March 2026 – PSA Parliaments

By Stephen Holden Bates

This blog was part of a larger project undertaken on policy specialisation and parliamentary roles with Caroline Bhattacharya and Stephen McKay, both of whom were involved in the collection and analysis of the data used in this blog. A draft of this blog has been hanging around for a few years now which explains why it doesn’t cover the 2019-2024 Parliament – apologies for that!

Backbench MPs can submit Early Day Motions (EDMs) “to put on record [their] views … or to draw attention to specific events or campaigns“. In this blog we show which groups of MPs are more likely to use EDMs, and which topics they focus on.

Popularity of EDMs over time

Table 1 shows the most popular EDMs submitted between the 1989-90 parliamentary session and the 2019 General Election. During this time, 50,849 EDMs were submitted, receiving 1,968,850 signatures from 1,722 signatories. This means the average MP sponsored and signed 29.5 and 1143.4 EDMs respectively with the average EDM receiving 38.7 signatures (although the mode is one).

The number of EDMs submitted per sitting day decreased after 2010, but the average number of signatures attracted remained comparable over time. The average number of EDMs per sponsor and per signatory remained comparable; MPs remained as likely to sponsor and sign at least one EDM.

Table 1: Top 10 most popular EDMs, 1989-2019

Title	Parl. Session	Num. Signatories
INDIA AND PAKISTAN	2001-02	503
MAKE POVERTY HISTORY IN 2005 CAMPAIGN	2004-05	455
CLIMATE CHANGE	2004-05	416
FIRST AID IN SCHOOLS	1991-92	416
BBC WORLD SERVICE	1992-93	408
PRESIDENTIAL & PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS IN SIERRA LEONE (No. 2)	2001-02	402
ABOLITION OF THE POST OFFICE CARD ACCOUNT	2005-06	398
WARM HOMES & ENERGY CONSERVATION	1999-2000	396
POST OFFICE CARD ACCOUNTS	2002-03	392
PRESIDENTIAL & PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS IN SIERRA LEONE	2001-02	387
[source: EDM database]

Popularity of EDMs among (different groups of) MPs

Some MPs were (very) prolific in terms of signing or being the primary sponsor on EDMs with most of the most prolific being white and male, usually from the Labour Party (see Table 2).

Table 2: Top 10 most prolific primary sponsors and signatories of EDMs overall and per Sitting Day not in Government, 1989-2019

Rank	Name	Gender	Ethnicity	Party	Num. EDMs Overall	Num. EDMs per Sitting Day
					Sponsored	Sponsored
*Number Sponsored Overall*
1	Jeremy Corbyn	Male	White	Lab.	833	0.06
2	Paul Flynn	Male	White	Lab.	792	0.07
3	Keith Vaz	Male	British Asian	Lab.	731	0.07
4	Alan Meale	Male	White	Lab.	731	0.07
5	John McDonnell	Male	White	Lab.	694	0.09
6	Lindsay Hoyle	Male	White	Lab.	622	0.08
7	Peter Bottomley	Male	White	Con.	563	0.05
8	Bob Russell	Male	White	Lib. Dem.	545	0.08
9	Harry Barnes	Male	White	Lab.	493	0.08
10	Bob Spink	Male	White	Con.	471	0.09
*Number Sponsored per Sitting Day not in Government*
1	Paul Monaghan	Male	White	SNP	101	0.14
2	Jim Shannon	Male	White	DUP	411	0.12
3	Robert Halfon	Male	White	Con.	298	0.11
4	David Linden	Male	White	SNP	83	0.09
5	Bob Spink	Male	White	Con.	471	0.09
6	Greg Mulholland	Male	White	Lib. Dem.	399	0.09
7	Simon Thomas	Male	White	PC	165	0.09
8	John McDonnell	Male	White	Lab.	694	0.09
9	Bob Russell	Male	White	Lib. Dem.	545	0.08
10	Kirsten Oswald	Female	White	SNP	59	0.08
					Signed	Signed
*Number Signed Overall*
1	Jeremy Corbyn	Male	White	Lab.	19460	1.49
2	Alan Meale	Male	White	Lab.	18366	1.77
3	Mike Hancock	Male	White	Lib. Dem.	17778	2.36
4	Alan Simpson	Male	White	Lab.	17660	2.71
5	John McDonnell	Male	White	Lab.	17504	2.17
6	Lynne Jones	Female	White	Lab.	16636	2.56
7	Bill Etherington	Male	White	Lab.	16575	2.55
8	Kelvin Hopkins	Male	White	Lab.	15543	1.92
9	Peter Bottomley	Male	White	Con.	15373	1.24
10	Ann Cryer	Female	White	Lab.	15281	3.26
*Number Signed per Sitting Day not in Government*
1	Ann Cryer	Female	White	Lab.	15281	3.26
2	Rudi Vis	Male	White	Lab.	14816	3.16
3	Alan Simpson	Male	White	Lab.	17660	2.71
4	John Leech	Male	White	Lib. Dem.	9268	2.58
5	Lynne Jones	Female	White	Lab.	16636	2.56
6	Bill Etherington	Male	White	Lab.	16575	2.55
7	Mike Hancock	Male	White	Lib. Dem.	17778	2.36
8	Martin Caton	Male	White	Lab.	15155	2.34
9	Chris Stephens	Male	White	SNP	3622	2.25
10	John McDonnell	Male	White	Lab.	17504	2.17

