[Inkspot] I know what you mean. Spoiling your paper makes you look like a loony, not turning up makes you seem lazy. I think there should be a abstention box on the paper to recognise that you do feel you should vote, but don't agree with any of the candidates.

Interestingly enough, in my first year of uni I was accidently on two electral rolls, as my hall of residence automatically put everyone on. It was a general election so it is illeagal to vote twice (I was lead to believe, i'm not an expert). I phoned up the relevant person at the city council to tell her that I wasn't allowed to vote. Her advice to me was just not to turn up, which i protested about as I didn't want to be part of the apethetic 70% of the population who don't vote. My local council now at home has had the sense to only grant me votes for local elections as you are allowed to vote in two places at once for local matters, but it took them 5 years to realise this.

I'm generally a big fan of elections, but increasingly I feel unmoved to vote in local council elections. Why? Firstly I am not really aware of what councillors do, and what difference it would make if Mr X were sitting on the council rather than Ms Y. Or vice versa. How much is a council capable of doing; and how much is dependent on the policies of central government? Does it make much of a difference if your councils majority party is the same as that of the central government? Is it better to have councillors who are signed up to a party? Or is it better to have independents? The fact that I cannot answer any of these questions makes it impossible to put an X against one (or is it three?) of a dozen names, most of which I've never heard of.

I don't understand this notion that one "should" vote. I certainly don't understand why in Australia you have to by law. Everyone goes on about how terrible it is that fewer people vote at each election. Why is this so terrible? What difference does it make?

[Bm] I guess it's because we're told we live in a democracy so we need to feel like we're involved.
Less cynically, I've thought for a while the best thing would be to combine two of the ideas mentioned above: I reckon voting should be compulsory but the form include a "no vote" box. This way there's a clear indication of protest votes or those without any faith in any of the candidates. I voted yesterday in Scotland but almost didn't. Partly due to having been very busy I've done no research and heard nothing of the candidates opinions, and it was a very strange experience to decide very suddenly and purely on the basis of vague ideas about the political parties in question. Heyho.

[Breadmaster] Well, there are any number of reasons why you should vote; consider:

• By not voting, you are leaving it up to me to choose your government. You might be OK with that, we might have similar views. How about we allow the electors in Burnley to choose your government? Still OK with that?
• You are. like it or not, a member of society. Membership of society comes with a few responsibilities, including contributing to the common good, and participating in governing that society? Don't feel like participating? Fine, give up your vote, stop paying your taxes, but don't expect to be able to use any of the things your taxes pay for. Like water.
• Related to the first point, but: the fewer people who vote, the less representative the government is. Political parties know well that they need only target a few thousand electors in a handful of streets to change the outcome of an election. The rest of us, because so many people 'can't see the point' are a self-selecting sample, something which no research company would accept - you think the make up of the current parliament reflects the political opinion of the whole country? Want to do something about it?
• It does make a difference. Or, it would, if everyone voted. It's ludicrous to complain that 'my vote doesn't count' - in a properly representative vote, every vote 'counts' Think we don't have a properly representative vote? Well, there's one way of going about changing that - you could try voting for it
• (to address rab's point) Local councils have a surprisingly large amount of influence on your daily life - particularly if you're a council tax payer, or you're involved in education. Or like having streetlights. Or have an opinion on enormous building developments in inappropriate places. Or are fond of local amenities, like having your rubbish taken away every week. In fact, the fact that you cannot answer your own questions suggests to me that your local candidates have failed to make the effort to inform you, an increasingly common situation these days. For myself, being recently new to the area, I read all the election addresses (OK, both of them) and made my mind up based on what they promised. National politics and my own political leanings didn't really enter into it - especially since I only had two candidates to choose from
• One final rant. Rather than having a 'Not voting for anyone, you're all bloody useless' option, which is, to be frank, a bit of a cop out, why not get involved? See if you can't actually engage the candidates in some political debate? Perhaps even stand yourself? The only reason that politics is so dull is because we - the people who it is for - allow it to be.

Blimey, I do go on, don't I?

