, or who have not voted for ages.  They are mostly people who have no idea what Farage stands for, and they are electing people who often have no idea why they are standing. The whole Reform UK phenomenon is a symptom of the British people’s deep disillusionment with politics. 

Reform now benefits from First Past the Post – the party that gains more votes than any other, even a tiny amount more, wins most of the seats and all the power. With five parties in England, and six in Scotland and Wales, the proportion of votes needed to win is derisory.  Farage’s councillors may make fools of themselves at a local level, but he could still be Prime Minister in 2029 on as little as 29% of the national vote.

Changing the electoral system is not a magic bullet.  We must counter the cynicism of voters who should be voting for a Democratic Socialist party.  But the two are very much aligned, and Andy Burnham gets that.  This is why he stood in Makerfield – not just to reform the electoral system but also to return the Labour Party to its mission to improve ordinary people’s lives.

Canvassing there, I met Polly Toynbee. I mentioned how voters feel their vote changes nothing.  She said, “This time I can tell them that their vote counts more than it’s ever done before, because now they’ve got the chance to change the system”.  

An electoral system which empowers every vote would force Labour to take every voter seriously, whether it’s an unemployed person in Norfolk or a small businessperson in Liverpool.  Labour’s focus on Tory/Labour switchers in marginal constituencies has hollowed out our party and ignored the people who need our help the most.  No wonder so many of them are switching to new, untried parties or just not voting at all.  We need a new approach – and a new team to achieve it.