gavreid
Pretty Words...
Not really. You have to make a signed declaration, including your DoB, both of which are checked against a previously submitted sample.
Voter suppression: UK Voter ID
- Thread starter Tony L
- Start date
Not really. You have to make a signed declaration, including your DoB, both of which are checked against a previously submitted sample.
kensalriser
pfm Member
I was in a position to help both my parents make their postal vote in recent elections. One couldn't see very well and the other had dementia. In both cases it would have been quite easy to submit the votes with my choices rather than theirs.
gavreid
Pretty Words...
but that is their trust - you're not a random stranger. The tellers have to make the crosses for my blind parents.
droodzilla
pfm Member
My house is being nuked by Labour Party leaflets - three or four in the last week.
It's a Labour/Lib-Dem marginal ward in Sheffield.
Can't bring myself to vote Lib-Dem (or Labour, obvs) so just off to show support for The Greens.
It's a Labour/Lib-Dem marginal ward in Sheffield.
Can't bring myself to vote Lib-Dem (or Labour, obvs) so just off to show support for The Greens.
kensalriser
pfm Member
That seems a rational choice in Sheffield given the Greens already have significant representation, even if they're not competitive in your ward.
droodzilla
pfm Member
Yes, I'm quite happy with the current situation, with the Green's holding the balance of power.
Looking back, I don't think the Labour Partry did a great job in Sheffield when they had a majority.
Mind you, the Lib-Dems were even worse - ****ing awful to be honest.
Paul Scriven, the Lib-Dem ex-leader of the council was subsequently made a lord by his chum Nick Clegg.
Here he is shilling for a private hotel chain, while he was leader of the council:
Definitelly nowt dodgy going on there.
Tony L
Administrator
Just got back from making my entirely futile gesture of opposition. Had a chat with the three folk manning the polling station, who are always nice people IME. They had turned five people away. I pointed out I felt the policy was voter-suppression/gerrymandering and they all agreed with me. I think I actually helped reinforce that view as the disparity between the OAP bus pass (accepted) young person’s rail card/student union card (not accepted) didn’t seem to have hit home with one of them. My days work is done. Change minds whenever one can.
PS Five sounds like nothing, but this is a highly disenfranchised poor multi-ethnic area with notoriously low turnouts, and I suspect most votes won’t have been cast yet as folk work long and anti-social hours. My bet is that figure will be far higher before the night is out.
PS Five sounds like nothing, but this is a highly disenfranchised poor multi-ethnic area with notoriously low turnouts, and I suspect most votes won’t have been cast yet as folk work long and anti-social hours. My bet is that figure will be far higher before the night is out.
Tony L
Administrator
Some interesting data from Survation (Twitter) on how the Tories’ voter-suppression strategy impacts different ages, demographics and voting intentions.
Looking at the first results coming in via Britain Elects (Twitter) it looks like the suppression is working with a reduced overall turnout varying from a couple of percent to up to 20 in some seats. The Tories are still heading for a wipeout, but I suspect they’ll reduce the damage they take.
Looking at the first results coming in via Britain Elects (Twitter) it looks like the suppression is working with a reduced overall turnout varying from a couple of percent to up to 20 in some seats. The Tories are still heading for a wipeout, but I suspect they’ll reduce the damage they take.
gavreid
Pretty Words...
Tories have already won more than 400 seats. Shows that, despite everything and the overwhelming evidence of sleaze, corruption and incompetence in front of their stupid faces, more floaters in the local rivers than voters, some people are still prepared to vote for the extreme right.
Nick_G
pfm Member
Tony L
Administrator
“ITV reports “polling station tellers in Oxfordshire say "large numbers" of voters were being turned away, reporting that between 10-25% were unable to vote.” There was almost no voter fraud in the UK. There is now, and it is officially sanctioned.” Richard Murphy (Twitter).
The story of this election is unquestionably one of government voter-suppression. Anyone with even the slightest grasp of election statistics will grasp just how significant attempts to shift the outcome by even a point or two skewed on age, wealth and education demographics given we live in a first past the post electoral system where absolutely everything in a GE is decided on a small minority of closely fought ‘marginal seats’. The Conservative Party only need to rig this game very subtly to alter outcomes very significantly. They know this full well. It is why they are doing it. Voter fraud in the UK was always a non-issue. This is a smokescreen behind which an increasingly unpopular Tory elite can rig and stack the table even further in their favour. The GOP has been doing it for decades in poor black areas of the USA (follow the work of journalist Greg Palast). This is tried and tested election rigging strategy and we need to fight hard it with absolutely everything we have.
Thankfully Good Law Project are about to legally challenge the Conservative government over this. Please consider supporting the campaign here: actions.goodlawproject.org/voter_id
No one should be fooled by today’s election results. The Tories were only ever going to be battered based on their appalling record in government. They have still denied an awful lot of young, poor and vulnerable people the basic right to vote. They are playing the long-game.
