I received my postal vote the other day for the post of police crime commissioner. I'm not sure why such a role exists, beyond creating a job for somebody, since enforcing the law doesn't seem a particularly political matter. Besides which, the only options were Uniparty Blue, Red and Yellow so... no difference at all then in policy terms.
I don't actually know why I'm registered for postal voting. Must be a hangover from when I moved about a lot for work. I would actually prefer to go to a polling station as that feels more like fulfilling my civic duty, so will change things soon. I've also found out a few things about postal voting recently, which has given me pause for thought...
- it is prone to electoral fraud
- it is banned in other countries, like France, for this reason
- numerous politicians have been convicted of electoral fraud in this country; all Labour and from a particular demographic
The government has, sensibly, established a requirement that voters take ID with them to polling stations to prevent fraud. But no such restriction applies to postal voting. Literally anybody in my home could've cast my vote by post. If I were a patriarchal, medieval sort who doesn't think women should have opinions, I could commandeer all of the postal votes sent to my home for various family members, run it by my local religious leader, and then vote accordingly - as part of a monopolised bloc. This is, in fact, how voting does work in many countries that are corrupt and where people think it is normal to cheat the system.
In Rochdale recently, a whopping 50% of the votes were cast by post. Are 50% of the voters too disabled or elderly to walk to a nearby polling station? An extremist candidate won that election in the end - and one who had aimed his campaign in a particular direction. In London, it is more or less a certainty that Khan will benefit from postal voting, just as the bent mayor of Tower Hamlets (previously convicted for electoral fraud) does.
So, given that postal voting is vulnerable to fraud, largely unnecessary, shunned in other countries... why are we seeing such a high rate of it? I can see why the Labour party will have perceived it to be to their advantage previously when they were desperate for votes, and formed certain alliances for this reason. But Rochdale shows that this can change quickly and dramatically when they displease the vote harvesters. No doubt the Tories perceive advantage for themselves, perhaps from elderly voters. Point is, it shouldn't make any difference whether it does or does not benefit these parties - preventing electoral fraud and the resultant corruption of our democracy should be the chief consideration.
No doubt the Equalities Act and other such idiotic and corrosive legislation make it near impossible to achieve any good sense in this, but I would at least expect to have seen more made of this. No doubt a difficult subject to broach because of the specific community that's likely to end up in the conversation, but this is dangerous and wrong.
What do others think? As we are living in an increasingly low-trust society, do we need to return to good old fashioned ways like queuing up and putting our votes into the black boxes ourselves?
I don't actually know why I'm registered for postal voting. Must be a hangover from when I moved about a lot for work. I would actually prefer to go to a polling station as that feels more like fulfilling my civic duty, so will change things soon. I've also found out a few things about postal voting recently, which has given me pause for thought...
- it is prone to electoral fraud
- it is banned in other countries, like France, for this reason
- numerous politicians have been convicted of electoral fraud in this country; all Labour and from a particular demographic
The government has, sensibly, established a requirement that voters take ID with them to polling stations to prevent fraud. But no such restriction applies to postal voting. Literally anybody in my home could've cast my vote by post. If I were a patriarchal, medieval sort who doesn't think women should have opinions, I could commandeer all of the postal votes sent to my home for various family members, run it by my local religious leader, and then vote accordingly - as part of a monopolised bloc. This is, in fact, how voting does work in many countries that are corrupt and where people think it is normal to cheat the system.
In Rochdale recently, a whopping 50% of the votes were cast by post. Are 50% of the voters too disabled or elderly to walk to a nearby polling station? An extremist candidate won that election in the end - and one who had aimed his campaign in a particular direction. In London, it is more or less a certainty that Khan will benefit from postal voting, just as the bent mayor of Tower Hamlets (previously convicted for electoral fraud) does.
So, given that postal voting is vulnerable to fraud, largely unnecessary, shunned in other countries... why are we seeing such a high rate of it? I can see why the Labour party will have perceived it to be to their advantage previously when they were desperate for votes, and formed certain alliances for this reason. But Rochdale shows that this can change quickly and dramatically when they displease the vote harvesters. No doubt the Tories perceive advantage for themselves, perhaps from elderly voters. Point is, it shouldn't make any difference whether it does or does not benefit these parties - preventing electoral fraud and the resultant corruption of our democracy should be the chief consideration.
No doubt the Equalities Act and other such idiotic and corrosive legislation make it near impossible to achieve any good sense in this, but I would at least expect to have seen more made of this. No doubt a difficult subject to broach because of the specific community that's likely to end up in the conversation, but this is dangerous and wrong.
What do others think? As we are living in an increasingly low-trust society, do we need to return to good old fashioned ways like queuing up and putting our votes into the black boxes ourselves?
