Conservative Party's chronicles

[Mr K]

Originally Posted by OLD BOY

If you made voting mandatory, you would be requiring people with no interest in politics who don’t even know the name or party of the current prime minister to select a name that they have ever heard of.

How, in anyone’s world, is that acceptable?

Not sure about mandatory voting, but we should certainly make it easier. Some of the latest policies like voter id (when there wasnt an issue) seem to be designed to stop people voting. Allow voting online, and voting over a weekend.

Make everyones vote count - under the current system your vote only really matters if youre in a 'swing' constituency. A safe seat and many dont see the point. Folks feel obliged to tactically vote for partys they dont really back.

The bigger turnout the better, regardless of who you support.The Govt would have more legitimacy with a higher turnout/fairer voting system

The trade-off is a disconnect between voters and their representatives. It’s impossible to get rid of any of the utterly odious greens in the Scottish parliament, for example, because all of them are elected off a regional list where you vote for a party rather than an individual from that party. The top few names on the list will always get returned to Parliament as long as the party polls 7-10% overall, no matter how manifestly batsh** they’ve behaved over the course of a 5-year term.

When the Tories refused to do the decent thing and deselect Neil Hamilton ahead of the 1997 election, Martin Bell stood as an independent in Tatton and unseated him. Had there been a regional list for that part of England, Hamilton, as a safe-seat candidate, would also have been near the top of the regional list and almost certainly would still have been an MP from 1997-2001.

[Anonymouse]

Originally Posted by Mr K

The Govt would have more legitimacy with a higher turnout/fairer voting system

You mean the current lot aren't legitimate? Well, that explains everything!

[Sephiroth]

Mr K carefully said "more legitimacy". He didn't question the government's legitimacy per se. Within the law, they are the legitimate government. Within emotion, more legitimacy would arise with greater turnout. Different nuance on the word "legitimacy".