IMS_Blog

In case you haven’t noticed, the UK holds a general election on the 5th May this year. We get the chance to register our vote for who we believe the best candidate is. Except I don’t want to—or rather I want to officially register that I don’t believe in the difference between candidates, or the system much. The problem arises because if I vote along political party lines that vote is pretty much meaningless in a seat with is “safe” for a different party. Not only won’t the candidate of my party be elected, but my vote is essentially then disregarded. If however I’d lived somewhere which is a safe seat for the party I’m voting for, then the vote counts more, as my candidate get elected. I’ve never seen much logic in this (badly expressed) scenario. But the larger problem is that I simply fail to see enough difference between parties, or even between individual candidates (actually, the larger problem is that I’ll agree with one party on one point but with another party on a different point—there is absolutely no way to register this in our “democracy”, your supposed to take the good with the bad).

My gripe isn’t really the system (though I dislike it), however. It’s that on May 5 when I don’t vote I’ll be classed amongst the lazy and apathetic. This isn’t really true. Certainly I’m not lazy. What I want is a box to tick saying “abstain”. I want to register my not voting as an official vote. The only vague way to do this has always been to “spoil your ballet paper”. I’ve never been satisfied with that idea; for a start I’d then be lumped with those who do that accidently. I also remember student union elections always had Ron as a candidate. Ron was Reopen nominations, showing you weren’t content with any of the available options. I suppose the chaos and embarrassment caused on this happening in a “proper” election would be too much though…