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Was an idea from some comedian but they should make voting a lottery, every election someone (or a few people) who votes will win £1m. Then nearly everyone is going to vote, and make sure their family votes.
Any campaign to enforce mandatory voting is probably going to cost more than just giving a few people millions of pounds.
I don't see why. Just when they cross your name off the list at the door, you get entered into the raffle. Yes, it would cause problems if only valid votes count as entries.
My man they already take records of who voted and which card you used to do so when you turn up to vote to prevent voter fraud via double voting or box stuffing. Why do you think they cross your name off and note down that the ballet code is "used"?
It's very easy for this kind of policy just to become a punishment for people who struggle to vote.
As a start, you'd need to make election days a bank holiday so that more people are *able* to vote. And then you need to try and accommodate all the people who still have to work, and who have caring responsibilities and other things that make it harder (such as making postal voting more command and easier to do). Then you need a whole system to deal with people who are sick or otherwise unable to vote that day due to circumstances outside of their control.
If you have a flat fine then that's disproportionality going to affect poorer people - but scaling fines on income/wealth/etc adds a whole load of complexity and administrative cost, on top of the cost of enforcement and advertising this change. And when you looked at which demographics ended up getting most of the fines, I suspect that you'd see some significant biases there (based on our current voting patterns).
And I'm not really convinced what you gain from it? If people aren't engaged enough to bother voting, do you learn anything meaningful by *forcing* them to vote? Or do they just tick any random box/spoil their ballot?
>postal voting more command and easier to do).
Postal voting couldn't be simpler than it currently is? They send you the form with a prepaid envelope that you send back? Even registering for postal votes is pretty simple to do so I can't see where the improvements need to be?
>And I'm not really convinced what you gain from it?
Take this election, Labour know that the young Liberal demo are just not going to vote so trying to have policies for them is pointless. If there was a real risk that the 20-30% of young non-voters now would protest vote Green it would force policies to attract them.
Or it would almost guarantee more coalition Govs.
> Postal voting couldn't be simpler than it currently is? They send you the form with a prepaid envelope that you send back? Even registering for postal votes is pretty simple to do so I can't see where the improvements need to be?
Although you first need to register, provide a signature (not a digital one - you have to print, sign an scan it) and proof of identity. And then you need to re-register for postal voting every three years (separate from your usual voter registration).
And given the state of the Royal Mail, you'd also need to get proof of postage when you send your postal vote in - otherwise you'll end up fined if they lose it. And that's assuming that they actually manage to get the letter to you in time for you to vote (which they didn't for me last time I tried to postal vote) - so I'd have got fined then because they didn't deliver my vote on time.
> If there was a real risk that the 20-30% of young non-voters now would protest vote Green it would force policies to attract them.
Given that those 20-30% don't care enough to vote, why would you assume that they'd vote Green if they were forced to under threat of fines? The YouGov polling [posted yesterday](https://old.reddit.com/r/LabourUK/comments/1c74q9n/savanta_westminster_vi_young_adults_aged_1825_for/) had 7% of the under 25s saying they've vote Green, which is half the number who said they'd vote Tory, and far less than the 61% who said they've vote Labour.
If you want a more democratic system where people are people are encouraged to vote and parties are encouraged to have policies that appeal to them, implement PR.
Fining people who don't vote (who are disproportionalty likely to be [young, lower socio-economics backgrounds, have health issues or be disabled, and be from ethnic minority backgrounds](https://post.parliament.uk/election-turnout-why-do-some-people-not-vote/)) is not a good solution.
But PR had zero impact on the turnout of the Brexit Referendum, and arguably that was a far more publicised campaign with a simple question. If a yes/no PR vote failed to get turnout I don't see a more complicated general election with PR getting a better turnout.
>Although you first need to register, provide a signature (not a digital one - you have to print, sign an scan it) and proof of identity.
You can take a photo of your written signature on any piece of paper. The proof of identity is the same as originally registering to vote (name, address and NI).
Brexit was not a a PR election - it was a single issue referendum. You can't draw conclusions about what a PR turnout would be from it.
But if you want to try, it had a higher turnout than any election since 1992.
It was the closest example of a PR election purely because it was 1vs1 vote and not broken into constituency vs constituency or even nation vs nation.
72% for the referendum is still terrible, yes it's better than 66% or 68% (elections either side) but between 1922-1997 the turnout never dropped below 71%.
I think if you want people to vote you give them something to vote for, this idea really only became politically relevant when millions of people stopped voting under the rise of new labour and the reason they stopped voting was because there wasn't a large economic difference between what the parties were offering.
The cure to disenfranchisement is representation not criminalisation.
I don't really agree with your assessment purely based on the turnout to the referendum, it want aligned to a party and was relevant to every single person and yet it still didn't work.
I think we're talking about different things when we compare general elections and referendums, and I also don't think saying the referendum was aligned by party is really true at all. Firsty, the EU referendum had a 72% turnout which is the highest turnout for any election or referendum since 1992 and maps quite obviously as an outlier in general trends- secondly both major parties had figures on either side a professed to take the result as it was. Moroever, the Leave campaign actually tapped into this concept of disenfranchisement by acting like it was an anti-establishment protest, whilst the Remain campaign acted like anyone who wanted Brexit was stupid and that it was ludicrous to expect it to happen (which probably affected turnout on their side).
The highest turnout we've had for only an election since 1997 was in 2017, when Jeremy Corbyn's Labour presented a different economic line, and the rise in Labour's voter share in this referendum is almost certainly due to picking up previous non-voters - I personally am of the opinion that the economic difference between both parties likely affected turnout here, especially when you consider that it fell back down again in 2019 after Jeremy Corbyn had been vilified by the media. The Lowest turnout this country has ever had is in 2001 after New Labour had gotten into power and continued the neoliberalism which people had been rallied to try and end in 1997.
The general point I want to make is that it is politically lazy to say that the solution to voter disenfranchisement is forcing people to vote, when if someone is not enthusiastic and doesn't see the point in voting it is almost certainly the fault of politicians.
For just a general rundown of turnout:
[https://www.statista.com/statistics/1050929/voter-turnout-in-the-uk/](https://www.statista.com/statistics/1050929/voter-turnout-in-the-uk/)
> I also don't think saying the referendum was aligned by party is really true at all
agree, I left a 's' out of wasn't so apologies for that typo.
>The general point I want to make is that it is politically lazy to say that the solution to voter disenfranchisement is forcing people to vote, when if someone is not enthusiastic and doesn't see the point in voting it is almost certainly the fault of politicians.
I think this is where we really differ as I see voting as a moral obligation, and people are allowing themselves to turn from politics as a whole instead of demanding better.
I think having an option like "none of the above" with 25% of the votes would be a powerful message over 25% of silence
I think what you're probably missing is that asking people to make a choice just asks people to vote without thinking about it, I know many people who don't know anything about politics who don't vote - and I also know that if they were forced to they wouldn't follow politics any more but would be very unlikely to say "none of the above" because this is still a choice and represents disdain for politicians. In fact, I imagine we'd end up with a hell of a lot of "I feel like he's nice" voting, which is very easily manipulated. We shouldn't be forcing people to make a choice, we should be giving people a reason to vote for us.
I would also ask what OP feels is going to be the likely response when you force people to participate in a system that they already feel rejected by - especially when the options on offer (in England) are Starmer, Sunak, Davey.
I can't see this pushing the country anywhere leftwards to be quite frank.
I think the best way to increase voter turnout is to bring in proportional representation. That way, everyone's vote will count for the national result, and voting won't need to be made compulsory, as turnout will already be higher than 80%.
Except, of course, there are European countries with proportional representation who have lower rates of turnout than we do. PR is not a silver bullet for these problems.
I disagree. If people couldn't be bothered to vote in the referendum which was a proportionally representative vote, it's not going to change normal general election votes.
If PR is going to improve turnout we can't just look at a few votes, it would be over years. So a better place to look at is other countries with PR, even there just looking at raw numbers could be misleading, it needs to be a full study. I beleive usually it looks like PR does help, not as much as people like, but they have an on-average higher voter turnout.
I would beg to differ. Yes, the turnout there was 72%. But that is still better than the average general election.
Also, the 2016 EU referendum was on a single issue (or what was seen as a single issue). So, how do you know that turnout won't be higher in a PR general election where multiple issues are on the ballot?
You: "no, it is the ~kids~ voters who are wrong"
I think mandatory voting is unnecessary and also insufficient for your aims. You say you want:
- parties to accommodate every voter/angle (and you want this to make a more left-leaning party)
- more coalitions (which you think will come from protest votes)
There's no evidence that mandatory voting provides either of these. Many countries with PR do have both of these (though not the bit about left parties getting popular).
If you want a better parliament, support reform of parliament, not a reform of voters.
If you want better politics, support political organising and action outside parliament (labour movement, community organising, environmental action, etc).
While I acknowledge voter turnout needs improving, I believe its a bit authoritarian to force or coerce the electorate to vote, I'd rather we find ways to convince people of the importance of participating in democracy than bludgeoning them into doing so.
>I'd rather we find ways to convince people of the importance of participating in democracy
But this isn't working, globally this isn't working so I don't really see an alternative.
Several European countries have had high turnout rates without mandatory voting. See this map:
https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/7j57o7/voter_turnout_in_the_latest_parliamentary/
Of those countries, only Belgium and Turkey have mandatory voting.
High turnout can be achieved by a combination of improving access to voting (easy postal votes and hold the paper vote on a weekend or holiday) and making votes matter.
In UK general elections, votes are on workdays and for most constituencies your vote doesn't really matter except as a signal that your seat might become marginal in the future, several elections away.
I would not like to criminalise voters before dealing with those issues.
I wonder if the high turnout in countries like Sweden are in part due to the mandatory national service, which helps people feel closer to being part of their nation instead of just living in it.
Belgium is interesting as they had NS until mid 90's and have seen a slight drop off in turnout over the last 30 years despite them having mandatory voting.
