You've just given the programme controllers at Channel 5 their next big hit!

Voting should be compulsary for all major elections. Imagine the panic in the main parties who suddenly have to take into account the opinions of the 50-70% who regularly don't tick a box.
The main parties know exactly who votes at every election and the breakdown across the various social strata, they don't target policies at groups of people who in the majority don't vote.

Slap a 50 quid fine out to everyone who doesn't vote and watch the numbers go up and the politicians change their tunes.

That's a horrible idea, you can't force people to engage with politics if they don't want to. Besides, I reckon the party who introduced that law would be voted out by an absolute landslide at the next election if I am any judge of British mentality.

I voted UKIP

Regards

King James

If we agree that UKIP are a protest party. Then everyone who doesn't vote because they cannot be bothered due to disinterest of politics or as a protest is forced to vote................

Can you fill in the next part. Scary thought.

Voting is compulsory in Australia. $170 fine of you fail to do so. They seem to deal with it without any dummy spitting.

You can not "engage" as you put it by spoiling your ballot paper. I fail to see any downsides to compulsory voting nor any reasons to object to it. Put a box on there for "I do not wish to vote in this election" would also solve the problem of those who don't want to vote.

It is certainly true all the main parties pander to a small sector of those who do vote in order to win these particular peoples vote. The result is in effect the views of a small section of the voting public determine the politics of the country.

Getting all the voting population into the polling booth (or voting by more modern methods) by making it compulsory to vote is clearly the best way to get the government to reflect the view of the majority whatever that may be. The idea we would then be governed by a government without a mandate goes out of the window.

I can't fathom why anyone can seriously object to the idea.

I don't see any parallels with the say UK communist party and UKIP in terms of then being something sensible to choose to support. The communist party offers a coherent philosophy which you may or may not disagree with. Anyone can see what they stand for and decide to vote for them or not based on that. UKIP are a IMO a bunch of fascists who aren't offering anything remotely coherent or workable.

Why should the right to vote become a duty? It's our right to exercise our rights, not be forced to exercise them under threat of financial penalty.

Presumably non payment of this $170 fine will eventually lead to arrest and eventually incarceration - outrageous!

We supposedly live in a democracy, which in my mind means people should be free to do what they like as long as they don't inflict harm, loss or injury on anybody else.

So you don't believe what any of them were saying in their manifestos.

That means they are all the same, so how could you eliminate any of them?

If you have reasons not to vote Tory, Lib Dem or Labour it would be far easier to spot reasons not to vote UKIP.

If you are trying to suggest that UKIP didn't give you reasons to avoid them because you don't believe they will implement their dire and quite frankly bonkers domestic polices you have not been paying attention to how they behave in the EU parliament. Check out how they vote in there (yes they do vote despite wanting to leave the EU).

They have for example consistently voted against measures to close corporate tax avoidance loopholes.

So I am afraid giving them the benefit of the doubt that they won't be stupid was a bit short sighted.

Quote: TrinityIHC "That's a horrible idea, you can't force people to engage with politics if they don't want to. '" So you can force people to wear a seatbelt in a car or a crash helmet on a motorbike but you can't compel people to engage in the single most important decisions we make about the country we live in? Look at the voting pattern on page 10, it's pretty straighforward, the older you are the more likely you are to vote and the more well off you are the more likely to vote. The turnout amongst 18-24 year olds is truly pathetic, when I first got the vote I was proud to cast it. If I can find this out in 30 seconds and political strategists paid huge salaries are employed by all the main parties it's no surprise that policies that benefit or attract the votes of people who actually get of their bums and vote are prioritised. www.electoral-reform.org.uk/imag ... 93b87a.pdf

Quote: TrinityIHC "That's a horrible idea, you can't force people to engage with politics if they don't want to. '" So you can force people to wear a seatbelt in a car or a crash helmet on a motorbike but you can't compel people to engage in the single most important decisions we make about the country we live in? Look at the voting pattern on page 10, it's pretty straighforward, the older you are the more likely you are to vote and the more well off you are the more likely to vote. The turnout amongst 18-24 year olds is truly pathetic, when I first got the vote I was proud to cast it. If I can find this out in 30 seconds and political strategists paid huge salaries are employed by all the main parties it's no surprise that policies that benefit or attract the votes of people who actually get of their bums and vote are prioritised. www.electoral-reform.org.uk/imag ... 93b87a.pdf

Maybe so, but the others have proved themselves incompetent/ineffective. UKIP will no doubt turn out the same but I feel that someone else deserves a crack of the whip and if not them.. who?

Out of that list of parties that compete in my area, there are basically Labour, Tories and 2 small time national front type organisations, none of whom I will vote for. This leaves me with a straightforward choice between Ukip + Greens and I plumped for Ukip as the more likely to succeed out of those two.

Or alternatively count all the no-shows as spoiled votes in a "none of the above" style and include them in the results.

enforced voting?

no thanks

Aren't UKIP a small time National Front - type organisation though??.....