Half the parliamentary seats have not changed hands in my lifetime

Dr Mark has done a great post on The Wardman Wire today which highlights some fascinating and very telling statistics about how often parliamentary seats have changed hands.

For all 4 home countries, here are the stats for how many seats have never changed hands since the end of the Second World War in 1945:

England 30%

Scotland 19%

Wales 33%

Overall 29%

So almost a third of seats have not changed hands in the 17 general elections we have had since then.

Even more shocking though as far as I am concerned are the figures for how many seats have never changed hands since 1970:

England 50%

Scotland 42%

Wales 43%

Overall 49%

I was born in 1974 and so in the country I have lived in all my life (England) half of all seats have not changed hands in all the general elections we have had since then. It is virtually the same for the UK as a whole. I am actually quite shocked by those last figures. they certainly give the lie to the idea that our system is dynamic and allows change. Not for the 50% of people in those seats it doesn't.

This is the result of our "First Past the Post" electoral system that is propped up by Labour and the Conservatives. They want to keep it because it suits them. Most of the seats that don't change hands are theirs and they want to keep it that way.

Remember this the next time you hear Cameron banging on about reform like he was doing today. He might advocate some baby-steps reform to look like he is doing something but he will not do anything significant to tackle this as it suits him and his party too well.