Network analysis can be used to identify clusters of EDM co-signatories (i.e. MPs who are more likely to sign the same EDMs). Figure(s) 1 shows the EDM co-signatory networks for each of the five parliaments between 2001 and 2019, switching between showing the network by party and then by cluster for each Parliament. For the Party view, the nodes in the figures are colour-coded by party with the edges also colour coded to indicate (cross-)partisan linkages. For example, a red node with a purple edge would indicate a Labour MP with cross-partisan links with Conservative MPs. For the Cluster view, the nodes are simply colour coded by cluster. For both, the size of the node relates to the likelihood of an MP acting as a bridge between different parts of the network with larger nodes indicating a greater propensity to broker.

The figure shows that three clusters of EDM co-signatories can be identified in each parliament from 2001 onwards, except for 2015-17 where there were two. Where there are three clusters, two of these are mainly comprised of Conservative MPs and Labour MPs respectively with the third being mainly made up of another group of Labour MPs and MPs from smaller parties. For 2015-17, there is a smaller cluster mainly comprising SNP MPs and then a large cluster made up of everyone else. However, none of the clusters are particularly distinct with all being cross-partisan and with lots of interaction taking place between them and the MPs therein. The network of EDM signatories is thus generally a tightly knit one with the clusters which comprise it not being separate but rather interrelated. The network has become more clustered over time however.

Focusing on some key figures within these EDM networks, Figure(s) 2 shows the core group networks of the most active EDM co-signatories (co-signing at least 40% of EDMs) for each of the five parliaments. The fact that there is only one core group for each parliament reinforces the idea that the EDM network is an integrated one without particularly distinct clusters. Mirroring the results presented in Table 2, the networks are dominated by white, male Labour MPs, and perhaps more accurately Labour MPs who are members of the Socialist Campaign Group, at least until 2015 after which MPs from smaller parties – specifically, the SNP and the DUP – become dominant. This trend is probably a result of MPs such as Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell moving into leadership positions and not having the time and/or proclivity to sign (as many) EDMs as previously. This would then have a knock-on effect of disrupting relationships in the cluster of which these MPs were a part and, consequently, the wider network. Other relationships would then come to the fore.

Figure(s) 1: Early Day Motion Co-Signatory Networks by Parliament

Figure(s) 2: Core group networks of most active EDM co-signatories by Parliament

Characteristics of MPs who sponsor & sign EDMs

Conservative MPs were less likely to sponsor and sign EDMs than Labour and other party MPs (Figure(s) 3) and, when they did, they were also less likely to sponsor and sign as many: the average Conservative MP sponsored and signed 8.6 and 140 EDMs, whereas the figures for the average Labour MP and other party MP were 15.7 and 533, and 26.0 and 874 respectively.

Figure(s) 3: Percentage point difference between proportion of EDM activity and proportion of MPs in Parliament by party, 1989-2019

Female and ethnic minority MPs tended to be sponsors and signatories of EDMs roughly in line with their presence in Parliament (Figure(s) 4). There is some evidence that male sponsors and signatories were more likely to sponsor and sign more EDMs than their female counterparts, especially after 1997 but this gap closed during the last two Parliaments in our analysis. White sponsors were more likely to sponsor more EDMs than ethnic minority sponsors since 2001 but there was no clear trend regarding ethnicity and the ratio of signatories to signatures.