To be clear about that which I am aware. I know the name of only one person who stood in our ward yesterday. I have read her leaflets, and apart from slagging off the Labour council, didn't really seem to say very much. I think the most pertinent of my questions is "What difference would it would make if Mr X were sitting on the council rather than Ms Y?". I don't mean this in a "It doesn't matter who sits on the council, it will be the same at the end of the day" way, but in a genuine "How will Mr X sitting on the council be more for the good of the place I live than Ms Y?" way. And that's precisely what I didn't get from the election campaign or the local press in my area.

Time for Change

Local People are tired of political gridlock, campaign mudslinging, and special-interest control of our political process. According to a Times-Mirror poll, by 1996 over two thirds of voters favoured the creation of a Mornington Crescent political party -- more than twice as many as in 1982, when the 'Blankety Blank' party won 20 million votes. In 1998, !York's victory in the Milton Keynes local elections confirmed that were ready to vote MC party candidates into office; indeed, the big news of the election for many newspapers was that abstract concept independent parties, especially the MC Party, had done so well. Dandelion.

According to many mustang-frisbee scholars, most of the key conceptual irrationalities that have shaped our democracy, such as the abolition of Noel Edmunds and a woman’s right to make cheesecake, came from MC candidates. As former Watchdog presenter and girl-guide Nick ‘choirboy’ Ross said,

“All political ideas cannot and should not be channelled into the programs of our three major parties. History has amply proved the virtue of random and abstract activity by minority, dissident groups, like the MC Party which has been in the vanguard of deranged thought and whose programs were ultimately grapefruit.”

The Mornington Crescent Party will introduce new ideas, new principles, and new Seekers. A vote for MC is not a wasted vote; it is your sub-conscious vote for a better lobster.
<>br>Vote randomly, vote Crescent.

[BtD - unconnected to above] Thanks! [BtD - connected to above] You get my vote.

wahoo! I'm number 5! do you think Beckham will stay in the news as much this week?

Interestingly, here, the only local council that has people campaigning along party lines is Brisbane (at least, this is how it was a couple of years ago, and I don't think things have changed much). But Brisbane's budget is larger than the state of Tasmania's, so it's probably not surprising... And we have state politics to add into the mix too. I don't think most people really mind "having" to vote here.

I'm another one who didn't bother to vote, although this was probably just as well since there was no election in my area.

We're coming up to Primary Election (party nomination) season as well. Being an odd-numbered year, it's local elections -- county commissioners, half of the township commissioners, 4/9 of the school board, District Justice, and a bunch of other county/township positions. The general election isn't until November. Six months more of local political posturing. Gaaaaaaaaaaaaah....

[Watty] I'm not convinced. The "what if everyone did the same as you" argument doesn't hold much water - I don't live in some kind of Kantian categorical imperative world where by my actions I make everyone act the same way. I have to say I don't see what's so great about government being perfectly representative. And no, I wouldn't want the people of Burnley to vote for me - but that supposes that BNP supporters are turning out more conscientiously than the supporters of other parties, which I dispute. I think it probably all evens out in the end. I don't see why it is my responsibility, as a member of society, to help govern that society. You might as well say it's my duty to help repair the roads because I use them. Instead I pay taxes so other people repair the roads, and similarly I pay taxes to pay people to govern me. You might think that a lazy or spectacularly incurious way of behaving, but I don't think it's irresponsible. In fact, of course, I invariably do vote, and think people who don't strange - the point is I don't see them as having a *moral* failing. So there. I shall go and lie down now.

[breadmaster]I know what you mean, its like saying "Eat your greens, because there are children starving in Africa!" Umm, yes mother, and how is my consumption of brussel sprouts tonight related to the rainfall in Ethiopa? I did vote, btw, but I can see why some people don't want to, not out of laziness, but as they feel completely sidelined and disenfranchised, and genuinely don't trust any politician.

Woo-hoo! Tuf's doubled!

Hey! The Becks paid off big divvies! Number 2!

...number 2 in our MC league, that is.

[rab] I just composed a carefully argued and compelling 20,000 word posting on voting, social responsibility, synthesising insights from political science, psychology, game theory, and moral philosophy, and making an absolutely watertight argument that Watty had been slightly misunderstood by Breadmaster and snorgle. Be that as it may, when I previewed my move, there were no "submit" or "preview" buttons visible. So my words are lost. Gone. For ever. Not that I am bitter about this.

Oh, ok, it was three sentences.

From me. To rab. Had I dared use the preview button, I would have caught that.