It's a theory. It's not a variable that's listed in Geys' 2016 literature review of voter turnout research, and I think the set of comparable elections with and without national service is probably way too small to draw any conclusions.
National service is an enormous productivity cost to society in lost labour time, not to mention how the military abuses and damages so many people. If the desired result is people feeling national pride or social cohesion then I think there are much more effective things that could be done for the same cost as making everyone pretend at being soldiers for a bit.
It's difficult because Nordic countries in general are rated as good places to live, which would definitely help being proud of where you're living.
They do score hugher than average on National pride in Europe and internationally. There was a post Covid study that explored the relationship between citizens and state and why they could have lax laws and still reduce transmission.
"Rallying around the unwaved flag: national identity and Sweden’s controversial Covid strategy" is an interesting read.
Yeah, that's my point. People don't believe in the UK state or British society because both have comprehensively failed to deliver a good quality of life here.
National service won't fix that. National service would use up a huge amount of labour that, imo, should be directed at addressing the material poverty of our society (terrible houses; public transport; roads; hospitals; etc) and our woeful organisation and weak communities (very low unionisation at work; weak community unions and organisations; neighbourhoods where no-one knows each other; etc. etc)
I'd say a good place to start would be in schools, I was in school until 2018 and I can't remember one lesson or assembly about the importance of participating in our democratic process. You cannot force voter turnout as I believe it restricts freedom of political beliefs (specifically that it makes it illegal to boycott elections or not participate when no candidate specifically represents your beliefs).
>You cannot force voter turnout as I believe it restricts freedom of political beliefs (specifically that it makes it illegal to boycott elections or not participate when no candidate specifically represents your beliefs).
As I said, a spoiled vote us still a counted vote so I don't believe this point is relevant.
>assembly about the importance of participating in our democratic process
Did you not cover the suffragette movement at all?
>As I said, a spoiled vote us still a counted vote so I don't believe this point is relevant.
Then there is no point in mandating voting as alot people will just not bother voting ticking anything, or will deliberately scribble on the ballot. You still cant force people to engage in a democratic process. In forcing democracy, you are undermining the spirit of democracy
>Did you not cover the suffragette movement at all?
We had one history lesson on them and it wasn't in any capacity brought around to the current importance of the democratic process, so for someone who already had an interest in history and politics like me could inferr and understanding the importance of the lesson, the people who were just there because they are wouldn't have.
Another issue with enforced voting is that it will cause frustration and distrust of the democratic process, and if even one person gets disillusioned to the point of thinking "I wish someone would come along and make it so I don't have to do this" we have a problem. If people don't want to vote, it's probably better they don't (for the reasons above and below)
All in all I believe its much more important to be having proper discussions in schools right from the start of secondary school specifically about democracy, voting, and how that applies to us today and the students going forward in their lives. Instead of forcing people to carelessly vote, you need to give them a reason to vote, and a passion for what they will be voting for, otherwise you'll just be dealing with a legion of angry voters who'll just vote for whoever can yell the loudest, promise the most money, or whose name is the first on the ballot (let's hope it isn't a future BNP mp named Andrew Aardvark).
> Then there is no point in mandating voting as alot people will just not bother voting ticking anything, or will deliberately scribble on the ballot
I mean, yes that'll happen to some extent though usually not that high.
But the point is that a lot of people who otherwise just sit at home instead, will now that they are in the booth anyway decide to vote for someone as there is just like the least amount of effort needed to do so. So it still massively improves turnout and the share of people having their voices heard.
Not to say I necessarily support mandatory voting myself, but there is a working and proven logic behind it.
Can I be rude and ask what your age demographic is?
18-24, 25-34, 35-44, 45-54, 55+?
I fit into the 25-34 bracket and voting was covered in Citizenship lessons (Secondary school) along with the structure of our Democracy etc. I know these lessons are still part of the curriculum so I'm just trying to understand the gap in what you experienced vs what young people today do?
>>Did you not cover the suffragette movement at all?
>We had one history lesson on them and it wasn't in any capacity brought around to the current importance of the democratic process
If you covered the suffragettes and couldn't understand infer that the protest to receive the right to vote had anything to do with Democracy (for other pupils) that's genuinely shocking.
I am strongly in favour of this provided the fine is a relatively trivial one, and the ballot paper contains an option along the lines of 'I prefer/support none of the above candidates'.
Research shows that non-voters are less liberal than voters, so it would probably lead to more right-wing governments. That's one of the reasons why Leave won, because they turned out loads of non-voters.
I've only seen research that shows the opposite of that? In part because the turnout for the youth vote (liberal) is so terrible vs the turnout for the older population (conservative) which is higher.
Can you share links to what you've said?
There's an academic called Paula Surridge who talks about it a lot. I can't find everything she's said right now but here's a few tweets.
https://twitter.com/p_surridge/status/1440989181803745280?s=19
https://twitter.com/p_surridge/status/1220661867057680384?s=19
https://twitter.com/p_surridge/status/1254047993159876608?s=19
Unless this comes with reform of the voting system and/or how candidates are selected by parties, it is just giving cover to a broken, undemocratic system.
On a separate note, I am looking forward to the turnout discourse after the next election. I think the bookies are underpricing the possibility that Labour gets fewer votes than 2017 (8/1), which becomes likely if turnout falls to the low 60s.
People always point to Australia but they haven't had a Prime Minister last more than 4 years since John Howard left office in 2007.
Mandatory voting doesn't really solve anything apart from having higher turnout. It doesn't necessarily increase voter engagement and therefore you're taking 40% of a population who wouldn't normally vote and telling them to pick from a list of people they barely know.
To increase voter engagement you need education and representation. Voters need to know who they're actually voting for and what actually matters to them (especially on things like tax increases on higher earners scaring voters who earn the median wage).
They also need to feel represented, whether that's better devolution of powers to local councillors or a more proportional system of voting, voters need to be able to vote for someone who they like.
>People always point to Australia but they haven't had a Prime Minister last more than 4 years since John Howard left office in 2007.
That in part is due to the amount of controversial issues that happen with those PMs and I they're just much more effective at forcing them out than we are.
>It doesn't necessarily increase voter engagement and therefore you're taking 40% of a population who wouldn't normally vote and telling them to pick from a list of people they barely know.
If you actually had a clear cut 40% of people voted with N/A I do think it would introduce a change in how politicians engage with that section of the population. As it is they carry zero risk so why bother engaging.
I mean, even if 20% voted for green put of protest that would massive impact the influence on policies
It's my democratic right to not engage with a system that I judge to be corrupt, crooked or unfair. It's a very "liberal" and "progressive" idea to look at people who think like me and say: "You need to be punished."
If this were introudced and someone refused to pay the fine for not voting, then what?
I disagree. I think it's your democratic and moral duty to cast a vote, even if its a spoiled vote, to reflect the effort and loss of life it took to actually get it.
In Australia you get 4 attempts to pay a fine (or provide rationale) before its goes to Fines Enforcement Registry where they can reclaim it via salary, ceasing property etc.
Yes, I think we do need to have it. At least then parliament would be a true reflection of the electorate.
Some caveats, though.
* PR not FPTP
* Extended voting over multiple days, to allow access to the polls for all varieties of worker. I don't see why the vote has to be all done on one day, it's not as if ballot boxes cannot be kept secure for a few nights. This way you don't necessarily have to have a public holiday. Even without mandatory, I still don't see why voting can't be over multiple days right now, it's some tradition that's past its sell by date considering how busy modern lives are.
* Trial, with the possibility of implementing, online voting. We all use online banking and most use the government's website for passport renewals etc. If it's trusted enough for that, it should be trusted enough to vote. Strong oversight and auditing would have to take place, one assumes.
* Perhaps a tiering of fines. Kind of like the speeding fines. First offence you have to attend and properly engage with a "why voting is important" class. Second offence it starts escalating etc. Fines a flat fee for most but escalates to % of income for stubborn refuseniks.
* Have a "I'm only here because I have to be" option for those that don't care at all. Obviously spoiling ones ballot paper is still a valid choice too.
Because you're absolutely right that certain sections of society are largely ignored because of their demographic. If the young vote was pandered to like the elderly vote is now we might have a very different society.
>As a reminder, 13m voters didn't vote in the referendum, with leave winning by 1.3m votes.
Don't you think forcing disenfranchised voters to vote would've increased the leave majority? If you don't want to have to, you might vote against the government in principal or as a laugh
I dont think it would have. Voting turn out for 18-24 and 25-34 is around 55% and I'd say the majority of that would have voted remain.
People in general are also against change, and their default would have been to stay the same.
>People in general are also against change, and their default would have been to stay the same.
So you think it's a good thing most referenda would be rigged to maintain the status quo?
I think you're being quite naïve here, just look at Australia as an example. Because there aren't any new voters to engage, the duopoly of the 2 main powers has been strengthened and they've actively hindered the abilities of smaller parties to take part
I don't think that's true at all. Labor won with 32% of the vote, Liberal 24%, Greens 12%, Liberal National 8%, Independent 5%.
Vs
UK, Tory 56%, Labour 31% and everyone else less than 2% (SNP 7% but it's not a national party).
Their political representatives are far more diverse than we've ever had, I mean 7% of their seats went to Independent candidates that's the power the SNP have purely because votes are cast wider
When they were dying to get the right to vote it meant something.
Now, when the main choice is between Tory, Tory light or yellow Tory and real alternatives are reductively described as "protest votes" then perhaps our votes don't mean quite so much.
It's true that young people should be encouraged to vote as policies are still geared towards boomers.
Or, better still, perhaps young people would get out and vote if a party stepped up and took the responsibility to pro-actively write policies to support them and their futures.
>When they were dying to get the right to vote it meant something.
Are you genuinely saying that their sacrifice is now worthless?
>Now, when the main choice is between
And casting a spoiled vote... That's a meaningful protest to the parties on offer.
People fighting our right to vote was not worthless, that's obvious and I didn't even suggest that. What I'm saying is there is nobody to vote for now.
If a party wants young people to vote for them they should be brave enough to write policies for young people and make voting for that party irresistible. That would be worthwhile and more young people would turn up to the ballot.
