UNIVERSITY REPRESENTATION
Sm,—As a University voter, I hardly think that Mr. Humphreys's con- clusions about the present system of University voting are warranted. As far as I can judge, the change in the character of University repre- sentation ha's nothing to do with the system of voting, but is due to the gradual growth of opinion among voters that;the proper way to use their University vote is to select representatives for-their personal qualifications, not for their support of a particular party. Given that state of mind among the bulk of the voters, it is by no means, certain that the results under the present system would be very different from what they would have been under the old. Thus it seems pretty clear that in Oxford and the Combined Universities the results would have been the same under either system. It might have been different at Cambridge. But Mr. Humphreys's assumption that under the old system everyone who gave one vote to Mr. Pickthorn would necessarily have given his other to another Conservative is quite unwarranted.
On the other hand, if the bulk of the voters want to vote on party lines, they will return party members, as they did at Cambridge in most elections up to the present time. But in that case the state of party opinion in a two-member constituency must be misrepresented under any system. For the minority must either have an equal representation with the majority or no representation at all, and obviously neither of these results is proportional representation. In fact, the term " proportional repKtsentation," as applied to a two-member constituency, is absolutely meaningless, and should not be used. Nor does any conclusion for or against real proportional representation follow from the experience of the present system in University constituencies.—I am, Sir, Yours, &c.,
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