The story of this election is unquestionably one of government voter-suppression. Anyone with even the slightest grasp of election statistics will grasp just how significant attempts to shift the outcome by even a point or two skewed on age, wealth and education demographics given we live in a first past the post electoral system where absolutely everything in a GE is decided on a small minority of closely fought ‘marginal seats’. The Conservative Party only need to rig this game very subtly to alter outcomes very significantly. They know this full well. It is why they are doing it. Voter fraud in the UK was always a non-issue. This is a smokescreen behind which an increasingly unpopular Tory elite can rig and stack the table even further in their favour. The GOP has been doing it for decades in poor black areas of the USA (follow the work of journalist Greg Palast). This is tried and tested election rigging strategy and we need to fight hard it with absolutely everything we have.
Thankfully Good Law Project are about to legally challenge the Conservative government over this. Please consider supporting the campaign here: actions.goodlawproject.org/voter_id
No one should be fooled by today’s election results. The Tories were only ever going to be battered based on their appalling record in government. They have still denied an awful lot of young, poor and vulnerable people the basic right to vote. They are playing the long-game.
gavreid
Pretty Words...
They'll never count the people who knew that they had no id so didn't go to the polling station at all. I'd bet that's the largest fraction.
Tony L
Administrator
It will be incredibly hard to put a figure on that. There will be clues in the differences in turnout in different areas based upon historical precedence. Hopefully we’ll here from those who have been disenfranchised to.
The Good Law Project know what they are doing and have a high enough profile now I’m sure detailed and solid data will find its way to their case. I’m curious if there is an international law angle to this too? Does the UK have “free and fair elections”? To my mind it never has had, but this new voter-suppression hoofs that concept even further away.
paulfromcamden
Baffled
Early results suggest today could be a good day for the Green Party. Fingers crossed.
Seeker_UK
Feelin' nearly faded as my jeans
And, apparently, 'greeters' who IIUC were stationed outside polling stations to check for ID before they got to the polling station proper. These won't be counted either.
The Election Commission are concerned and will issue a report on turnout, but I guess we have to wait for turnout figures to firm up later today.
I went to vote on the way home last night and when I got to the polling station I saw them turning away an elderly lady who had forgotten her id.
On her way out she muttered to us about being a Labour voter and wanting to get the Tories out.
As it turned out, it appears she was not to be deterred. After I left the polling station I saw her walking back there, id in hand, determined to cast her vote.
It appears her efforts were not in vain. After 20 years, the Conservatives have lost control of Hertsmere Borough council, and the result is “No Overall Control”. An amazing result here, really, as I thought the Conservatives were impregnable.
I wonder if Oliver “dowdy” Dowden, the current deputy PM and MP for the area, is looking over his shoulder a bit…
On her way out she muttered to us about being a Labour voter and wanting to get the Tories out.
As it turned out, it appears she was not to be deterred. After I left the polling station I saw her walking back there, id in hand, determined to cast her vote.
It appears her efforts were not in vain. After 20 years, the Conservatives have lost control of Hertsmere Borough council, and the result is “No Overall Control”. An amazing result here, really, as I thought the Conservatives were impregnable.
I wonder if Oliver “dowdy” Dowden, the current deputy PM and MP for the area, is looking over his shoulder a bit…
Sue Pertwee-Tyr
Accuphase all the way down
A disastrous mid-term local election result has, in the past, been a resigning matter for the party leader. I doubt that'll happen today though. Listening on R4 this morning, they had the Tory party chairman on. He laid the blame for 'damage to the Conservative brand' squarely on Johnson and Truss, which makes me assume they are going to shield Sunak by saying it is early days and a lot of his wonderfulness will need time to take effect.
By the time of the GE they'll not have that excuse, of course, and any competent opposition will be reminding the electorate of how they felt at this moment, strikes, cost of living, NHS, partygate, hosing cash at donors, fast track and all the other horrors. I don't see much prospect of improvement in that stuff on the current trajectory, but time is a great healer. These wounds need to be, if not kept open, then not healed and still aching noticeably when people think about them.
By the time of the GE they'll not have that excuse, of course, and any competent opposition will be reminding the electorate of how they felt at this moment, strikes, cost of living, NHS, partygate, hosing cash at donors, fast track and all the other horrors. I don't see much prospect of improvement in that stuff on the current trajectory, but time is a great healer. These wounds need to be, if not kept open, then not healed and still aching noticeably when people think about them.
Seeker_UK
Feelin' nearly faded as my jeans
Of course they'll keep him. Defenestrating a leader this close to the GE campaign kick-off this far behind in the polls would be the worst thing they could do.
Paul Scully was laying the foundations last night on the BBC: "Mid-term blues", "Need the PMs five point plan to really make its mark", "Not as bad as everyone predicted". Although I didn't hear "protest vote"