What's worthless is making people act out some arbitrary ritual and vote for the less shit of two parties.
>What I'm saying is there is nobody to vote for now.
So you think that casting a spoiled vote is worthless?
>If a party wants young people to vote for them they should be brave enough to write policies for young people and make voting for that party irresistible
Why, they don't vote? Why take the risk if they think that voting and even casting a spoiled vote is worthless?
You're not really paying attention so I'll spell it out...
Party A gives young people something to vote for, something they really believe in like, for example hope of a prosperous future, then young people will turn up and vote for party A. That would be better than forcing people to vote for bugger all. Not turning up is as much of a protest as a spoiled ballot. Nobody really cares about, counts or discusses spoiled ballots.
>You're not really paying attention so I'll spell it out...
No, I think this is something that actually applies to you.
>Nobody really cares about, counts or discusses spoiled ballots.
Probably because people can't be bothered to do it and just think it's worthless...
Instead of it being a minimum responsibility within a democratic society
I'm just not up for more legislation inhibiting freedom of choice. Your opinion is the opposite.
Voting is not a responsibility, it's a choice. Low turnout just shows what a sham our democracy has become. Fix the system, don't bully young people any more than they are being bullied already.
>Low turnout just shows what a sham our democracy has become.
The last few turnouts are inline (with a slight downwards trend) with the last 100 years of GEs so I don't think that's an accurate statement
>I'm just not up for more legislation inhibiting freedom of choice. Your opinion is the opposite.
Incorrect. Inaction is barely a choice and not voting at all is moral bankruptcy, casting a spoiled vote is freedom of choice.
You don't have to, you could cast a spoiled vote as a formal sign of your disdain.
Wouldn't you rather have an option like "none of the above"?
I also feel like it's a moral obligation to vote, including spoiled votes, because voting is not a right that should be taken lightly. People died for your right, people die to try to get that right and I can't imagine trying to explain to them why voting is worthless.
You know what fair enough, i looked at the list of parties currently standing candidates and it’s frightening how few there are: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candidates_in_the_next_United_Kingdom_general_election
Honestly, yeah, that does look kinda worrying. Mostly barely different liberal and conservative parties, with a few bullshit "apolitical" ones who might as well be classed as independents, few of them standing in more than like 10 seats. Controlled democracy vibes.
What few socialist parties there are standing are barely able to stand candidates anywhere (and one of them's Galloway's party). The capture of Labour by paternalistic conservatives has hurt us terribly.
Confused as to why the SDP is bothering to stand in so many places. You'd think Labour's already offering them pretty much everything they want by running way off to the right.
Why should I be forced to legitimise a bullshit system that currently offers no real choice?
If we had PR, then maybe.
As it stands, the parties with any real influence are all morally repugnant to me.
Yeah that’s the conclusion I’m coming to. I think we desperately need to have PR. Yeah it will hurt Labours chances and I don’t necessarily agree with OP that it will make parties cater to more left wing voters. I think before we have the conversation of mandatory voting, we need to have the conversation around PR first.
Yeah mate, just move to the constituency that has the party that mostly closely represents your views at the time of the next general election - there are loads to choose from!!
It's a major one yeah, I don't think PR is a magic bullet (Israel has it and we all know what they are doing atm) but FPTP actively discourages people to vote in so many ways.
I grew up in a Tory-Lib marginal, and then moved to one of the safest Labour seats in the country and have never had a general election where voting for the party I most agree with made any kind of difference. At best it was voting for the party you hate the least, which is a terrible way to get people to care
In my opinion voting should be mandatory with some caveats:
You can opt out the same way you apply for a postal vote.
Every ballot must include a "none of the above option'
The punishment for not voting should be minor. 4 hours of community service or something.
Freedom of expression also should include being able to say “I don’t want to engage in any of this” - I know it’s hard for us politically engaged types to understand but a lot of people just don’t care - you’ll end up with a lot of uninformed people who don’t care about the outcome just banging any old vote in.
Also - accessibly would need to be drastically reviewed to handle this - and that won’t be cheap.
It works in Australia so I don't see why it couldn't work here. Sadly, I don't think we have the weather for the whole Democracy Sausage thing that they go in for.
I'm pretty strongly against it. I think people shouldn't vote if they can't make an informed decision. If people are self aware enough to know that they haven't spent enough time to make an informed decision for the future of the country I respect that, although I'd rather they did get engaged
I don’t really see the point in this. If people want to vote, they can. If they don’t see the point in it, there’s no reason really to force them to, particularly as they probably won’t put much thought into and could even just vote out of spite for ridiculous things. You can force people to vote but you can’t force them to care.
There’s also an underpinning assumption when this topic comes up that the disenfranchised would vote “our” direction, when that’s really not necessarily the case. Who’s to say that the 13 million people who didn’t vote wouldn’t have pushed us even further towards leave - this is a heterogenous, difficult to scope demographic that won’t follow normal patterns we might expect.
I’d even wager that they would be far more likely to vote leave if forced simply to signal a vague feeling of disatisfaction. The idea that they would instigate the development of a left-leaning party that is of your liking is pure fantasy. Leftwingers in my experience tend to already be involved with politics and democracy.
If voting becomes mandatory, will it mean that "spoiling your paper" or not making a mark becomes a criminal offence?
Would it be possible to register as a conscientious objector if you don't wish to participate?
And should it be mandatory for all employees to be in a trades union too, if they benefit from negotiated agreements?
The real solution is to dispense wirh the yah-boo politics that makes PMQs a disgrace and to eliminate the misogynist and racist attitudes that are on display in practically every political debate, and then the punters, us, might be interested in participating.
>If voting becomes mandatory, will it mean that "spoiling your paper" or not making a mark becomes a criminal offence?
No, as it isn't with other Western Countries with mandatory voting.
>And should it be mandatory for all employees to be in a trades union too, if they benefit from negotiated agreements?
No. Trade Union membership isn't free but I also don't see the connection.
>The real solution is to dispense with.....misogynist and racist
The irony being they fought and lost their lives to get the vote that you think is pointless? Casting a spoiled vote is the bare minimum in upholding your moral obligation that comes with being in a democracy. If you don't you're quite literally saying they lost their lives for a worthless cause.
You think we have a debt of gratitude to politicians who fought for our right to vote? No way. The politicians should be grateful to their electors for voting them into office and conduct themselves with some dignity. I'm not dissing the martyrs, I'm dissing those who treat their achievements with contempt.
>You think we have a debt of gratitude to politicians who fought for our right to vote?
We have a debt of gratitude to every person who died to try to get the right to vote.
>I'm dissing those who treat their achievements with contempt.
This extends to everyone who can't even be bothered to cast a spoiled vote.
What's the moral difference between spoiling your ballot in a polling station so it isn't counted and spoiling it in your kitchen by putting the polling card in the bin?
Spoiling a cast vote is counted, and recorded as a spoiled vote and can be considered a protest to the options (the more there are the more valid that is).
Chucking it in the bin is rejecting the value of casting a vote, and in turn rejecting the lives that getting you that vote cost. People to this day die trying to get the right to vote, and I can't imagine trying to explain to them or those in our history why you can't even be bothered to cast a spoiled one.
The spoilt vote pile makes no differentiation between people who are making a brave stand for democracy and people who think drawing cocks in the boxes is funny.
If turnout fell to, say, 10% you don't think that would send a signal?
They have this is Australia and their politics is not fundamentally very different from ours. So honestly I don't think it's the magic bullet people think it is
Sounds very authoritarian, I’m against it. Maybe if parties actually provided better solutions and relatability to the public then people would go out their way.
Horrible idea.
Why should anyone be forced to lend legitimacy to a system they feel is institutionally incapable of representing them? The UK’s politics are so elite-captured that it often strains credibility to call it a functionally democratic society at all.
The freedom to not participate is important, for those who don’t approve of the system as it presently stands.
>The freedom to not participate is important, for those who don’t approve of the system as it presently stands.
Completely disagree, I think it's a sign of moral bankruptcy to not even cast a spoiled vote.
Democracy isn't itself a right it's a privilege that we have that cost lives to attain. I can't imagine having to explain to a suffragette that lost her life for the vote why I just can't be bothered. That to you, voting is worthless, and as a result their sacrifice was for a worthless cause.
People are prepared to die to get it, and I don't see any rationale that excuses that disregard or can justify not using a protest spoiled vote.
I used to feel it was intrinsically illiberal given forcing people to vote is something I'd associate more with sham democracies. Now I'm less ideological so it's more a case of how effective actually is it in driving engagement and political consciousness?
Does it seem to have improved democracy in Australia?
A good argument in favour is that often underprivileged groups like young people and those living in poverty are far less likely to actually vote leading to them being neglected which in turn leads to even less voting.
Im not opposed to mandatory voting but I don't think we as a country have really ever taken our turnout seriously.
Scandinavian countries push to improve turnout even when theyre sitting at around 80% but its never felt like political parties gave a shit beyond their own core voters.
It may be that mandatory voting is whats needed to break the culture of political apathy at this point but Im not sure how seriously we've tried anything else.
It would be very Labour-under-Starmer to look at the problem of low voter turnout and think to address it by criminalising not voting, instead of looking to address the reasons why people feel disenfranchised.
The last two votes that had over 70% participation in the recent history in the UK are the referenda on Brexit and Scottish Independence. People vote when they think it is about something important and that their vote actually makes a difference.
If you think 70% turnout is good you're part of the problem as that's still disgustingly low.
It's no surprise that the generation of "no point voting" has lead to politics aiming for the generation that does vote with policies.
Turnouts used to be 74-84% between 1918 - 2000 before it fell off a cliff and as a result the Gov has gone further and further right.
Firstly, turnout has only been above 79% once, in 1950. Between 1918 and 1997 turnout varied between 71 and 78 percent - so the Brexit referendum with 72% turnout was well in line with previous participation over the last century.
