Why didn’t New Labour introduce electoral reform?

When Tony Blair’s New Labour government came to power in 1997, it promised a referendum on changing the voting system for the House of Commons. It then appointed the political grandee Roy Jenkins to work out what an alternative might look like. The Jenkins Commission reported its proposals for a new electoral system in 1998, but the referendum was never held.

With electoral reform once again high on the political agenda, in this episode Lee and Richard revisit the last time a Labour government seriously considered changing the way Britain elects its MPs. They look at the long history of the electoral reform debate, from attempts to change the voting system in the early 20th century to Labour’s growing interest in PR in the 1990s. And they examine the Jenkins Commission, Tony Blair’s scepticism about electoral reform, and the political calculations that ultimately saw New Labour quietly abandon its pledge of a referendum.

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Since Attlee & Churchill is a podcast about post-war British politics - since Attlee & Churchill - and is hosted by Lee David Evans, an historian of the Conservative Party, and Richard Johnson, an historian of the Labour Party.

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