FAQ

Even if the Liberal Democrats and Greens don’t go along with our stand-aside recommendations, our modelling indicates it would be highly unlikely that vote-splitting and tactical rejection of Labour beyond their likely 280th win in England and Wales would cause Labour to fail to win a seat that would be relevant in whether the Conservatives achieve a majority or viable minority government. If our vote-splitting advice causes one or two seats to be won by the Conservatives that otherwise wouldn’t at small swings to Labour, these prevented gains would be more than cancelled out by people following our advice to vote Labour in many more seats which are relevant to the outcome in Labour’s 231st to 280th most likely win range.

This is a safe and effective strategy to bring about a more proportional election outcome which will be more conducive to electoral reform.

Our modelling (which probably underestimates Liberal Democrat gains from the Conservatives), has the Conservatives at around 260-280 seats if Labour are successfully restricted to 300-320 seats.

The primary goal of the Sprint for PR campaign is to get a solid commitment for electoral reform in the Labour manifesto before the election. If this campaign becomes a threat to Labour candidates who wish to get elected, which of these candidates will be lobbying the Labour leadership to change their stance on electoral reform? The ones who support reform, or the ones who are opposed?

There is very little point in getting PR-supporting Labour MPs elected if the leadership is whipping MPs to oppose reform. We either change the Labour manifesto before the election, or we restrict their electoral success, so forcing them to work with a party that has electoral reform as a firm red line.

We believe electoral reform is the most important political issue to the future success of the United Kingdom, and this issue warrants a single-issue political party.

We believe we need to live our values by showing others how first-past-the-post election results can be strategically disrupted to achieve positive change.

We won't stand where we believe other pro-PR parties could have a decent chance of victory, so it is safe, and useful, for us to draw attention to future Sprint for PR campaigns by standing candidates. If voters feel really strongly about PR, they can vote for us to send the strongest possible message to Labour on this issue. We would however be happier if our standing in a seat caused Liberal Democrat and Green candidates to gain more support than they otherwise would have, while preventing a Labour candidate gaining the necessary votes to contribute to an illegitimate majority in the House of Commons.

Election polling precedent suggests that polls will tighten over the course of the election campaign to an extent that electoral wipeout is highly unlikely. The Conservatives have a lot of money, and a lot of experience of the dark arts of political campaigning. Of course, if the gap between the parties stays at 25% or grows, then we would understand the attraction of destroying the Conservative party completely. If the polls do narrow, the electorate should have a choice of electoral outcomes. We believe ensuring Conservative defeat, while preventing an illegitimate Labour majority, is the best political outcome that can be offered to voters, and it is important that voters can be helped to make the voting choices locally which will safely bring about that result at the national level.

While it is clearly easy for us to advocate for the SNP to defeat the Conservatives in the currently Conservative-held seats, advising actions in Labour-SNP contests is more complex. If we were focused entirely on delivering a hung parliament then asking people to vote SNP over Labour in Scotland would be the easy route. We are however, also interested in delivering a more proportional outcome to the next election. The SNP are currently enormously over-represented relative to their vote share, so advocating for SNP victories against Labour would go against one of the important principles we are trying to promote.

As a compromise, we will issue no tactical voting advice in Labour's first 20 most likely wins in Scotland, before advocating SNP votes or Liberal Democrat votes in all other Scottish constituencies. Where the SNP and Lib Dems are competing for seats, we will advocate for Lib Dem wins as the Liberal Democrats are far more likely to be in a position to request concessions from Labour, and far more likely to have electoral reform as one of their first priorities.

The modelling we have done indicates the current strategy is safe (in that it won’t help the Conservatives stay in power), and effective (in that it will make an illegitimate majority Labour government more difficult to achieve). The strategy has been adjusted on the 28th of May 2024 to include 20 likely wins for Labour in Scotland within the 300 seats we are hoping to help/allow Labour to achieve... and then restrict their progress from (20 seats is 35% of Scottish seats, so is proportional to Labour's polling in Scotland at the end of May).

The strategy will not need to be adjusted as polls fluctuate over the election period. Whether the swing to Labour is a 5-point swing, or a 20-point swing, it is hoped that our actions can bring the result closer to the desired hung parliament with Labour as the largest party.