Figure(s) 4: Percentage point difference between proportion of EDM activities and proportion of female and ethnic minority MPs in Parliament, 1989-2019

EDM topics

EDMs are not directed to a particular department so we used topic modelling to identify 27 different policy areas. social welfare, macroeconomics and international affairs are the most popular topics mentioned in EDMs with at least a quarter being related to at least one of these topics (Figure 5). Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are the least popular topics.

Perhaps the most notable trend in the popularity of topics is the steady increase over time in EDMs which mention social policy (Figure(s) 6). Other topics which tended to increase in popularity over time, at least to a certain extent, are civil rights, domestic commerce, education, energy, health, and technology. Topics which tended to decrease in popularity over time, again at least to a certain extent, are agriculture, foreign trade, government operations, international affairs, and law & crime. Other topics remained broadly flat (although macroeconomics did have an increase around the time of the financial crash before falling back slowly to around the same level of popularity as previously).

When comparing different groups of MPs, what is most notable is the consistency in the topic rankings for MPs from different parties. The top five topics are the same for Conservative MPs, Labour MPs and MPs from other parties, even if the order of the ranking is not the same. Perhaps the only notable difference is the ranking of the topic labour. This topic is ranked 13^thout of 27 for EDMs sponsored by a Labour MP, whereas it’s ranked 23^rd and 20^th for EDMs sponsored by a Conservative MP and an MP from another party respectively.

With regard to gender, Civil rights, education, health and social welfare are all more popular topics with female sponsors compared to their male counterparts with international affairs having the biggest difference between the popularity among male sponsors compared to their female counterparts. With regard to ethnicity, the biggest differences in the popularity among sponsors from an ethnic minority background compared to their white counterparts are for the topics civil rights, defence, immigration, international affairs, and social welfare.

Figure 5: Percentage of EDMs which mention topic

Figure(s) 6: Percentage of EDMs which mention topic by parliamentary session

About the author

Dr Stephen Holden Bates is a Senior Lecturer in Political Science at the Department of Political Science and International Studies at the University of Birmingham.

By Dr Larissa Peixoto Gomes.

It must be said that Wales is a place of complex identity that I would never claim to personally understand. Many Welsh people see themselves as British, others see themselves as British and Welsh, others as Welsh and British, others still as Welsh only (Henderson 2021). Some that I have spoken to claim that they have been colonised by the English, some that they are part of the British empire. Yet, despite its complex and often contradictory nature, I did find points of similarity with my own place of origin and helped contribute to the academic debate.

Throughout the devolution process, Wales has taken the British/English institutions that they were left with and mostly maintained how they functioned under British rule, at best making incremental changes rather than making it their own, despite having the freedom to do so. When devolution finally came about, Wales and Scotland chose the same type of mixed-member proportional system, adding a proportional element to the already present pluralist system. It created a complex voting system that is misunderstood by most and has led to an abstention rate as high as 53% for Senedd elections. Wales was already a Labour stronghold, which could explain the impetus to maintain, at the time, a system that is widely accepted to return legislatures that are often ideologically and regionally unrepresentative. Currently, the government and the Senedd have been making an effort to reform the electoral system in various areas, which is where I came in.^[1]

The view from outside

Welsh Government was scouring the globe for best practices in electoral administration, as the rules around elections, what is normally referred to as electoral reform, had already been the topic of an expert report (McAllister et al. 2017). Specifically, they wanted to explore ways to improve voter turnout and to understand whether issues of safety were keeping marginalised people from running. Like many other governments, they commission experts to write reports on topics they are looking to better understand, and they often do so through the Wales Centre for Public Policy (WCPP), at Cardiff University, which had just happened to hire me, in 2021, during the Covid-19 pandemic.

As political scientists, we often discuss political opportunity and change but are not always on the practical side of that. The meetings mostly involved civil servants, and it was crucial to have them be honest about the political context and the actual scope for change due to the steep learning curve about Wales that lay ahead of me. The process itself involved deciding which aspects of electoral administration they wanted to tackle, guiding them through the political science, while they guided me through the politics, i.e., how much they were willing and able to change things.

During these discussions, I was able to make the case for the broadest spectrum of possibilities so that there would be a “menu” of sorts. Yet it was important to demonstrate not just the many possibilities they could choose from, but that by pulling on one thread, another might unravel. For example, increasing the number of polling stations to help with voter participation is a fine idea in principle, but it’s not going to make a difference if people don’t have a way to get to them. This process also included going beyond the Anglo-Saxon Commonwealth and the Global North for cases, considerations around offline electronic voting and its potential for transparency, access, and data, and clarifying understanding that to discuss inclusion and safety measures for marginalised candidates, the whole potential politician pipeline had to be reviewed. These and many other building blocks had to be carefully worded to ensure that the goal remained: ensuring that people who weren’t going to the polls or submitting their ballots found a way to do so, even if that mean overcoming obstacles or disengagement. If the goal is enfranchisement, it has to be more than who isn’t in the room, but why, and what can we do to bring the room to them.

