h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

The point of voting though is to have your say in the running of government, it's not to point out that you aren't just lazy or don't know enough to choose.

Your representation in parliament will be the same regardless of spoiling or not turning up.

Whatever. I think what I think and - since this is a free space - you are entitled to think what you think.

I personally think that one has a duty to vote for a whole bunch of reasons, most of them given in the entry. If push comes to shove and you really can *not* stomach any of the candidates, then I think you should spoil your paper to show the parties standing that they do not represent you.

If you choose to leach of the society in which you live, and refuse to engage with it to the extent that you cannot be a**ed to vote that is up to you. It is - as I said - a free country.

But consider that 17 people were killed in Iraq this very morning, coinciding with the announement of the new cabinet. *That* is what can happen in a country where voting is forbidden for decades. People lose the ability to protest peacefully.

I would rather live in a country where politicians are afraid of the ballot box, than in a country where they are afraid of the bomb. And the only way to keep democracy alive is to participate in the process.

Use it or lose it. Trite but true.

So.... consider whether or not you are acting out of principal, or whether or not you are acting - or failing to act - out of smug, complacent laziness.

Ben

"I think you should spoil your paper to show the parties standing that they do not represent you."

The only problem with that it that it does not really represent an 'abstain'. A spoiled paper will simply be recorded as 'paper spoiled'; thus, unless a huge number of people spoil their papers, the activity will be, in my opinion, largely futile.

However, until they award us an 'abstain' option, I don't see a better way.

Might it not be an idea for all voting papers to carry a box labelled None of the above or I abstain? Then "don't knows" and so on could register something?

Anyone know how the Australians manage to have compulsory voting? How's it achieved?

Jenny

The penalties aren't very severe - you have to give a valid reason for not voting or pay a $20 fine. If you don't, you face the possibility of prosecution, and might have to pay $50 + court costs.

I think that it is worth posting the BBC Election site's report on the way that Australia does its voting - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/vote_2005/frontpage/4489931.stm

It all sounds like quite a good laugh.

So why does the prospect of spoiling my vote feel so negative, I would like to make a more positive contribution.

For example instead of a single “x” in a box, a questionnaire on a range of issues concerning living in the UK. Almost like a guideline the political parties could follow, which represents the feelings of those in the UK.

Well, spoiling your paper is negative, and I have never done it. I would prefer it if we had parties that people could engage with and vote for. But I wrote the piece because I am more worried about the falling turnouts.

There are so many reasons why people don't vote - a colleague of mine does not feel informed enough to do so, which is almost a valid reason. Others simply don't care. Others feel disempowered. But the ones who get under my skin are the ones who claim that they are protesting.

The only way that we can say 'this system of voting - first past the post with no option to say "none of the above" - is NOT working' is to turn up and, well, say so.

Or of course one can join the electoral reform society: http://www.electoral-reform.org.uk/

Ben

Ben

With more people voting in the last Big Brother than the election, should the election go the way of light entertainment and arrange a live final hosted by Davina McCall?

'you can also text your vote to...'

Now that would be funny if it wasn't full of such Orwellian truth and irony.

Ben

Can we put the party leaders plus respective Chancellors into the BB house for the week before the election?

Failing to vote might be turning into a valid protest now, because of the use of electronic voting machines. These can be easily rigged, so that you never know whether your vote goes to your chosen candidate or absence of candidate. No safety record is kept (some sort of paper slip or whatnot) in case you want to contest the result.

In my home town last may there was a rather large discrepancy between the *amount* of registered votes from people signing the presence sheet and from number of votes recorded in the machine. The amount, mark you - who knows how the real votes were distributed and where the fictional ones went. (And yet, the city council agreed to use again the same voting system for upcoming elections )