The UK General Election was held on Thursday the 5th May 2005 and was won by the Labour Party. Tony Blair, the leader of the Labour Party and Prime Minister has won a historic third term in government for the Labour party. As part of the ‘Reporting the Election 2005' project, the British Council brought prominent journalists from around the world to spend time shadowing parliamentary candidates in the final week of the General Election campaign. There are more details on this project at the bottom of the page. We have also produced some brief introductory notes below about the General Election, the result and electoral processes.
645 parliamentary seats were contested at the general election with the winning party needing 324 seats to form the Government. The results were as follows:
|
Party |
Number of seats won in Parliament |
Percentage of the vote won |
|
The Labour Party |
352 |
35.2% |
|
The Conservative Party |
197 |
32.2% |
|
The Liberal Democrats |
62 |
22% |
|
Others (including Welsh, Scottish and Irish national party’s, minority parties and independents |
30 |
10.5% |
The Labour Party’s majority has been reduced from 167 to just 67 seats. The voter turnout for the election was 61%, a slight increase from the 2001 election.
In the UK a General Election is held every four or five years to elect Parliamentarians for the UK Parliament's House of Commons. Parliamentarians are elected from across the UK . Elections for each of the devolved administrations (in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland ) take place separately and electoral arrangements differ from Westminster.
Westminster Explained, a website managed by Westminster 's Parliamentary Information Services
Statistics suggest that the UK public's views of politics and democratic processes are changing. The General Election campaign will bring to light important issues of education, health, crime and security but will also indicate direction on the electoral and voting process and the under-representation of women and ethnic minorities in Parliament.
The following organisations are involved in raising awareness and in supporting/promoting wider democratic participation and engagement in politics:
The Fawcett Society provides an overview of issues for women voters
The Electoral Commission's website ‘do politics’ provides downloads to a range of workshop activities to get young people thinking about politics.
Headsup is a citizenship resource for school children and teachers
Funky Dragon is the Welsh Assembly Government's portal for young people
New Politics network and Charter88 are running a Democracy challenge
The Electoral Commission is an independent agency responsible for overseeing the electoral process, for managing political party registration and financing, and for raising public awareness about elections and voting.
Directgov, the Government information portal, provides an overview of electoral arrangements in the UK .(Follow the Election 2005 link.) For the running of elections the commission enforce the two major acts of law, the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 and the Representation of People Act 1983. These provide the rules for candidate nomination through to running the polling station on voting day. For more details on the legislation and the running of the election see the Electoral Commission web site.
Parliamentary candidates are selected by the political parties they represent. Independent candidates may also stand for election, provided they meet the criteria for prospective candidates.
Directgov, explains who is entitled to stand for election and who is entitled to vote. (Follow the Election 2005 link.)
The three main political parties are Labour, Conservatives and Liberal Democrats, taking 95% of the vote in the last General Election. There is a number of national parties, as well as increasing numbers of single issue and marginal parties and political networks. The Electoral Commission web site provides links to registered political parties, though not all maybe putting forward candidates for this election.
It has been debated that the current electoral system is unrepresentative and unfair, particularly towards the smaller and more marginal parties. The current UK election system is the ‘winner take all' system (also known as first-past-the-post). This is where a party or independent candidate does not need the majority of the votes cast but wins by simply by gaining more votes than any other candidate in their constituency. The alternative system of ‘proportional representation' (number of seats in parliament is in proportion to votes won), which is commonly used in other countries has been long debated to replace the current system. In this election, the Labour Party got 55% of the seats in Parliament with only 37% of the votes. With a proportional representation system, the percentage split of the number of seats would have looked very different - Labour (35%), the Conservative (32%), Liberal Democrats (22%) and other party’s (10%). Will the Government now hold its long promised referendum on voting reform and address what some people some people are calling an undemocratic system?
Make My Vote Count is a the front of the coalition that campaigns for referendum on a more representative voting system
Guardian Newspaper debate on proportional representation
The trend for recent elections has been a decreasing voter turnout and this issue may become more of a concern to the Government and political parties.
This BBC article looks at the voter turnout at elections from 1945 to 2001and offers some explanation as to the decreasing turnout.
The Electoral Commission has produced a research paper exploring what people thought before the European, local and London elections in 2004 and what might motivate them to vote.
Whilst at least maintaining, or increasing voter turnout is an electoral issue in the UK; there are also those groups who do not have the right to vote. For example, prisoners currently cannot vote but there is debate as to whether they should be allowed to. The BBC covers these campaigns
The establishment of the devolved parliament in Scotland and assembly in Wales means that many of the issues making the headlines in England (e.g. health, education, immigration) do not register in Scotland and Wales, where these issues are the responsibility of the devolved bodies.
The Northern Ireland Assembly was dissolved on 14 October 2002 when the UK Government assumed direct rule and governs all areas of public life. However, two of the main UK parties, Labour and the Liberal Democrats do not field candidates in Northern Ireland and the Conservatives are contesting only two seats.
The BBC has websites covering the election in Scotland , Wales and Northern Ireland .
The British Council is bringing prominent journalists from around the world to spend time shadowing parliamentary candidates in the final week of the General Election campaign. More than 30 journalists from 28 countries, including Iraq, Sudan, China, Palestine, Venezuela, Azerbaijan, Bosnia, Nigeria, Serbia, and Afghanistan, will follow the campaign and report on their experiences to audiences in their home countries. ‘Reporting the Election 2005' will provide unique access to candidates and voters in the run up to the election, and aims to increase knowledge overseas of British elections and of the democratic process. The Belgium office has posted information about the project on their website giving a list of where the journalists come from and which politicians they will be following.
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