York City Council vote to support proportional representation
On Thursday March 26, during a ‘full council’ meeting at York’s Guildhall, an 80% supermajority of City of York Council (CYC) members voted in favour of a motion titled ‘Fair votes for all’ which endorsed Proportional Representation (PR) and called for a National Commission on Electoral Reform. CYC is the first local authority to approve such a motion since the 2024 general election.
Listed on the agenda as item 14(2), the motion was moved by Cllr Anne Hook and seconded by Cllr Emilie Knight (both Rural West York, Lib Dem). Through a show of hands, 38 out of CYC’s 47 councillors supported it. No amendments to the motion were proposed.
Despite their longstanding rivalry on CYC, both the governing Labour Party and opposition Liberal Democrats supported the motion, with every councillor of those parties present for the debate voting in its favour.
In her introductory remarks, Cllr Hook said the motion was about ‘whether our democracy is fair and whether people can see that fairness reflected in the results that produces’, which ‘they can’t’ under First Past the Post (FPTP). Seconder Cllr Knight spoke about how ‘the current system feels from the perspective of the people we represent’, saying that because ‘too many people cast their vote and see it make little or no difference to the outcome [of an election]’, they end up ‘questioning the value of taking part at all’.
Cllrs Tony Clarke (Guildhall, Labour), Jason Rose (Acomb, Labour) and Derek Wann (Rawcliffe and Clifton Without, Lib Dem) also spoke in favour of the motion, opining inter alia that FPTP ‘discounts votes’ and ‘feel[s] like a postcode lottery’.
Only Cllrs Chris Steward (Copmanthorpe) and Michael Nicholls (Bishopthorpe), the Leader and Deputy Leader of CYC’s Conservative Group respectively, voted against the motion. Cllr Steward, in the only dissenting speech, said that while FPTP ‘is really not a perfect system’, there is ‘not one PR’, discounting arguments for PR as ‘nonsense’. With one abstention, three apologised absences and three unaccounted absences also noted, 41 votes were recorded overall.
The motion encouraged Group Leaders Cllr Claire Douglas (Heworth, Labour), Cllr Nigel Ayre (Heworth Without, Lib Dem) and Cllr Steward to write to the Prime Minister, Local Government Secretary and Democracy Minister, calling for the urgent establishment of a National Commission on Electoral Reform ‘in time for any [reported] recommendations to be implemented before the next general election’.
Endorsed by the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Fair Elections, which has also produced suggested terms of reference, a National Commission would assess the criteria for a voting system suitable for general elections and recommend which specific system would best meet these. Advocates believe that by considering relevant expert evidence and initiating an open public consultation a National Commission could help to build the widest possible consensus on this issue.
In opposing FPTP, the motion referred to system’s origins from a time when ‘the vote [was] restricted to property-owning men’, its limited use within Europe by only the UK and ‘authoritarian’ Belarus, and the highly disproportionate results of the 2024 general election.
In supporting PR, the motion referred to its use for devolved elections throughout the UK and for local elections in Scotland and Northern Ireland, its use in 80 other countries, and points to broad cross-party support including from Labour at their 2022 Annual Conference. Noting that ‘PR ensures all votes count, have equal value, and that seats won match votes cast’, the motion also argued that under PR ‘decision-making improves, participation widens, and trust in politics increases’.
Local members of the cross-party PR campaign group Make Votes Matter (MVM) and representatives of the ‘progressive’ think-tank and campaign group Compass attended the debate. They also took part in the earlier public participation session – during which a total of six speakers supported the motion’s call for ‘fair votes’ – and formed a welcoming party for councillors as they arrived for the meeting.
PR campaigners hope that CYC’s endorsement of this motion will now see other councils follow York’s lead by passing similar motions, building momentum and public pressure for PR as Parliament continues to debate the Representation of the People Bill – which the motion called ‘a step in the right direction’. According to Councils for PR, local authorities supportive of PR includes Sheffield City Council.