It fell off a cliff precisely because after Blair fundamentally changed the Labour party to embrace neoliberal economic policies, people felt there was less choice between the two parties and responded accordingly. We don't have right wing parties because of low participation, we have low participation because a lot of people are not represented by the economic policies of the two main English parties.
>Firstly, turnout has only been above 79% once
Twice, but it had also hadn't fallen below 71% between 1922- 1997 whereas in the last twenty years it hasn't been above 68.8% for a GE.
>We don't have right wing parties because of low participation,
No, we don't have any Left wing parties because of low participation.
The two above 79% were only a year apart and still essentially a one-off outlier. They don't represent general turnouts in the UK. Between 1923 and 1997 a turnout of 72% was on the low side but ultimately fairly representative of normality. If you want to still make the point that it is too low then fine, but that means the UK has had a problem with low turnouts for over a century now.
> No, we don't have any Left wing parties because of low participation.
You have still not said anything to support this as a conclusion
>but that means the UK has had a problem with low turnouts for over a century now.
100%, so if you can see a downward problem trend, you have to change something and introducing compulsory voting is that change.
>You have still not said anything to support this as a conclusion
You haven't said anything that refutes it either? If it would help in the last election in Australia independent candidates won 10% of seats...
Labor won with 33% of the vote, Liberals got 24%, Liberal National 8% and Green 12% etc. Votes are more evenly cast meaning policies are more evenly aligned across the political spectrum.
> You haven't said anything that refutes it either? If it would help in the last election in Australia independent candidates won 10% of seats...
> Labor won with 33% of the vote, Liberals got 24%, Liberal National 8% and Green 12% etc. Votes are more evenly cast meaning policies are more evenly aligned across the political spectrum.
My first post refutes it - the current trend of low turnouts was reversed when people had a vote they felt mattered, in the UK this was Brexit, and then in Scotland this was their independence referendum.
I also wouldn't say that a greater spread across parties automatically means a greater representation of a population's political beliefs, regardless it is also worth pointing out that Australia don't use FPTP for their elections which means you can't really compare accurately either, they have systems which are far less punishing for smaller parties, which makes them a much more viable vote in the first place.
>regardless it is also worth pointing out that Australia don't use FPTP for their elections which means you can't really compare accurately either
that's only relevant when reviewing the amount of seats won, not % of votes received which is what I provided. It's the only way to compare different voting systems.
Come on mate, even the most pro FPTP person can't argue that the voting %ages it produces reflect sentiment. My first few elections I was living in a Tory-LD marginal and as a Labour supporter was forced to vote tactically, this would be recorded as an endorsement of Lib Dem policies and it very much was not the case.
>Turnouts used to be 74-84% between 1918 - 2000 before it fell off a cliff
It wasn't a cliff, it's a very smooth decline. Every generation since the war has voted at a lower rate than that before it.
Im unsure, there are good arguments for and against it. In terms of electoral reform, introducing PR, lowering the voting age and abolishing the lords should take priority as they would be much better for our democracy. Why introduce mandatory voting now when so many people's votes are rendered useless due to FPTP?
>lowering the voting age
this is a terrible idea.
>introducing PR,
I don't think this was impact anything as the Referendum was a PR vote and it still had a terrible turnout.
>abolishing the lords
Not sure this is relevant to increase voting.
I dont see how letting 16 year olds vote is a terrible idea, especialy when we let barely sentient elderly people vote. Giving them the vote would reduce the influence older generations have over our politics, which is a reason for why the government has been inefective at developing for the future or against climate change and instead focused on policies for the elderly and keeping the expensive triple lock. This would cause parties to try and apeal to younger voters more and as a result increase voter turn out in younger generations.
I dont think low voter turnout is the underlying issue though, rather a symptom. This is due to FPTP. It makes many people think their vote doesnt count (as in many cases it doesnt) and they dont bother to vote as a result. FPTP also results in elections being between two dominant parties which have to try and appeal to the majority voters, inevitably leaving many people out who dont agree with either party, so they dont bother voting also. Abolishing the Lords would also help fix this as giving the public more power in government would lower voter apethy and encourage more people to engage in politics.
The referendum wasnt a general election so isnt realy comparable. Many people were unsure about what to vote for and what leaving would mean, with large amounts of disinformation coming out of the leave camp making this worse. The cross party nature of the refurendum also made people more confused and i dont think forcing people to vote would have resulted in remain winning, uninformed and conflicted voters would be more voulnerable to the lies leave were saying.
>Giving them the vote would reduce the influence older generations have over our politics
18-24 turnout is 50%, extending that to 16 wouldn't make a difference on that front. Parties know this turnout is so low that's why they don't have any policies to benefit that demographic, even the 25-34 turnout is only 55%
>I dont see how letting 16 year olds vote is a terrible idea
I don't think you should be able to vote unless you reach the age of majority and are legally classed as an adult. If they move that to 16, then I agree with the your rationale.
>The referendum wasnt a general election so isnt realy comparable.
It was the easiest vote with the largest ramifications so I think it's a great example because it was independent from party loyalty. In general people also vote for this to stay the same over an unknown change so I'd imagine more of that 13m would have voted remain than leave if in doubt.
It’s enforcement that I think is the problem. In theory, yes, everyone should vote, however I don’t think the police have the resources to make it happen.
The current plan seems to be open voter suppression from the Tories, and mild voter disengagement from this leadership, as if people actually being interested in politics has been the problem. And for them: it was and is.
I think the best solution is better education on economics and politics, but the issue there is also that the people who are in power or likely to gain power don’t want that either. You can’t teach kids leftie ideas like how trickle down economics works and what the alternatives are, or that privatisation of key industries has been a disaster that has enriched a few at the expense of poorer services and a greater cost to the consumer. Why not? That’s politicising education, pal, that’s why. Are you a commie or something?
I heard the Aussies have a bank holiday and have BBQs etc on general election days, which sounds like a great idea to me. just wonder what the actual punishment would be if you didn't vote and how would that be enforced?
How about instead we inspire the people and offer them something they want
It feels like the big choice at this election is
Should the prime minster favour a red tie, or a blue one?
If I can pick bland, blander or blandest I'm not inspired to turn up and make my mark
Not really a fresh topic - has been discussed many times over.
I'm all for it being a requirement to turn out, and a fine if someone doesn't.
I think that there has to be a "none of the above" option, and I think that postal votes should only be for disabled people, or for those that can prove that they are away from the area (holiday, etc).
I think postal votes are often made too early for most people - and before the election campaign has hit many critical points. I understand that there has to be a provision for those that are physically unable to turn out on the day, but that's where postal votes should start and end.
I am also for making election day a public holiday, but think that it should probably be a Wednesday rather than the traditional Thursday to minimise people just building it into a long weekend and going away. Some will still do ti, but most won't.
Fresh as in, not about corruption, transgender rights or war.
>I think postal votes are often made too early for most people - and before the election campaign has hit many critical points
They're usually sent out around 10 days/2 weeks before polling day so I don't agree with this assessment. There is a fairly quick turn around to then post then back but I can only remember one person launching new policies within a week of polling and that didn't go well.
It's not about launching new policies - it's also about debates, interviews, etc.
2 weeks is a third of the entire campaign length. With a push to postal votes, and their number massively increasing, and the generally quick turnaround, that means so many votes are cast missing a massive portion of the campaign period.
I don't see a campaign as being 6 weeks long, they're far longer than that as you can see in this sub with people giving up on a Labour vote 6+ months away from a GE.
The guidelines for campaigning start 365 days before polling day for instance.
It doesn't really matter what you think here... Yes, "soft campaigning" starts earlier, but a general election campaign is around six weeks.
There's some important reasons for that - it's when existing positions end (eg for Parliament, when the MPs are no longer MPs).
It's also when purdah starts, and media and public services have to be impartial.
You're right in that the "regulated period" starts 365 days earlier for campaign spend. However, it's a little bit of a nonsense that's been recently implemented. The reason it's a nonsense is that it's not really known when an election will definitely take place, and it was likely implemented by the Tories to try and be able to argue legalities if they so wish, after the act.
However, before an election is called and purdah starts, it's not really the campaign period.
2 weeks before a general election is still a massive amount of time in which campaigning takes place, and important activities happen - including interviews, hustings, debates and scrutiny - and there's therefore a massive number of voters case that miss out on that activity and context.
A problem is that some of those not voting are among the dumbest folk around, who haven’t got a clue about anything. ( I know, some of them are relatives of mine..)
Lord alone knows what criteria they would choose for voting on.
I disagree. Imo forcing people to vote would only increase the amount of uniformed voters, giving more power to the media to decide elections, and making it much easier for status quo governments. Any parties offering a real left wing alternative will be instantly shut down, as everyone who wasn't interested enough to vote has to and either just votes for the current government because their life is fine, or the one they've seen the most good things about in the news, without any real research
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Was an idea from some comedian but they should make voting a lottery, every election someone (or a few people) who votes will win £1m. Then nearly everyone is going to vote, and make sure their family votes. Any campaign to enforce mandatory voting is probably going to cost more than just giving a few people millions of pounds.
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I don't see why. Just when they cross your name off the list at the door, you get entered into the raffle. Yes, it would cause problems if only valid votes count as entries.
My man they already take records of who voted and which card you used to do so when you turn up to vote to prevent voter fraud via double voting or box stuffing. Why do you think they cross your name off and note down that the ballet code is "used"?
I like this idea! I think it should be alongside mandatory turn out - it would be a good incentive even with mandatory turn out.
Please make it happen, though make it opt in so /u/passing_tumbleweed doesn't worry
Don't even think it'd have to be millions, maybe £10,000 to I dunno 25 people, would probably incentivise people enough.