Ultimately, the report Reform of electoral law and practice included early voting, special voting arrangements (innovative electoral practices, as per their jargon), candidate and agent safety, campaign finances and spending, and electoral management bodies. The SVA section included postal and flexible voting, offline electronic ballot boxes, and ways to make voter registration easier and more accessible. Presentations played a key role, where the practices were explained in detail and with examples, such as demonstrating how electoral data repositories work.

The Elections and Elected Bodies (Wales) Bill was passed on 9 July 2024. Items included were an electoral administration body, automatic voter registration, an online platform that centralises election information, specific services for inclusion of marginalised groups aiming for diversity in candidacies, and increased campaign finance rules and oversight. Meanwhile, what seemed to be their biggest concern at the time, spoiled ballots in postal voting, does not feature in the new law. In the final debate, Members of the Senedd (MSs) voted for the bill claiming its importance for Welsh democracy (Plenary 09/07/2024). Two of my biggest concerns, lack of physical access to polling stations due to transportation and lack of secrecy in voting for blind people, went unaddressed, but the hope (that most fragile and beautiful of things), is that these will be considered and improved one day.

A relationship between academia and policy-making

Writing reports and evidence[2] is a great way to do some literature review and keep up with the research out there, but it is good to keep expectations low. The Reform of electoral law and practice was published in 2022, with something here and there alluding to it, but nothing concrete. Impact can indeed take a long time and I moved to a different department at Cardiff University.

At one point, Laura McAllister invited me to write a piece of evidence for the Senedd with her, regarding job sharing for Welsh politicians. Having witnessed and read about the experience of collective candidacies in Brazil and elsewhere, I did feel I had something to contribute, so Laura and I submitted our evidence.

I was then invited by the Senedd’s Business Committee to submit written evidence and attend the oral evidence session on the Senedd Cymru (Electoral Candidate Lists) Bill, which proposed the application of gender quotas in the now closed-list proportional representation system of Wales. Sadly, the bill was withdrawn by Welsh Government, probably due to fear over constitutional issues and that the UK government would challenge it.

I have been in other meetings with Senedd civil servants, have submitted more written evidence in job sharing and the bill submission process, was interviewed as a case study for Senedd engagement, spoke at The Learned Society of Wales about how to give evidence, and participated in discussions on the Diversity and inclusion guidance for political parties. Five years after I had started at Cardiff University, I am still a foreigner, but one who has been able to write other works about Wales. I find myself particularly concerned with transportation for MPs and the location of polling stations, something that hasn’t been taken into much consideration.

Validation, citations, and impact

As academics, we tend to look for validation in publication first and then, in citations. Being cited, even to be criticised, means that our peers have judged our work valuable enough to be repeated, judged next to theirs, improved upon. We do not often consider the possibility of actual change to the system being made by us. And our evaluation systems often do not take into account anything but peer-reviewed publications, in the ‘correct’ journals or publishers.

As an immigrant and a non-white woman, there is a feeling that I am not allowed to be wrong, which means that if they do nothing, it’s fine, but if they do something on my advice and it fails, it’ll be my fault. They won’t look to blame me, no one will say my name, but many therapy sessions will be spent on it.

But I have found that being a foreign academic in the UK, having earned my degrees in Brazil, has been one of my strengths (not that I haven’t face my share of prejudices). Not just because I came from the Global South, not just because I came from a country with an imperfect, but very good electoral administration system, but because an interdisciplinary social sciences and comparative methodology training taught me to look beyond the country and attempt to understand the framework that sustains it. I found that being able to ask them to change “the way things were”, putting my finger on those dusty corners that no one had wanted or thought to touch really opened doors and pricked up ears. However, actually working on it, being possibly responsible for people’s access to the polling station, reminded me about the humanity of the process.

^[1] Wales has now fully reformed its electoral system to closed list proportional.

[2] For those not into the British lingo, “evidence” can be oral or written evidence, which are submission of expertise to politicians within the context of their respective legislature and a topic.

About the author

Dr Larissa Peixoto Gomes is a postdoctoral research fellow on the ERC-funded QUALREP project and is based at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland.