Moving On From The Census ...

I have a divided opinion on this issue.

On the one hand I honestly believe that every British adult holding a British passport should vote as a duty. We owe it to all those that gave thier lives to fight for our freedom in two world wars. As fas as I am concerned if you do not exercise that right, you have no right to slate any politician that you could have stopped being elected.

On the other hand, I have such utter contempt, loathing and mistrust of politicians that I also sometimes think that an election is pretty much a waste of time. I do not know of a good, honest and decent politician that genuinely serves the people that elected them. You can never get a direct answer from a politician. They always have an ulterior motive and a hidden agenda.

Remember we had a referendum about joining the Common Market and the result was ignored because it did not suit the purpose of that odious snake in the grass Ted Heath. We were promised a referendum about the EU. It didn't happen simply because the politicians know that the result will not suit thier plans.

The situation facing the UK is that, there is not one wannabe politician with the guts to stand up and actually do anything that he or she actually promises the electorate in order to get elected into thier life of Riley positions. EVERY single issue facing the UK today is the direct result of there being far too many people in the country. We are grossly over populated and the problem is getting much worse EVERY day.

Until our useless, gutless, cowardly and dishonest politicians grow some balls and do something positive the rot will continue. The writing is on the wall. There is going to be mass civil disturbance in the Uk in the very near future. People are sick of all the lies and con tricks. Most folk just want to earn a decent living, have a roof over thier heads, food on the table, enjoy thier families growing up in safety and peace. Workers want to see thier taxes being spent on what is needed for the UK, like hospitals, schools, decent highways.

Far too many people want far too much from an ever decreasing small pot. The people that demand the most are those that contribute the least and cause the most social problems. We can start by taking radical steps.

* Close our borders immediately.
* Round up every illegal immigrant in the UK and deport them to thier country of origin.
* Refuse entry to any immigrant unless he can lodge adequate funds with the government to cover all housing, health, domestic and education needs for a minimum of ten years for himself and his dependants.
* Refuse any social benefits to anybody that has not paid into the system.
* Stop all foreign aid immediately.
* Withdraw from the EU immediately.
* Increase import duty on any product imported into the UK that could be made here.
* Introduce 2 years National Service for every body on reaching 16 years old.
* Make it a criminal offence to have a kid before the age of 25.
* Make it a criminal offence to have a kid if you cannot pay for them.
* Bring back the death penalty for rapists, murderers, peadophiles and terrorists.
* Sack all PCSO's and put real coppers on the beat.
* Make politicians work for minimum wage with a fixed expense account.
* Make it a criminal offence for a politician to lie or break an election promise.
* Abolish road tax for motorcycles and remove VAT on all bike parts and accessories.
* Ban the light blind, selfish morons that tow caravans and block our roads every summer.
* Ban football and turn the stadiums into secure allotments.
* Roadside executions for cyclists dressed in bright lycra shorts.
* Make offenders do thier full sentences.
* Ban drink drivers for life.

Bear with me, I will give thought to how best to deal with the PC brigade, human and civil rights wimps, parking attendants, social workers and those evil lollipop ladies.

Chopper.

 

I worked at polling stations for many years and would despair at watching residents of nearby houses go to work, return from the school run, go shopping, work in their gardens, wash their cars, return from work, shopping, etc., go to the pub, etc. and they couldn't be even be bothered to walk across the road and cast ther vote!

 

Scrungee perhaps they did their votes as postal ones like we have done these last few times.

I always vote as a matter of principal because woman died to give us the freedom to be able to have our say as to who runs this country:yess: {I do so love this smiliey :yess::yess::yess:}

 

Postal voters are identified on the electoral roll so will not be issued with a ballot paper if they turn up in person. One of those 'evening before' jobs for residing officers used to be going through the roll and physically crossing out postal, underage (those not old enough, but who would be over 18 before the register expired) voters, plus non-nationals only entitled to vote in certain elections.

Some would walk past and actually stop for chat outside the entrance and then continue on their way.

P.S. If you want the canvassers to call so you can have a go at them, get a postal vote for elections as they know you're one of the few extremely likely to vote. I seem to recall something like up to 90% when verifying votes for postal ballots.

 

Scrungee,thanks for that info.

Where Mr Kandy works his colleagues queue up to be a residing officer when it is voting time because they get a good rate of pay plus the next day off as some times the counting can go on well into the night.I keep telling him he ought to put his name down and earn himself a bit more money to add to the pittance he gets paid,but he usually has had enough after doing a full day without staying there longer :D

 

They tried getting me to carry on, but a hard day's early retirement is enough for me. In the past I've been up at dawn, driven 10 miles to the polling station to get things set up before start of poll and had the poll clerk not turn up, afterwards gone to the count which carried on into the early hours and got back home with just enough time for one hour's sleep before the alarm went off to start work. Done everything from hamlets with about 200 on the register to those in the worst parts in town and having to deal with all sorts of difficult 'customers' - and that included tellers, and candidate's agents at times!

So if you include picking up the ballot box, signs, papers, etc., checking them, confirming the arrangements with the caretaker, travelling, set up time, working until XX pm, closing down, completing ballot accounts and taking everything back to the count, it's a lot of hours for the pay and when you've dealt with drunks, people trying to gather up the ballot papers from every member of their family to use themselves, others trying to direct their partners how to vote, etc. you really earn the money.

I mainly did it as a contribution to the democratic process.

 

All I know is that it dont matter one way or the other how I vote, (talking general elections here), the same party will always win in the area I live.

Therefore why should I bother voting in such elections.

As to council elections, I dont even know who the candidates are and what they stand for, nobody comes round these days.

Probably scared of getting lynched.

 

Chopper, I've just related what you've said to my family and wish I hadn't. They agree with most of what you say and I've started a heated discussion here!
Meanwhile I think we'll stick with our dear old Tynwald (Manx Government), drifting along until some English politician comes along and upsets our apple cart from time to time. :gaagh:

 

Pete

The first sentence of your post is the reason that in my opinion you should vote. You are obviously not happy with the elected person and their party. Voting against them is your only weapon. Your right to a free and private vote was won by the ultimate sacrifice of a great number of people. Your vote could be just the vote that is needed to make the changes you want to see. If you don't bother to vote it is a wasted opportunity to voice your opnion.

Council elections are another matter altogether. The last local election I had a visit from some jobsworth supposedly canvassing support for someone. He had absolutely no idea what to say, couldn't answer a single question and was quite surprised when I told him to go away in short sharp jerky movements! Councillors are all amateur politicians, most of whom have ideas way above thier station and very little idea of what the local population wants doing. They just want to get thier noses in the trough. Worthless characters, the lot of them.

Chopper.

 

Since AV is the only system under which minority/lesser parties might get even a sniff of running the country (apart from being in a coalition) it's not surprising they are the ones who push for change - no Government on earth is going to suggest a change which might seem them in opposition after all.

The point which seems not to have been addressed in all this is, if, having counted, re-counted and redistributed the perference votes there is still no party with 50% what do we get? A FPTP! Additionally, even with AV you're only required to vote for one candidate - if everyone decided to do that, you'd again be back to a FPTP result. And - if (let's say) a die-hard Labour supporter wants their candidate to win, they're hardly likely to put a 2 against BNP or UKIP or indeed against the Tory candidate's name - the only place where it might make a difference is in marginal constituencies and since there are going to be boundary changes (yet again) it's possible some/many/all of those maringals may disappear in any event.

Chopper is mistaken in saying that the result of the 1975 referendum '... was ignored ...' in fact (from a 64% turnout) - 67% voted 'Yes'. And even if that hadn't been the case, it's worth remembering that a referendum is not legally binding, it is merely an indication of opinion - or perhaps it's more correct to say it is the opinion only of those members of the population who bothered to express one. If you can't be arsed to vote, don't whinge about the outcome.