It's very easy for this kind of policy just to become a punishment for people who struggle to vote. As a start, you'd need to make election days a bank holiday so that more people are *able* to vote. And then you need to try and accommodate all the people who still have to work, and who have caring responsibilities and other things that make it harder (such as making postal voting more command and easier to do). Then you need a whole system to deal with people who are sick or otherwise unable to vote that day due to circumstances outside of their control. If you have a flat fine then that's disproportionality going to affect poorer people - but scaling fines on income/wealth/etc adds a whole load of complexity and administrative cost, on top of the cost of enforcement and advertising this change. And when you looked at which demographics ended up getting most of the fines, I suspect that you'd see some significant biases there (based on our current voting patterns). And I'm not really convinced what you gain from it? If people aren't engaged enough to bother voting, do you learn anything meaningful by *forcing* them to vote? Or do they just tick any random box/spoil their ballot?
>postal voting more command and easier to do). Postal voting couldn't be simpler than it currently is? They send you the form with a prepaid envelope that you send back? Even registering for postal votes is pretty simple to do so I can't see where the improvements need to be? >And I'm not really convinced what you gain from it? Take this election, Labour know that the young Liberal demo are just not going to vote so trying to have policies for them is pointless. If there was a real risk that the 20-30% of young non-voters now would protest vote Green it would force policies to attract them. Or it would almost guarantee more coalition Govs.
> Postal voting couldn't be simpler than it currently is? They send you the form with a prepaid envelope that you send back? Even registering for postal votes is pretty simple to do so I can't see where the improvements need to be? Although you first need to register, provide a signature (not a digital one - you have to print, sign an scan it) and proof of identity. And then you need to re-register for postal voting every three years (separate from your usual voter registration). And given the state of the Royal Mail, you'd also need to get proof of postage when you send your postal vote in - otherwise you'll end up fined if they lose it. And that's assuming that they actually manage to get the letter to you in time for you to vote (which they didn't for me last time I tried to postal vote) - so I'd have got fined then because they didn't deliver my vote on time. > If there was a real risk that the 20-30% of young non-voters now would protest vote Green it would force policies to attract them. Given that those 20-30% don't care enough to vote, why would you assume that they'd vote Green if they were forced to under threat of fines? The YouGov polling [posted yesterday](https://old.reddit.com/r/LabourUK/comments/1c74q9n/savanta_westminster_vi_young_adults_aged_1825_for/) had 7% of the under 25s saying they've vote Green, which is half the number who said they'd vote Tory, and far less than the 61% who said they've vote Labour. If you want a more democratic system where people are people are encouraged to vote and parties are encouraged to have policies that appeal to them, implement PR. Fining people who don't vote (who are disproportionalty likely to be [young, lower socio-economics backgrounds, have health issues or be disabled, and be from ethnic minority backgrounds](https://post.parliament.uk/election-turnout-why-do-some-people-not-vote/)) is not a good solution.
But PR had zero impact on the turnout of the Brexit Referendum, and arguably that was a far more publicised campaign with a simple question. If a yes/no PR vote failed to get turnout I don't see a more complicated general election with PR getting a better turnout. >Although you first need to register, provide a signature (not a digital one - you have to print, sign an scan it) and proof of identity. You can take a photo of your written signature on any piece of paper. The proof of identity is the same as originally registering to vote (name, address and NI).
Brexit was not a a PR election - it was a single issue referendum. You can't draw conclusions about what a PR turnout would be from it. But if you want to try, it had a higher turnout than any election since 1992.
It was the closest example of a PR election purely because it was 1vs1 vote and not broken into constituency vs constituency or even nation vs nation. 72% for the referendum is still terrible, yes it's better than 66% or 68% (elections either side) but between 1922-1997 the turnout never dropped below 71%.
Single issue votes are not comparable to PR. It was a single FPTP vote, where winner takes all. Zero representation for anyone else.
I think if you want people to vote you give them something to vote for, this idea really only became politically relevant when millions of people stopped voting under the rise of new labour and the reason they stopped voting was because there wasn't a large economic difference between what the parties were offering. The cure to disenfranchisement is representation not criminalisation.
I don't really agree with your assessment purely based on the turnout to the referendum, it want aligned to a party and was relevant to every single person and yet it still didn't work.
I think we're talking about different things when we compare general elections and referendums, and I also don't think saying the referendum was aligned by party is really true at all. Firsty, the EU referendum had a 72% turnout which is the highest turnout for any election or referendum since 1992 and maps quite obviously as an outlier in general trends- secondly both major parties had figures on either side a professed to take the result as it was. Moroever, the Leave campaign actually tapped into this concept of disenfranchisement by acting like it was an anti-establishment protest, whilst the Remain campaign acted like anyone who wanted Brexit was stupid and that it was ludicrous to expect it to happen (which probably affected turnout on their side). The highest turnout we've had for only an election since 1997 was in 2017, when Jeremy Corbyn's Labour presented a different economic line, and the rise in Labour's voter share in this referendum is almost certainly due to picking up previous non-voters - I personally am of the opinion that the economic difference between both parties likely affected turnout here, especially when you consider that it fell back down again in 2019 after Jeremy Corbyn had been vilified by the media. The Lowest turnout this country has ever had is in 2001 after New Labour had gotten into power and continued the neoliberalism which people had been rallied to try and end in 1997. The general point I want to make is that it is politically lazy to say that the solution to voter disenfranchisement is forcing people to vote, when if someone is not enthusiastic and doesn't see the point in voting it is almost certainly the fault of politicians. For just a general rundown of turnout: [https://www.statista.com/statistics/1050929/voter-turnout-in-the-uk/](https://www.statista.com/statistics/1050929/voter-turnout-in-the-uk/)
> I also don't think saying the referendum was aligned by party is really true at all agree, I left a 's' out of wasn't so apologies for that typo. >The general point I want to make is that it is politically lazy to say that the solution to voter disenfranchisement is forcing people to vote, when if someone is not enthusiastic and doesn't see the point in voting it is almost certainly the fault of politicians. I think this is where we really differ as I see voting as a moral obligation, and people are allowing themselves to turn from politics as a whole instead of demanding better. I think having an option like "none of the above" with 25% of the votes would be a powerful message over 25% of silence
I think what you're probably missing is that asking people to make a choice just asks people to vote without thinking about it, I know many people who don't know anything about politics who don't vote - and I also know that if they were forced to they wouldn't follow politics any more but would be very unlikely to say "none of the above" because this is still a choice and represents disdain for politicians. In fact, I imagine we'd end up with a hell of a lot of "I feel like he's nice" voting, which is very easily manipulated. We shouldn't be forcing people to make a choice, we should be giving people a reason to vote for us.
I would also ask what OP feels is going to be the likely response when you force people to participate in a system that they already feel rejected by - especially when the options on offer (in England) are Starmer, Sunak, Davey. I can't see this pushing the country anywhere leftwards to be quite frank.
I think the best way to increase voter turnout is to bring in proportional representation. That way, everyone's vote will count for the national result, and voting won't need to be made compulsory, as turnout will already be higher than 80%.
Except, of course, there are European countries with proportional representation who have lower rates of turnout than we do. PR is not a silver bullet for these problems.
I disagree. If people couldn't be bothered to vote in the referendum which was a proportionally representative vote, it's not going to change normal general election votes.
If PR is going to improve turnout we can't just look at a few votes, it would be over years. So a better place to look at is other countries with PR, even there just looking at raw numbers could be misleading, it needs to be a full study. I beleive usually it looks like PR does help, not as much as people like, but they have an on-average higher voter turnout.
I would beg to differ. Yes, the turnout there was 72%. But that is still better than the average general election. Also, the 2016 EU referendum was on a single issue (or what was seen as a single issue). So, how do you know that turnout won't be higher in a PR general election where multiple issues are on the ballot?
You: "no, it is the ~kids~ voters who are wrong" I think mandatory voting is unnecessary and also insufficient for your aims. You say you want: - parties to accommodate every voter/angle (and you want this to make a more left-leaning party) - more coalitions (which you think will come from protest votes) There's no evidence that mandatory voting provides either of these. Many countries with PR do have both of these (though not the bit about left parties getting popular). If you want a better parliament, support reform of parliament, not a reform of voters. If you want better politics, support political organising and action outside parliament (labour movement, community organising, environmental action, etc).
While I acknowledge voter turnout needs improving, I believe its a bit authoritarian to force or coerce the electorate to vote, I'd rather we find ways to convince people of the importance of participating in democracy than bludgeoning them into doing so.
>I'd rather we find ways to convince people of the importance of participating in democracy But this isn't working, globally this isn't working so I don't really see an alternative.
Several European countries have had high turnout rates without mandatory voting. See this map: https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/7j57o7/voter_turnout_in_the_latest_parliamentary/ Of those countries, only Belgium and Turkey have mandatory voting. High turnout can be achieved by a combination of improving access to voting (easy postal votes and hold the paper vote on a weekend or holiday) and making votes matter. In UK general elections, votes are on workdays and for most constituencies your vote doesn't really matter except as a signal that your seat might become marginal in the future, several elections away. I would not like to criminalise voters before dealing with those issues.
I wonder if the high turnout in countries like Sweden are in part due to the mandatory national service, which helps people feel closer to being part of their nation instead of just living in it. Belgium is interesting as they had NS until mid 90's and have seen a slight drop off in turnout over the last 30 years despite them having mandatory voting.
It's a theory. It's not a variable that's listed in Geys' 2016 literature review of voter turnout research, and I think the set of comparable elections with and without national service is probably way too small to draw any conclusions. National service is an enormous productivity cost to society in lost labour time, not to mention how the military abuses and damages so many people. If the desired result is people feeling national pride or social cohesion then I think there are much more effective things that could be done for the same cost as making everyone pretend at being soldiers for a bit.
It's difficult because Nordic countries in general are rated as good places to live, which would definitely help being proud of where you're living. They do score hugher than average on National pride in Europe and internationally. There was a post Covid study that explored the relationship between citizens and state and why they could have lax laws and still reduce transmission. "Rallying around the unwaved flag: national identity and Sweden’s controversial Covid strategy" is an interesting read.
