It’s only a couple of weeks before we all need to vote on whether we want the voting system changed, so hopefully everyone is deciding which way they’re going to vote at the moment. It would be a shame if people missed this opportunity – in many ways voting on the way our government is elected in the future is just as important as voting in a general election.
Despite this I’m sure there will be a huge number of people who don’t vote – either because they don’t care either way or can’t be bothered to make the effort. This is partly due to the low quality leaflet that was sent round to everyone – it explained what the new voting system would be like but didn’t clearly lay out the benefits of both systems.
Without knowing and understanding the benefits it’s difficult to make a decision. This isn’t helped by the fact that most people don’t trust politicians to be honest with them about what the benefits and drawbacks of the two voting systems are. Instead, they know that they’ll “advise” people to vote for the system that benefits them and their party the most. This isn’t surprising really, it would be very strange to get a politician supporting a change in voting system that worked against him or her, but for people with only a passing interest in politics it makes choosing difficult.
I like the new voting system as it seems more people will have their vote count for something. The problem is that most people find it difficult to find one politician they like at the moment, let alone two or three….