General Discussion
Voting
Hands up all those who can't be naffed to vote, whether it be local, national, international or even Interstellar!.....Me! Me me!
If we had a progressive alliance that pledged to abolish the House of Lords and introduce PR we'd have something to vote for. Unfortunately politics is stagnant/retrogressive.
i'll vote but my vote counts for nothing under 1st past the post. our democracy is tokenistic - so i can see why you're disillusioned with it @DC24601
Me i think the law should be changed making it compulsory to vote as it is in Australia and 21 other countries around the world.
I bet you're the first to moan when the elected government do things that you don't like.
I agree with leatash that voting should be compulsory.
@DSC24601 I feel your sentiment on this subject and I have also felt like not voting, but if you want a better system you have to use your vote.
As has been seen over the last few years to present day, the electorate are sick of the usual rhetoric of the main parties who believe they have a God given right to be in power. They say what they have to to get in and then back pedal on their promises.
You only have to look at the our last general election and the election of Trump to see that peple have wised up to the stale promises of politicians. The only problem with this is a different type of unpalatable leader that no one really wants, but is sick of the historic/current status quo, and I'm not talking abouth the rock band.
Change is always difficult, especially when it comes to the wealthy, private schooled gentry who run our country on a political/ corporate and media level. One can only hope that over time with the electorate tactically using their votes, politicians might get the hint that the electorate want a government that will actually put the people of this country first and have a positive effect on our nation. Sadly I think it will be along time coming.
As to forcing people to vote, I have to disagree. You know what the outcome of this would be - police banging on your door, criminal charges, fines for not voting----I think not! It may be a poor system in this country, but it still has a label that says democracy not dictatorship.
It's certainly not a dictatorship in Australia or Belgium they both have legislation making it compulsory to vote.
And just to add to that you dont have to fine folk or have the Police banging on their door just withdraw peoples' driving licence if there is no legitimate reason for not voting.
A compulsory vote could include the right to choose 'none of the above' with that option being included in the results.
As @Burnside mentions on another thread, what would happen if majority of people chose this option? Good question.
But at least that would mean that the political system is not seen as fit for purpose and would reflect the majority's view. The onus would then be on real change,
I favour PR which might open up politics beyong the main parties - so a 'none of the above' vote would be less likely perhaps. At least under that system your vote counts for more than the 1st past the post system.
This general election has been called because May knows she would still be negotiating Brexit in 2020, and she'd look foolish if she hadn't led us out of Europe by then and would risk defeat in an election in 3 years. Brexit won't take two years, more like 4-5. We may see Scottish independence before 2022. I'd hope that the break-up of the union might be the catalyst for change, but who knows?
Public pressure and activism seems to create more change than being able to vote on a singular day in May or June every 5 years.
There are lots of people who don't have a driving licence, so that argument falls flat. In a democracy, voting should be a choice not a compulsion.
To come back to whatever deal it is that Theresa MaybeI'llchangemymind comes up with, whenever it is she comes up with it.
Whatever it is, it will not please all.
How can it please all Remainers, Soft Brexit Leavers, Hard Brexit Leavers?
It can't, can it?
So she could well be on a hiding to nothing.
I actually don't care if any deal upsets the Remainers. If the vote had gone the other way last June they would have shut down any further discussion on our part in the EU, and we would have been left with the scraps that Mrs Merkel had offered Cameron.
But the point is.......how much the deal she ends up with divides the various Brexit factions within the Conservative party.
And then the various Brexit factions within the country.
And then of course there will still be Remainers.
A united country? In your dreams Theresa.
You won't have a united party let alone a united country.
Just watch the Tories turn on themselves.
TM's opposition will come from her own backbenchers for there is absolutely no way that she can please everyone.
Theresa May won't get a deal, we'll end up with whatever the EU states are prepared to allow the UK on their terms. And they'll make an example of this country to dissuade other nation states from opting out of the EU.
The Tories are deluded if they think they can negotiate a 'deal' on equal terms. It's 1 vs 27.
In that case we will leave without an amicable deal and trade on WTO terms, that will be far more damaging to the EU than us. The EU is losing its second biggest net contributor, and will be in serious trouble once we have left, which explains the increasingly hysterical demands that we pay a ridiculous "divorce" bill. The EU house of cards has started to collapse, I only hope that Le Pen can finish the job.
Then we will all be losers, Burneside - and you know it. You vote for a potentially economically disastrous and hard-right future if you want to. The better and infinitely less risky option is to do a deal.
Toss a coin for the future of our country and our children? No thanks.
As Theresa May has repeatedly stated; no deal is better than a bad deal.
Labour and the LibDims want a deal which would essentially mean that we stay in the EU. Well the people voted against that option last June, get used to it all you Remoaners.
If our PM carries on repeating that mantra during her campaign, she may not get elected in her own Maidenhead constituency, which voted (quite sensibly in my opinion) to Remain.
I don't know how people voted in the referendum in your constituency Burneside, I just hope that - unlike the MP for Newton Abbot - the Tory candidate that will be seeking to represent you has at least got the common sense to want to seek a more pragmatic solution than falling off a cliff.
So if 4 plus years of Brexit negotiations fail then we could have many more years of negotiations with the WTO, which their Director General Azevedo claims will be a lenghty and difficult process.
In any case politics should be more than solely about brokering trade agreements. We may be one of the richest nations in the world and the EU's second biggest net contributor right now, but so what - the wealth created isn't distributed equitably and nor will it be when we leave the EU. All we get is never ending austerity.
The future of our children has looked bleak for years long before Brexit came along. Who really benefits from free market economics? Not the majority and not future generations. If anyone is really concerned about their children and their children's children, etc, they're misguided if they think economic growth is part of the solution. The resources of the planet are not infinite. Brexit/Remain represents the same disastrous economic policies based on never ending growth as does the WTO and the UN.
Brexit take us to the environmental tipping point sooner, we were heading there under the EU anyway.