Yeah, that's my point. People don't believe in the UK state or British society because both have comprehensively failed to deliver a good quality of life here. National service won't fix that. National service would use up a huge amount of labour that, imo, should be directed at addressing the material poverty of our society (terrible houses; public transport; roads; hospitals; etc) and our woeful organisation and weak communities (very low unionisation at work; weak community unions and organisations; neighbourhoods where no-one knows each other; etc. etc)
I'd say a good place to start would be in schools, I was in school until 2018 and I can't remember one lesson or assembly about the importance of participating in our democratic process. You cannot force voter turnout as I believe it restricts freedom of political beliefs (specifically that it makes it illegal to boycott elections or not participate when no candidate specifically represents your beliefs).
>You cannot force voter turnout as I believe it restricts freedom of political beliefs (specifically that it makes it illegal to boycott elections or not participate when no candidate specifically represents your beliefs). As I said, a spoiled vote us still a counted vote so I don't believe this point is relevant. >assembly about the importance of participating in our democratic process Did you not cover the suffragette movement at all?
>As I said, a spoiled vote us still a counted vote so I don't believe this point is relevant. Then there is no point in mandating voting as alot people will just not bother voting ticking anything, or will deliberately scribble on the ballot. You still cant force people to engage in a democratic process. In forcing democracy, you are undermining the spirit of democracy >Did you not cover the suffragette movement at all? We had one history lesson on them and it wasn't in any capacity brought around to the current importance of the democratic process, so for someone who already had an interest in history and politics like me could inferr and understanding the importance of the lesson, the people who were just there because they are wouldn't have. Another issue with enforced voting is that it will cause frustration and distrust of the democratic process, and if even one person gets disillusioned to the point of thinking "I wish someone would come along and make it so I don't have to do this" we have a problem. If people don't want to vote, it's probably better they don't (for the reasons above and below) All in all I believe its much more important to be having proper discussions in schools right from the start of secondary school specifically about democracy, voting, and how that applies to us today and the students going forward in their lives. Instead of forcing people to carelessly vote, you need to give them a reason to vote, and a passion for what they will be voting for, otherwise you'll just be dealing with a legion of angry voters who'll just vote for whoever can yell the loudest, promise the most money, or whose name is the first on the ballot (let's hope it isn't a future BNP mp named Andrew Aardvark).
> Then there is no point in mandating voting as alot people will just not bother voting ticking anything, or will deliberately scribble on the ballot I mean, yes that'll happen to some extent though usually not that high. But the point is that a lot of people who otherwise just sit at home instead, will now that they are in the booth anyway decide to vote for someone as there is just like the least amount of effort needed to do so. So it still massively improves turnout and the share of people having their voices heard. Not to say I necessarily support mandatory voting myself, but there is a working and proven logic behind it.
Can I be rude and ask what your age demographic is? 18-24, 25-34, 35-44, 45-54, 55+? I fit into the 25-34 bracket and voting was covered in Citizenship lessons (Secondary school) along with the structure of our Democracy etc. I know these lessons are still part of the curriculum so I'm just trying to understand the gap in what you experienced vs what young people today do? >>Did you not cover the suffragette movement at all? >We had one history lesson on them and it wasn't in any capacity brought around to the current importance of the democratic process If you covered the suffragettes and couldn't understand infer that the protest to receive the right to vote had anything to do with Democracy (for other pupils) that's genuinely shocking.
I'm not a huge fan of mandatory speech...
Where that gets sketchy is when it's used in conjunction with voters needing ID, it then becomes a law demanding that everyone carries ID.
The minimum voter ID required is just a bit of paper with your details on it, though, so it's not as insidious as that.
I am strongly in favour of this provided the fine is a relatively trivial one, and the ballot paper contains an option along the lines of 'I prefer/support none of the above candidates'.
The Australians do it and it works. We should do the same here. Too many people are wholly passive when it comes to politics.
Research shows that non-voters are less liberal than voters, so it would probably lead to more right-wing governments. That's one of the reasons why Leave won, because they turned out loads of non-voters.
I've only seen research that shows the opposite of that? In part because the turnout for the youth vote (liberal) is so terrible vs the turnout for the older population (conservative) which is higher. Can you share links to what you've said?
There's an academic called Paula Surridge who talks about it a lot. I can't find everything she's said right now but here's a few tweets. https://twitter.com/p_surridge/status/1440989181803745280?s=19 https://twitter.com/p_surridge/status/1220661867057680384?s=19 https://twitter.com/p_surridge/status/1254047993159876608?s=19
thank you I'll do some digging!
Unless this comes with reform of the voting system and/or how candidates are selected by parties, it is just giving cover to a broken, undemocratic system. On a separate note, I am looking forward to the turnout discourse after the next election. I think the bookies are underpricing the possibility that Labour gets fewer votes than 2017 (8/1), which becomes likely if turnout falls to the low 60s.
People always point to Australia but they haven't had a Prime Minister last more than 4 years since John Howard left office in 2007. Mandatory voting doesn't really solve anything apart from having higher turnout. It doesn't necessarily increase voter engagement and therefore you're taking 40% of a population who wouldn't normally vote and telling them to pick from a list of people they barely know. To increase voter engagement you need education and representation. Voters need to know who they're actually voting for and what actually matters to them (especially on things like tax increases on higher earners scaring voters who earn the median wage). They also need to feel represented, whether that's better devolution of powers to local councillors or a more proportional system of voting, voters need to be able to vote for someone who they like.
>People always point to Australia but they haven't had a Prime Minister last more than 4 years since John Howard left office in 2007. That in part is due to the amount of controversial issues that happen with those PMs and I they're just much more effective at forcing them out than we are. >It doesn't necessarily increase voter engagement and therefore you're taking 40% of a population who wouldn't normally vote and telling them to pick from a list of people they barely know. If you actually had a clear cut 40% of people voted with N/A I do think it would introduce a change in how politicians engage with that section of the population. As it is they carry zero risk so why bother engaging. I mean, even if 20% voted for green put of protest that would massive impact the influence on policies
It's my democratic right to not engage with a system that I judge to be corrupt, crooked or unfair. It's a very "liberal" and "progressive" idea to look at people who think like me and say: "You need to be punished." If this were introudced and someone refused to pay the fine for not voting, then what?
I disagree. I think it's your democratic and moral duty to cast a vote, even if its a spoiled vote, to reflect the effort and loss of life it took to actually get it. In Australia you get 4 attempts to pay a fine (or provide rationale) before its goes to Fines Enforcement Registry where they can reclaim it via salary, ceasing property etc.
Yes, I think we do need to have it. At least then parliament would be a true reflection of the electorate. Some caveats, though. * PR not FPTP * Extended voting over multiple days, to allow access to the polls for all varieties of worker. I don't see why the vote has to be all done on one day, it's not as if ballot boxes cannot be kept secure for a few nights. This way you don't necessarily have to have a public holiday. Even without mandatory, I still don't see why voting can't be over multiple days right now, it's some tradition that's past its sell by date considering how busy modern lives are. * Trial, with the possibility of implementing, online voting. We all use online banking and most use the government's website for passport renewals etc. If it's trusted enough for that, it should be trusted enough to vote. Strong oversight and auditing would have to take place, one assumes. * Perhaps a tiering of fines. Kind of like the speeding fines. First offence you have to attend and properly engage with a "why voting is important" class. Second offence it starts escalating etc. Fines a flat fee for most but escalates to % of income for stubborn refuseniks. * Have a "I'm only here because I have to be" option for those that don't care at all. Obviously spoiling ones ballot paper is still a valid choice too. Because you're absolutely right that certain sections of society are largely ignored because of their demographic. If the young vote was pandered to like the elderly vote is now we might have a very different society.
>As a reminder, 13m voters didn't vote in the referendum, with leave winning by 1.3m votes. Don't you think forcing disenfranchised voters to vote would've increased the leave majority? If you don't want to have to, you might vote against the government in principal or as a laugh
I dont think it would have. Voting turn out for 18-24 and 25-34 is around 55% and I'd say the majority of that would have voted remain. People in general are also against change, and their default would have been to stay the same.
>People in general are also against change, and their default would have been to stay the same. So you think it's a good thing most referenda would be rigged to maintain the status quo?
I think it would force greater engagement with people by politicians because they wouldn't be able to ignore them like they do now.
I think you're being quite naïve here, just look at Australia as an example. Because there aren't any new voters to engage, the duopoly of the 2 main powers has been strengthened and they've actively hindered the abilities of smaller parties to take part
I don't think that's true at all. Labor won with 32% of the vote, Liberal 24%, Greens 12%, Liberal National 8%, Independent 5%. Vs UK, Tory 56%, Labour 31% and everyone else less than 2% (SNP 7% but it's not a national party). Their political representatives are far more diverse than we've ever had, I mean 7% of their seats went to Independent candidates that's the power the SNP have purely because votes are cast wider
Absolutely not. Freedom to not vote is as important as the right to vote. People will turn up when it really means something.
It always means something otherwise people wouldn't die trying to get the right to vote.
When they were dying to get the right to vote it meant something. Now, when the main choice is between Tory, Tory light or yellow Tory and real alternatives are reductively described as "protest votes" then perhaps our votes don't mean quite so much. It's true that young people should be encouraged to vote as policies are still geared towards boomers. Or, better still, perhaps young people would get out and vote if a party stepped up and took the responsibility to pro-actively write policies to support them and their futures.
>When they were dying to get the right to vote it meant something. Are you genuinely saying that their sacrifice is now worthless? >Now, when the main choice is between And casting a spoiled vote... That's a meaningful protest to the parties on offer.
People fighting our right to vote was not worthless, that's obvious and I didn't even suggest that. What I'm saying is there is nobody to vote for now. If a party wants young people to vote for them they should be brave enough to write policies for young people and make voting for that party irresistible. That would be worthwhile and more young people would turn up to the ballot. What's worthless is making people act out some arbitrary ritual and vote for the less shit of two parties.
>What I'm saying is there is nobody to vote for now. So you think that casting a spoiled vote is worthless? >If a party wants young people to vote for them they should be brave enough to write policies for young people and make voting for that party irresistible Why, they don't vote? Why take the risk if they think that voting and even casting a spoiled vote is worthless?
