Voting is a duty, not a right, writes Richard Darlington, head of news at the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR).
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Richard Darlington is the head of news at the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR)
I’ve long been in favour of copying Australia and making voting compulsory. But there’s a great new idea from Guy Lodge and Sarah Birtch that voting should be made compulsory for first-time voters in the first election in which you become eligible to vote. Over time, no one in Britain could say they have never voted.
Like jury service, voting should be one of those things we do as a democratic duty, rather than something we take for granted as one of our own rights. Even if you don’t buy that argument, there’s a very strong case for using compulsion to help redress the balance in the UK’s turnout inequality.
Turnout in this week’s elections is likely to be low – but the growing inequality in turnout is more worrying than falling turnout itself.
According to Ipsos-Mori, at the last general election, 76 per cent of voters from the top social class (AB) voted, whereas just 57 per cent of voters in the bottom social class (DE) did. This social-class gap has tripled since 1992.
The age-gap is even more striking. Just 44 per cent of 18-24 year olds voted in 2010, while 76 per cent of those aged over 65 turned out. Until ‘granny tax’, the grey vote had been sheltered from the manifesto busting “we’re all in this together” austerity. Why have manifesto pledges on tuition fees been broken but on free TV licenses, bus passes and winter fuel payments, they have been kept?
Mandatory participation in elections is more widespread than many realise. In approximately a quarter of the world’s democracies, including Belgium, Australia and much of South America, it is mandatory to attend the polls. Not all of these states actively enforce the legal requirement to turn out on election day, but among those that do, enforcement is usually underpinned by means of small fines.
Evidence (pdf) suggests there would be no overall partisan impact of such a move because parties would alter their appeals to reflect the changed composition of the electorate.
• Vote 2012: An introduction to the various elections on May 3rd 17 Mar 2012
Calls for compulsory voting are commonly met with the objection that it is a citizen’s right to choose not to vote. But first-time voters should be compelled only to turn out and should have a ‘none of the above’ option, much like the ‘re-open nominations’ option common place in student union ballots.
It’s time to take another look at compulsory voting and first-time voters are the best place to start.
47 Responses to “Vote 2012: Voting is a duty, not a right”
Anonymous
Oh, so Australia hasn’t done it then. Wait, they have. Smokescreen.
Anonymous
What voting system is that, precisely, so I can take a look at the workings behind it?
Anonymous
Welcome to party politics!
Also, really? Which major UK party, in England, is to the left? Because none of the big three are…
Jasonkent
Compulsory voting is only enforced in 10 countries in the world and apart from Oz, none are great bastions of democratic freedom – far from it.
Compulsory voting can drive voter turnouts down by increasing the number of donkey votes, informal votes, blind guesses and unregistered voters. This occurred in Chile which is why compulsory voting was recently abolished there.
Australia’s voter turnouts (at 81%) are lower than many countries with voluntary voting including Sweden, Denmark, Iceland and Malta. And Australia’s turnouts would be a lot lower if you count the high levels of donkey votes, informal votes, and blind guesses. Over 10% of eligible Australian voters are not even registered to vote.
If you want to empower the electorate and make them feel like their vote matters the last thing you want to do is steal their power away by threats of fines enforceable with violence. That doesn’t empower people, it does the complete opposite.
If you want to encourage voting it is better to use peaceful means such as education, information and ideas. Choose peace. Choose democracy. Our decision to vote should be democratic. Don’t be tempted to force people to exercise their freedom because then it ceases to be freedom.
Richard Darlington
Turnout seems to be 32% – the lowest since 2000. See my @leftfootfwd blog on idea for compulsory first-time voting: http://t.co/tltWRR6D