What if Ireland had said yes to First past the post ?

Didn't stop the DUP holding the balance in the UK, Healy Rae would top poll anyway as constituencies would be smaller

Jeez, because getting even 20% of the vote will result in no seats in parliament if two larger parties get 45% and 35% each; replicated across a country, this would see all seats go to the party with 45%.

UK would be a very different place today if the 15% who voted UKIP were properly represented in parliament, the tories would probably not have moved so far right

No. the left leaning parties (if they coalesced) would have merged into Labour. Sinn Fein might never have emerged here in a FPTP system.

True, Independants would not get elected so often, but some (like Healy Raes, Michael Lowry, Neil Blaney) might have emerged anyway. WE might have gotten smaller regional parties developing...

The answer really is nothing much would have been different (for the first 90 years of the state anyway).

As a rule FPTP voting systems typically result in the vote coalescing around two large big tent parties, at the expense of smaller parties. That's what has happened in the USA and that's what has happened in England. The thing is though even though we had PR-STV we ended up with a very similar outcome. Due to the long lasting affects of civil war politics we basically had a 2 and a half party system for the vast majority of the history of the country. Even within that only 2 parties have ever held the office of an Taoiseach. Yes there were other smaller parties along the way but typically they only ever entered coalitions in very small numbers and often they flamed out along the way.

Nothing better displays this dominance by the two big parties than the results of the November 1982 election in Cavan-Monaghan. Of the 9 candidates, all but 1 were from FF and FG and together they obtained 99.7% of the vote.

FF managed to gain overall majorities on a number of occasions ('38, '44, '57, '69 & '77), even with PR-STV, such was their stranglehold on the electorate. It's only really since their collapse in 2011 that we have seen the multi-party system emerge that one would expect from our voting system.

For those posters thinking that FPTP is some sort of panacea and that if only we had it all of your least favourite politicians would not be elected - think again. The lesson we can learn from the USA/England is that FPTP often leads to uncompetitive races in the majority of constituencies. In the Ameician example this means that the real elections are actually their primaries which means that rather than getting compromise candidates who appeal to the overall population you instead end up with partisan extremists who were best able to win over their own party's base - that fact more than anything else explains the complete breakdown of bi-partisanship in Washington.

In particular if you detest all of the childish back and forth that you see and hear between FG politicians and SF politicians - well all of that would be 10 times worse if we had FPTP.

That's not a perfect solution either as it substitutes one type of unwanted politician for another. List systems make it much easier for favoured party insiders, who might fail to get elected under their own steam, to get elected on the coat-tails of the party. Personally I would take them over the hyper local, parish pump independents that we currently have in many constituencies but I suspect a lot of people would not (particularly voters who actually want a parish pump politician in their own area).

My only issue with the PR system here is that there is a pre-requisite number of seats to be filled.

I think it would be more democratic if instead only those who reached the quota in each constituency were elected.

Jeysus could you imagine the amount of Healy-Raes we would end up with if Kerry was a 7 seater

As long as they dont enforce their language on us like the Brits did.

No arguments from me there. I'm certainly not advocating for FPTP. It's an abominable system in my opinion. I was contrasting List systems with multi-seat PR-STV (i.e. the Irish system)

I think you're taking me up wrong there. What I'm referring to are people who are deemed elected simply by being the last person standing after every one below them has been eliminated and their votes transferred, even though they may not reach the quota.

Has nothing got to do with the type of electoral system. Absolutely stupid comment

Doesn't matter. The remaning candidate is still more popular than any of the other unelected candidates, and there is no reason why the constituency should be punished by being under-represented in the Oireachtas.

The equaivalent rule under the FPTP system would be to refuse to elect a candidate who could not secure more than 50% of the vote. If the UK had such a rule, 329 out of 650 seats would be unfilled.

Mmm. Conventional republican theory is that citizens have not only a right but also a duty to exercise their share of political power for the common good. In electoral terms, this means that each constituency must be represented in Parliament; you can't opt out and elect not to be represented, or to be underrepresented, simply because some of the candidates on offer don't meet your exacting standards. If that's your issue, the proper response is to nominate more suitable candidates, rather than to try to get yourself disenfranchised.

Bear in mind that, under your rule, the people who decline to express a preference among the remaining candidates aren't just reducing their own representation; they are reducing the representation of the entire constituency, including those who did have, and did express, a preference. Why should they be given that right?

Basically, declining to express a preference between candidates is not a statement that "If it comes to it, I don't wish to be represented by any of these people; I would prefer to be unrepresented". Being unrepresented is not an option offered in elections in a republic. The statement you are making is "If it comes to it, I don't mind which of these people represents me; let someone else choose".

In fact, the candidate elected without reaching the quota must be more popular than all the other unelected candidates added together.(otherwise there the lowest is eliminated and there is another count)

Not electing the last candidate because he does not reach the quota means there is a large amount of votes (though less than a quota) which have not elected any representative.

@Brussels Sprout said "The answer really is nothing much would have been different (for the first 90 years of the state anyway)".

I think that is due more to the legacy of the civil war than of the electoral system. For a long period of time, certainly up to the late 60s, early 70's, voting for the 'other side' irrespective of the abilities of the candidate would have been seen as treachery within the family - leading to likely ostracism ( perhaps, along with democracy, another practice we should have copied from the Athenians).

Doh! I'd forgotten of course that when there's only two candidates left they don't bother transferring the lower person's votes.

Not necessarily.

Taking the 1932 general election - I picked it at random - we see that there were five 7-seat constituencies, three 8-seat constituencies and one 9-seat constituency. And yet the top three parties (FF/CnaG/Lab) came out of that election with, between them, 89% of the seats. The top two parties had 84% of the seats. One other party (Farmers Party) is represented. Independents get 9% of the seats.

Contrast the result of the 2020 election - no 7, 8 or 9-seat constituencies. But the top three parties (SF/FF/FG) get only 67% of the seats; the top two parties only 46%. Six other parties (Green/Lab/SD/PBP/Aontú/I4C) are represented. Independents get 12% of the seats.

A higher turnout would likely lead to even more fragmentation of the vote and more empty seats under your system