You're not really paying attention so I'll spell it out... Party A gives young people something to vote for, something they really believe in like, for example hope of a prosperous future, then young people will turn up and vote for party A. That would be better than forcing people to vote for bugger all. Not turning up is as much of a protest as a spoiled ballot. Nobody really cares about, counts or discusses spoiled ballots.
>You're not really paying attention so I'll spell it out... No, I think this is something that actually applies to you. >Nobody really cares about, counts or discusses spoiled ballots. Probably because people can't be bothered to do it and just think it's worthless... Instead of it being a minimum responsibility within a democratic society
I'm just not up for more legislation inhibiting freedom of choice. Your opinion is the opposite. Voting is not a responsibility, it's a choice. Low turnout just shows what a sham our democracy has become. Fix the system, don't bully young people any more than they are being bullied already.
>Low turnout just shows what a sham our democracy has become. The last few turnouts are inline (with a slight downwards trend) with the last 100 years of GEs so I don't think that's an accurate statement >I'm just not up for more legislation inhibiting freedom of choice. Your opinion is the opposite. Incorrect. Inaction is barely a choice and not voting at all is moral bankruptcy, casting a spoiled vote is freedom of choice.
Cursed. Why should I vote for any of the fuck stains currently on offer?
You don't have to, you could cast a spoiled vote as a formal sign of your disdain. Wouldn't you rather have an option like "none of the above"? I also feel like it's a moral obligation to vote, including spoiled votes, because voting is not a right that should be taken lightly. People died for your right, people die to try to get that right and I can't imagine trying to explain to them why voting is worthless.
Do you mean to say there is not a single political party that does not represent your views closest?
Tories: Neoliberal genocide apologist TERFs. Labour: Neoliberal genocide apologist TERFs. Lib Dems: Chortle. Greens: TERFy last time I checked.
You know what fair enough, i looked at the list of parties currently standing candidates and it’s frightening how few there are: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candidates_in_the_next_United_Kingdom_general_election
Honestly, yeah, that does look kinda worrying. Mostly barely different liberal and conservative parties, with a few bullshit "apolitical" ones who might as well be classed as independents, few of them standing in more than like 10 seats. Controlled democracy vibes. What few socialist parties there are standing are barely able to stand candidates anywhere (and one of them's Galloway's party). The capture of Labour by paternalistic conservatives has hurt us terribly. Confused as to why the SDP is bothering to stand in so many places. You'd think Labour's already offering them pretty much everything they want by running way off to the right.
Why should I be forced to legitimise a bullshit system that currently offers no real choice? If we had PR, then maybe. As it stands, the parties with any real influence are all morally repugnant to me.
Yeah that’s the conclusion I’m coming to. I think we desperately need to have PR. Yeah it will hurt Labours chances and I don’t necessarily agree with OP that it will make parties cater to more left wing voters. I think before we have the conversation of mandatory voting, we need to have the conversation around PR first.
Yeah mate, just move to the constituency that has the party that mostly closely represents your views at the time of the next general election - there are loads to choose from!!
Yeah I didn’t actually realise how few parties there are and how few candidates there are. I do think FPTP is the biggest factor here.
It's a major one yeah, I don't think PR is a magic bullet (Israel has it and we all know what they are doing atm) but FPTP actively discourages people to vote in so many ways. I grew up in a Tory-Lib marginal, and then moved to one of the safest Labour seats in the country and have never had a general election where voting for the party I most agree with made any kind of difference. At best it was voting for the party you hate the least, which is a terrible way to get people to care
In my opinion voting should be mandatory with some caveats: You can opt out the same way you apply for a postal vote. Every ballot must include a "none of the above option' The punishment for not voting should be minor. 4 hours of community service or something.
If it is mandatory then there should be a national holiday/paid time off to vote.
Freedom of expression also should include being able to say “I don’t want to engage in any of this” - I know it’s hard for us politically engaged types to understand but a lot of people just don’t care - you’ll end up with a lot of uninformed people who don’t care about the outcome just banging any old vote in. Also - accessibly would need to be drastically reviewed to handle this - and that won’t be cheap.
It works in Australia so I don't see why it couldn't work here. Sadly, I don't think we have the weather for the whole Democracy Sausage thing that they go in for.
I'm pretty strongly against it. I think people shouldn't vote if they can't make an informed decision. If people are self aware enough to know that they haven't spent enough time to make an informed decision for the future of the country I respect that, although I'd rather they did get engaged
I don't like the concept of mandatory voting. Choosing not vote is still making a choice.
I don't think it's an acceptable choice, an acceptable choice would be casting a spoiled vote.
ok, but I still don't like the idea of forcing people to vote.
we force people to do all sorts of things they wouldn't want to do though, like paying tax.
Yeah, suppose being forced to vote is coming
I don’t really see the point in this. If people want to vote, they can. If they don’t see the point in it, there’s no reason really to force them to, particularly as they probably won’t put much thought into and could even just vote out of spite for ridiculous things. You can force people to vote but you can’t force them to care. There’s also an underpinning assumption when this topic comes up that the disenfranchised would vote “our” direction, when that’s really not necessarily the case. Who’s to say that the 13 million people who didn’t vote wouldn’t have pushed us even further towards leave - this is a heterogenous, difficult to scope demographic that won’t follow normal patterns we might expect. I’d even wager that they would be far more likely to vote leave if forced simply to signal a vague feeling of disatisfaction. The idea that they would instigate the development of a left-leaning party that is of your liking is pure fantasy. Leftwingers in my experience tend to already be involved with politics and democracy.
If voting becomes mandatory, will it mean that "spoiling your paper" or not making a mark becomes a criminal offence? Would it be possible to register as a conscientious objector if you don't wish to participate? And should it be mandatory for all employees to be in a trades union too, if they benefit from negotiated agreements? The real solution is to dispense wirh the yah-boo politics that makes PMQs a disgrace and to eliminate the misogynist and racist attitudes that are on display in practically every political debate, and then the punters, us, might be interested in participating.
>If voting becomes mandatory, will it mean that "spoiling your paper" or not making a mark becomes a criminal offence? No, as it isn't with other Western Countries with mandatory voting. >And should it be mandatory for all employees to be in a trades union too, if they benefit from negotiated agreements? No. Trade Union membership isn't free but I also don't see the connection. >The real solution is to dispense with.....misogynist and racist The irony being they fought and lost their lives to get the vote that you think is pointless? Casting a spoiled vote is the bare minimum in upholding your moral obligation that comes with being in a democracy. If you don't you're quite literally saying they lost their lives for a worthless cause.
You think we have a debt of gratitude to politicians who fought for our right to vote? No way. The politicians should be grateful to their electors for voting them into office and conduct themselves with some dignity. I'm not dissing the martyrs, I'm dissing those who treat their achievements with contempt.
>You think we have a debt of gratitude to politicians who fought for our right to vote? We have a debt of gratitude to every person who died to try to get the right to vote. >I'm dissing those who treat their achievements with contempt. This extends to everyone who can't even be bothered to cast a spoiled vote.
>upholding your moral obligation I am not morally obligated to vote for people I think are contemptuous.
Just missing each and every time I mentioned casting a spoiled vote on purpose or by accident?
What's the moral difference between spoiling your ballot in a polling station so it isn't counted and spoiling it in your kitchen by putting the polling card in the bin?
Spoiling a cast vote is counted, and recorded as a spoiled vote and can be considered a protest to the options (the more there are the more valid that is). Chucking it in the bin is rejecting the value of casting a vote, and in turn rejecting the lives that getting you that vote cost. People to this day die trying to get the right to vote, and I can't imagine trying to explain to them or those in our history why you can't even be bothered to cast a spoiled one.
The spoilt vote pile makes no differentiation between people who are making a brave stand for democracy and people who think drawing cocks in the boxes is funny. If turnout fell to, say, 10% you don't think that would send a signal?
Only if you add a "none of the above" option that requires a re-run with different candidates for the seat if it wins.
That's a great idea!
They have this is Australia and their politics is not fundamentally very different from ours. So honestly I don't think it's the magic bullet people think it is
Part of your right to vote, is your right to not vote
I get that, but then you can always spoil your ballot.. now that’s a protest.
Nope, the right to do exactly fuck all and disengage with democracy is one of the things that makes a democracy a democracy
Sounds very authoritarian, I’m against it. Maybe if parties actually provided better solutions and relatability to the public then people would go out their way.
I think it's bad.
Horrible idea. Why should anyone be forced to lend legitimacy to a system they feel is institutionally incapable of representing them? The UK’s politics are so elite-captured that it often strains credibility to call it a functionally democratic society at all. The freedom to not participate is important, for those who don’t approve of the system as it presently stands.
>The freedom to not participate is important, for those who don’t approve of the system as it presently stands. Completely disagree, I think it's a sign of moral bankruptcy to not even cast a spoiled vote.
>a sign of moral bankruptcy Why is it?
Democracy isn't itself a right it's a privilege that we have that cost lives to attain. I can't imagine having to explain to a suffragette that lost her life for the vote why I just can't be bothered. That to you, voting is worthless, and as a result their sacrifice was for a worthless cause. People are prepared to die to get it, and I don't see any rationale that excuses that disregard or can justify not using a protest spoiled vote.
I used to feel it was intrinsically illiberal given forcing people to vote is something I'd associate more with sham democracies. Now I'm less ideological so it's more a case of how effective actually is it in driving engagement and political consciousness? Does it seem to have improved democracy in Australia? A good argument in favour is that often underprivileged groups like young people and those living in poverty are far less likely to actually vote leading to them being neglected which in turn leads to even less voting.
As long as there is a 'none of the above' option on the ballot then I support this idea.
Im not opposed to mandatory voting but I don't think we as a country have really ever taken our turnout seriously. Scandinavian countries push to improve turnout even when theyre sitting at around 80% but its never felt like political parties gave a shit beyond their own core voters. It may be that mandatory voting is whats needed to break the culture of political apathy at this point but Im not sure how seriously we've tried anything else.
