Labour Leader: Keir Starmer IV

[doctorf]

No, it's not even remotely difficult, not difficult at all in fact - about 4% would be disenfranchised according to the Gov's own published figures based on their pilots.

This equates to just short of 2 million registered voters for both national and local elections (again, according to Gov numbers as of 2019)

An awful lot more damaging to democracy than any proven cases of imposter voting - by an extremely large margin in fact.

See how easy it was - the numbers are all out there and freely available for all to check.

Link please. It’s very easy to get skewed figures from poorly designed pilots.

 

[miktec]

Link please. It’s very easy to get skewed figures from poorly designed pilots.

Fill yer boots - and skew to your heart's content:

https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-9187/

https://www.electoralcommission.org...arch/our-research/voter-identification-pilots

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/evaluation-of-voter-id-pilots-2019

Note that the Electoral Commission's finding are slightly more pessimistic than the Gov's own published claim of 96% coverage but they were basing it on actual practice in NI rather than the Gov's (in your words) 'poorly designed pilots':

"Since 2014 the Electoral Commission has recommended that photo ID should be required in the rest of the UK. In December 2015 the Commission published a report on options for delivering and costing a voter ID scheme. The scheme was modelled on the existing scheme operating in Northern Ireland. It estimated 92.5% of the electorate who would have one of the forms of photo ID it was recommending."

 

[JonR]

To call any concern about democracy or liberty ‘overtly sensitive harping’, or any person expressing such concerns a ‘snowflake’ is reducing the argument to insult and is not an argument in support of voter ID on its merits

[..]

Think yourself lucky - he could have called you 'woke'

Doubtless that would have blown a gasket or two

 

[ks.234]

Link please. It’s very easy to get skewed figures from poorly designed pilots.

Surely the point is that any scheme that has even the potential to discourage people voting is a bad thing? To argue about how many people will be disenfranchised is to miss the point that we should be encouraging more people to vote, not less.

It should be incumbent on anyone proposing restrictions on voting to demonstrate how such measures enhance democracy, not for us ‘snowflakes’ to demonstrate the opposite.

The case for voter ID has simply not been made and in the absence of any credible evidence to support the need for voter ID, the only conclusion to be drawn is that the intention behind the move is malign

 

[ks.234]

Think yourself lucky - he could have called you 'woke'

Doubtless that would have blown a gasket or two

Terms like snowflake and woke are used by the right wing to marginalise debate and troll opponents without having to supply evidence or reason. Do you approve of such trolling or do you have some evidence based opinion on the matter?

 

[doctorf]

Surely the point is that any scheme that has even the potential to discourage people voting is a bad thing? To argue about how many people will be disenfranchised is to miss the point that we should be encouraging more people to vote, not less.

It should be incumbent on anyone proposing restrictions on voting to demonstrate how such measures enhance democracy, not for us ‘snowflakes’ to demonstrate the opposite.

The case for voter ID has simply not been made and in the absence of any credible evidence to support the need for voter ID, the only conclusion to be drawn is that the intention behind the move is malign

I agree with your comments, but I am of the opinion that it is not in any government’s interests to find that their voting system is liable to fraudulent voting.
It’s a bit like successive governments talking up aspects of the health service, despite figures showing poor performance compared to other countries. They tend to massage or hide figures that don’t fit their agendas.
But I do take your point that one would not want to discourage people from voting.
And thank you for being civil in your responses, unlike some arseholes on here.

 

[JonR]

Terms like snowflake and woke are used by the right wing to marginalise debate and troll opponents without having to supply evidence or reason. Do you approve of such trolling or do you have some evidence based opinion on the matter?

Trolling? No.

ID Cards - I don't have a problem with them personally - citizens of certain EU countries have carried them for years so why shouldn't we? On the other hand I'm also sympathetic to the idea that a polling card should be sufficient. At the moment, however, you can turn up to vote without one. Perhaps they should just make it mandatory.

 

[Seeker_UK]

I've never understood the point of issuing the card and then not asking to see it.

 

[ks.234]

I agree with your comments, but I am of the opinion that it is not in any government’s interests to find that their voting system is liable to fraudulent voting.
It’s a bit like successive governments talking up aspects of the health service, despite figures showing poor performance compared to other countries. They tend to massage or hide figures that don’t fit their agendas.
But I do take your point that one would not want to discourage people from voting.
And thank you for being civil in your responses, unlike some arseholes on here.

Many thanks, and I take your point about the use of figures to manipulate politics itself being undemocratic, but the only figures we have on voter fraud is 7 convictions in two General Elections and the EU Referendum.

Someone far cleverer than me can tell us how many noughts would come after the decimal point when working out what percentage of the turnout of 3 elections 7 convictions represents, but my right sided brain says it will be infinitesimally small.

