We are limiting people's freedom to choose by keeping this archaic first-past-the-post system, which is now almost 150 years old. There is not only a moral argument to introducing a proportional system, there are strong practical reasons also. In England and Wales, many councils have single parties holding in excess of 75 per cent of the seats. This can give councils and administrations carte blanche on official business. This, in turn, leads to weakened accountability, which has an effect on public procurement, which in turn impacts the way taxpayers' money is spent. 

One-party councils constitute a modern form of fiefdom, where scrutiny committees reviewing millions of pounds in government contracts hardly get scrutinised at all. The Electoral Reform Society, in 2015, found that single-party dominated councils were wasting as much as £2.6 billion a year due to lack of scrutiny. Decisions often in these councils are made pre-emptively, in private meetings with majority groups behind closed doors, and then sprung upon the rest of the council at short notice. Their vote, their opinion, their thoughts don't matter. 

The ERS study further looked into thousands of public sector contracts and found that these one-party dominated councils were about 50 per cent more at risk of corruption than politically competitive councils. Bad for democracy, bad for voters and bad for the public purse. Dozens of countries have made the switch, and not one has made the switch back. Australia, New Zealand, Ukraine: they have shifted from first-past-the-post to a more proportional system.