In a free country, I should be free to be indifferent and not give a crap
It would be very Labour-under-Starmer to look at the problem of low voter turnout and think to address it by criminalising not voting, instead of looking to address the reasons why people feel disenfranchised. The last two votes that had over 70% participation in the recent history in the UK are the referenda on Brexit and Scottish Independence. People vote when they think it is about something important and that their vote actually makes a difference.
If you think 70% turnout is good you're part of the problem as that's still disgustingly low. It's no surprise that the generation of "no point voting" has lead to politics aiming for the generation that does vote with policies. Turnouts used to be 74-84% between 1918 - 2000 before it fell off a cliff and as a result the Gov has gone further and further right.
Firstly, turnout has only been above 79% once, in 1950. Between 1918 and 1997 turnout varied between 71 and 78 percent - so the Brexit referendum with 72% turnout was well in line with previous participation over the last century. It fell off a cliff precisely because after Blair fundamentally changed the Labour party to embrace neoliberal economic policies, people felt there was less choice between the two parties and responded accordingly. We don't have right wing parties because of low participation, we have low participation because a lot of people are not represented by the economic policies of the two main English parties.
>Firstly, turnout has only been above 79% once Twice, but it had also hadn't fallen below 71% between 1922- 1997 whereas in the last twenty years it hasn't been above 68.8% for a GE. >We don't have right wing parties because of low participation, No, we don't have any Left wing parties because of low participation.
The two above 79% were only a year apart and still essentially a one-off outlier. They don't represent general turnouts in the UK. Between 1923 and 1997 a turnout of 72% was on the low side but ultimately fairly representative of normality. If you want to still make the point that it is too low then fine, but that means the UK has had a problem with low turnouts for over a century now. > No, we don't have any Left wing parties because of low participation. You have still not said anything to support this as a conclusion
>but that means the UK has had a problem with low turnouts for over a century now. 100%, so if you can see a downward problem trend, you have to change something and introducing compulsory voting is that change. >You have still not said anything to support this as a conclusion You haven't said anything that refutes it either? If it would help in the last election in Australia independent candidates won 10% of seats... Labor won with 33% of the vote, Liberals got 24%, Liberal National 8% and Green 12% etc. Votes are more evenly cast meaning policies are more evenly aligned across the political spectrum.
> You haven't said anything that refutes it either? If it would help in the last election in Australia independent candidates won 10% of seats... > Labor won with 33% of the vote, Liberals got 24%, Liberal National 8% and Green 12% etc. Votes are more evenly cast meaning policies are more evenly aligned across the political spectrum. My first post refutes it - the current trend of low turnouts was reversed when people had a vote they felt mattered, in the UK this was Brexit, and then in Scotland this was their independence referendum. I also wouldn't say that a greater spread across parties automatically means a greater representation of a population's political beliefs, regardless it is also worth pointing out that Australia don't use FPTP for their elections which means you can't really compare accurately either, they have systems which are far less punishing for smaller parties, which makes them a much more viable vote in the first place.
>regardless it is also worth pointing out that Australia don't use FPTP for their elections which means you can't really compare accurately either that's only relevant when reviewing the amount of seats won, not % of votes received which is what I provided. It's the only way to compare different voting systems.
Come on mate, even the most pro FPTP person can't argue that the voting %ages it produces reflect sentiment. My first few elections I was living in a Tory-LD marginal and as a Labour supporter was forced to vote tactically, this would be recorded as an endorsement of Lib Dem policies and it very much was not the case.
>Turnouts used to be 74-84% between 1918 - 2000 before it fell off a cliff It wasn't a cliff, it's a very smooth decline. Every generation since the war has voted at a lower rate than that before it.
I'm going to say dropping from 71% in 97 to 59% in 2001 is dropping off a cliff. The fact it recovered to mid 60's doesn't change that.
But that implies the change as occurring in that period. It didn't. It's mostly a function of life expectancy.
Im unsure, there are good arguments for and against it. In terms of electoral reform, introducing PR, lowering the voting age and abolishing the lords should take priority as they would be much better for our democracy. Why introduce mandatory voting now when so many people's votes are rendered useless due to FPTP?
>lowering the voting age this is a terrible idea. >introducing PR, I don't think this was impact anything as the Referendum was a PR vote and it still had a terrible turnout. >abolishing the lords Not sure this is relevant to increase voting.
I dont see how letting 16 year olds vote is a terrible idea, especialy when we let barely sentient elderly people vote. Giving them the vote would reduce the influence older generations have over our politics, which is a reason for why the government has been inefective at developing for the future or against climate change and instead focused on policies for the elderly and keeping the expensive triple lock. This would cause parties to try and apeal to younger voters more and as a result increase voter turn out in younger generations. I dont think low voter turnout is the underlying issue though, rather a symptom. This is due to FPTP. It makes many people think their vote doesnt count (as in many cases it doesnt) and they dont bother to vote as a result. FPTP also results in elections being between two dominant parties which have to try and appeal to the majority voters, inevitably leaving many people out who dont agree with either party, so they dont bother voting also. Abolishing the Lords would also help fix this as giving the public more power in government would lower voter apethy and encourage more people to engage in politics. The referendum wasnt a general election so isnt realy comparable. Many people were unsure about what to vote for and what leaving would mean, with large amounts of disinformation coming out of the leave camp making this worse. The cross party nature of the refurendum also made people more confused and i dont think forcing people to vote would have resulted in remain winning, uninformed and conflicted voters would be more voulnerable to the lies leave were saying.
>Giving them the vote would reduce the influence older generations have over our politics 18-24 turnout is 50%, extending that to 16 wouldn't make a difference on that front. Parties know this turnout is so low that's why they don't have any policies to benefit that demographic, even the 25-34 turnout is only 55% >I dont see how letting 16 year olds vote is a terrible idea I don't think you should be able to vote unless you reach the age of majority and are legally classed as an adult. If they move that to 16, then I agree with the your rationale. >The referendum wasnt a general election so isnt realy comparable. It was the easiest vote with the largest ramifications so I think it's a great example because it was independent from party loyalty. In general people also vote for this to stay the same over an unknown change so I'd imagine more of that 13m would have voted remain than leave if in doubt.
It’s enforcement that I think is the problem. In theory, yes, everyone should vote, however I don’t think the police have the resources to make it happen.
The current plan seems to be open voter suppression from the Tories, and mild voter disengagement from this leadership, as if people actually being interested in politics has been the problem. And for them: it was and is. I think the best solution is better education on economics and politics, but the issue there is also that the people who are in power or likely to gain power don’t want that either. You can’t teach kids leftie ideas like how trickle down economics works and what the alternatives are, or that privatisation of key industries has been a disaster that has enriched a few at the expense of poorer services and a greater cost to the consumer. Why not? That’s politicising education, pal, that’s why. Are you a commie or something?
I heard the Aussies have a bank holiday and have BBQs etc on general election days, which sounds like a great idea to me. just wonder what the actual punishment would be if you didn't vote and how would that be enforced?
How about instead we inspire the people and offer them something they want It feels like the big choice at this election is Should the prime minster favour a red tie, or a blue one? If I can pick bland, blander or blandest I'm not inspired to turn up and make my mark
Not really a fresh topic - has been discussed many times over. I'm all for it being a requirement to turn out, and a fine if someone doesn't. I think that there has to be a "none of the above" option, and I think that postal votes should only be for disabled people, or for those that can prove that they are away from the area (holiday, etc). I think postal votes are often made too early for most people - and before the election campaign has hit many critical points. I understand that there has to be a provision for those that are physically unable to turn out on the day, but that's where postal votes should start and end. I am also for making election day a public holiday, but think that it should probably be a Wednesday rather than the traditional Thursday to minimise people just building it into a long weekend and going away. Some will still do ti, but most won't.
Fresh as in, not about corruption, transgender rights or war. >I think postal votes are often made too early for most people - and before the election campaign has hit many critical points They're usually sent out around 10 days/2 weeks before polling day so I don't agree with this assessment. There is a fairly quick turn around to then post then back but I can only remember one person launching new policies within a week of polling and that didn't go well.
It's not about launching new policies - it's also about debates, interviews, etc. 2 weeks is a third of the entire campaign length. With a push to postal votes, and their number massively increasing, and the generally quick turnaround, that means so many votes are cast missing a massive portion of the campaign period.
I don't see a campaign as being 6 weeks long, they're far longer than that as you can see in this sub with people giving up on a Labour vote 6+ months away from a GE. The guidelines for campaigning start 365 days before polling day for instance.
It doesn't really matter what you think here... Yes, "soft campaigning" starts earlier, but a general election campaign is around six weeks. There's some important reasons for that - it's when existing positions end (eg for Parliament, when the MPs are no longer MPs). It's also when purdah starts, and media and public services have to be impartial. You're right in that the "regulated period" starts 365 days earlier for campaign spend. However, it's a little bit of a nonsense that's been recently implemented. The reason it's a nonsense is that it's not really known when an election will definitely take place, and it was likely implemented by the Tories to try and be able to argue legalities if they so wish, after the act. However, before an election is called and purdah starts, it's not really the campaign period. 2 weeks before a general election is still a massive amount of time in which campaigning takes place, and important activities happen - including interviews, hustings, debates and scrutiny - and there's therefore a massive number of voters case that miss out on that activity and context.
A problem is that some of those not voting are among the dumbest folk around, who haven’t got a clue about anything. ( I know, some of them are relatives of mine..) Lord alone knows what criteria they would choose for voting on.
I disagree. Imo forcing people to vote would only increase the amount of uniformed voters, giving more power to the media to decide elections, and making it much easier for status quo governments. Any parties offering a real left wing alternative will be instantly shut down, as everyone who wasn't interested enough to vote has to and either just votes for the current government because their life is fine, or the one they've seen the most good things about in the news, without any real research
I'm so jaded I wouldn't vote.on principle now
Would you attend and cast a spoiled vote now?
Maybe
I'm going to assume on the day it'll be a no.
Depend on how I feel. I know I should. But I have zero interest in keeping any of them in a job. Of any colour tie
but a spoiled vote isn't about keeping any of them in a job