If the figures for voter fraud are in actual fact higher, the question should be about why there have not been more convictions, not about delivering ID cards!

 

[Seeker_UK]

If the figures for voter fraud are in actual fact higher, the question should be about why there have not been more convictions, not about delivering ID cards!

Because, as the numbers show, it's quite a hard journey from suspicion to conviction. I should imagine that the evidence required for 'beyond reasonable doubt' given the slightly anonymous nature of the voting process, is a bit hard to collect.

 

[ks.234]

Because, as the numbers show, it's quite a hard journey from suspicion to conviction. I should imagine that the evidence required for 'beyond reasonable doubt' given the slightly anonymous nature of the voting process, is a bit hard to collect.

But the numbers show that only 160 people were suspected, which is still a microscopic percentage of the turnout in 3 elections.

The case for voter fraud being a statistically significant problem has not yet been made

 

[gavreid]

But the numbers show that only 160 people were suspected, which still a microscopic percentage of the turnout in 3 elections.

The case for voter fraud being a statistically significant problem has not yet been made

It was never about fraud ks, it's all about disenfrachisement, deliberate disenfrachisement. There's just no point arguing with right wingers, call them out for what they are and leave it there.

 

[ks.234]

It was never about fraud ks, it's all about disenfrachisement, deliberate disenfrachisement. There's just no point arguing with right wingers, call them out for what they are and leave it there.

Yes, but the point is that if a legitimate motive such as fraud is demonstrably not the motivation behind voter ID, then another malignant motive, be it disenfranchisement or stealing public money to hand it over to Tory donors, is all that’s left.

Some people will not care about democracy or public money being stolen and/or misused, but being the wokey snowflake I am, I’ll keep on whinging about it at length!

 

[gavreid]

A major new study published by Verso shows that “the EHRC investigation did not remotely uphold the dominant public accusations against Labour, while even those limited findings it did make cannot withstand factual or legal scrutiny.”

Launch today, chaired by Michael Mansfield QC - the book's free so there's no excuse to remain misinformed.

 

[ff1d1l]

I agree with your comments, but I am of the opinion that it is not in any government’s interests to find that their voting system is liable to fraudulent voting.
It’s a bit like successive governments talking up aspects of the health service, despite figures showing poor performance compared to other countries. They tend to massage or hide figures that don’t fit their agendas.
But I do take your point that one would not want to discourage people from voting.
And thank you for being civil in your responses, unlike some arseholes on here.

Arseholes....is that a new daily mail one?

 

[Brian]

If I don’t need a photo-ID to fill out and pay my tax return what right do the Conservative Party have in demanding one for my vote?

PS Not surprised the Brexit ultras are out and calling anyone who is concerned about civil rights and democracy ‘snowflakes’ etc. Farages gonna Farage.

Brexit ultras.

I’m not surprised at such a response, you do like to point the finger from time to time despite being repeatedly told you’re closer to supporting Farage and helping the tories than I am. Uncomfortable fact. Predictable likes too.

A national ID card is fine, I carried one for years without issue.

... and in this case they are bang on the money.

What is that supposed to mean?

 

[Tony L]

A national ID card is fine, I carried one for years without issue.

Even ignoring the blindingly obvious link between a Brexit mindset and right-wing authoritarianism, you do realise that an enforced ID card will disproportionately lose huge numbers of *Labour* votes? It will hit the poorest, ethnic minorities, and the young the hardest (and IMHO very deliberately). That strikes me as something that impacts you, way, way more than me. I honestly don’t care if Labour get any votes next election. I know they won’t be getting mine!

 

[Seeker_UK]

Even ignoring the blindingly obvious link between a Brexit mindset and right-wing authoritarianism, you do realise that an enforced ID card will disproportionately lose huge numbers of *Labour* votes? It will hit the poorest, ethnic minorities, and the young the hardest (and IMHO very deliberately). That strikes me as something that impacts you, way, way more than me. I honestly don’t care if Labour get any votes next election. I know they won’t be getting mine!

What if it's a free ID card?

 

[Tony L]

What if it's a free ID card?

I’d put money on it not being. This is a very cheap ctrl-c ctrl-v of some remarkably ugly US Trump/Republican policy that has kept the right to vote as far away from poor black areas as possible.

 

[sean99]

Even ignoring the blindingly obvious link between a Brexit mindset and right-wing authoritarianism

Lexiters have been ignoring this one since before the referendum in 2016. It must be a significant ongoing mental effort to ignore it, but I think the realization, deep down, that they have enabled the most right wing, authoritarian government in modern UK history underlies their inability to publicly admit they made a mistake.