Local Elections 2023

[denislawsbackheel]

If you use your passport, does it have to be currently valid or will an expired one do? Because the passport office is another service they've made an absolute shit show of. I imagine there are plenty of people who just let them expire during the pandemic and haven't renewed them yet.

Expired ones are accepted

 

[bluethrunthru]

Just saw Sunak being interviewed - tried to point to a few thin gains - leaned heavily on the fact only 25% of the votes counted yet but most pathetically he quoted HIS five peoples priorities - boats, inflation etc - three times in less than 3 minutes......... all delivered in a monotone

 

[mosssideblue]

No doubt the Tories will put a squeeze on financial support to Labour controlled Councils to make them look bad

 

[denislawsbackheel]

Yet Belgium and Australia have compulsory voting and are democracies, though with the former I do sometimes wonder…

Is it?
Or is it compulsory to turn up and a spoiled ballot paper is acceptable?

 

[I'm With Stupid]

You are right to pull me up for my overly strident 'no evidence whatsoever'. It would have been more accurate to say it's not a material problem. There will always be the occasional issue but in the last GE in 2019 we had one person convicted of electoral fraud. So though the Electoral Commission agrees with the idea of voter ID they have also said they don't actually think we have a significant issue with voter fraud in this country.

Personally I don't have an issue with voter id in principle. My issue is that it's virtually irrelevant compared to other more critical areas of electoral reform but yet it has been prioritised in an utterly cynical fashion.

Well the real question is which will lead to a truer picture of the will of the British people? A system where occasionally in one election, one person votes illegally, or a system where large numbers of people can't vote because they didn't get their paperwork in order in time?

And that's even assuming that you accept the argument that voter ID will reduce voter fraud. It makes no difference to postal votes, which would be the obvious way you would commit widespread voter fraud.

 

[I'm With Stupid]

Interesting from pollster John Curtice.

On the evidence of our key wards, turnout is only slightly down on both 2019 and 2022, while there is no marked evidence that turnout has fallen more in places where fewer people possess a passport.

Meanwhile there is no clear evidence that the swing to Labour is lower in wards where turnout has fallen most. Between them, this evidence does not lend much weight to claims that the introduction of voter ID would depress turnout in a way that would be to Labour's disadvantage.

Interesting. Although it's worth mentioning that it's not the outcome that was the issue, it was the intention. It was absolutely clear that they wanted to disadvantage people they thought would vote against them, whether or not that's how it turned out.

 

[I'm With Stupid]

View attachment 77698

Fucking hell, I'd forgotten about her. First it was a funny story, but her subsequently doing literally every media appearance possible, months after it stopped being funny, suggests that she's exactly the sort of self-important jobsworth anyone would get pissed off at on a Zoom meeting.

 

[bluethrunthru]

This is a parody account but on screen is the real chairman of the Tory Party Greg Hands and he is saying real words

 

[Gabriel]

Dilemma... would you vote LibDem in NE Somerset because you're pro-EU, or Labour as they have best chance to beat Rees-Mogg?

An intriguing one. Since its creation, that seat has remained firmly Conservative with Rees-Mogg its MP, and only in one of the four elections (2010) would the combined votes of Labour and the Liberal Democrats have sufficed to win the seat. They would have fallen way short both in 2015 and in 2017, and in 2019 it would have been nip and tuck even with the Greens and Independent votes. Indeed, there wasn’t that much between the two main defeated candidates in 2019 (Labour 13,631 and the Liberal Democrats 12,422) with Labour down 10.5% on 2017 and the Liberal Democrats up 13.8% on their 2017 showing, so one could argue the case for either party standing aside and giving the other a clear run. It’s that division and uncertainty, however, that could yet see Rees-Mogg returned even if his 28,360 support collapses.

 

[Gabriel]

Is it?
Or is it compulsory to turn up and a spoiled ballot paper is acceptable?

Yes, you’re quite correct. I should have clarified.