My feed
Premium

Please
or
to access all these features

Brexit

OH NO Tens of thousands denied the right to vote!

54 replies

0phelia · 08/06/2016 10:07

The Register to vote site crashed, so tens of thousands have now missed the deadline.

If there is enough noise the Gvnt might extend the deadline

Petition here

OP posts:
Report
PlayingGrownUp · 08/06/2016 10:09

I was under the impression it crashed for 2 hours last night?

Report
MakingJudySmile · 08/06/2016 10:12

Tens of thousands were registering in the last few hours before the deadline?

That's a mad number of procrastinators.

Report
rosie1959 · 08/06/2016 10:12

Why leave it to the last minute !
Cannot believe so many people are not already on the electoral role and daft enough to leave it so late

Report
kirinm · 08/06/2016 10:14

It's irrelevant that they left it to the last minute. They had until midnight and the system failed. They've been prevented from exercising their democratic rights. Even Farage agrees they should re- open registration for a day.

Report
shitchef · 08/06/2016 10:45

I've absolutely no sympathy I'm afraid. You'd have had to be in a coma for the last 6 months not to know that you had to be registered to get a vote. Why would anyone leave it to the last hour to register? Have they never tried booking gig tickets and had websites crash due to demand? (I did find it quite funny on Newsnight last night when Evan Davis said something along the lines of 'Well I was going to remind people that they have less than an hour to register to vote but ....don't bother'.)

Report
PortiaCastis · 08/06/2016 10:47

Why leave it until the last minute? No sympathy

Report
shitchef · 08/06/2016 10:50

Kirinm, how have they had their democratic rights removed? Who has stopped them from registering at any time in the last six months?

Report
PlayingGrownUp · 08/06/2016 10:52

To vote in NI you needed to print off a form & post it because you can't register online.

Report
Emochild · 08/06/2016 10:53

It's not irrelevant that they left it to the last minute

If they were that bothered they've had months if not years to register

Everyone should be on the electoral register from when they turn 18

Report
shitchef · 08/06/2016 10:55

In fact I wish there was a way of voting against a petition like this but that would get ridiculous, a petition against a petition.

Report
lostinyonkers · 08/06/2016 10:58

It's similar situation to the numpties who go to the polling booth at 2 minutes to 10 then complain there is a queue.

Report
Daffodil90 · 08/06/2016 11:00

shitchef, lostinyonkers Yep.

Report
trevortrevorslatterfry · 08/06/2016 11:01

Yep daft. If they are that bothered about exercising democratic rights why are they not already on the electoral register? It's not a special EU-referendum registration website that's failed!

Anyone who was bothered enough about democracy to take part in the local elections (in lots of parts of the country last month) would already be on the register.

Report
hownottofuckup · 08/06/2016 11:05

It's not relevant that they left it till the last hour, or two hours or even the final few minutes. They were still within the allotted time to register. That time needs to be given back.

Report
kirinm · 08/06/2016 11:05

If you comply with the rules you should be able to register. They've tried to. They haven't been able to because of a technical issue. Not sure how that isn't obvious.

Report
Blu · 08/06/2016 11:09

And the managers of the system could easily have predicted this and allowed for it....

Report
alltouchedout · 08/06/2016 11:12

Whether you have sympathy or not is immaterial, people were prevented from registering because the system didn't work when it was supposed to. The deadline was not "before midnight if the website stays up", it was simply "before midnight".

Report
shitchef · 08/06/2016 11:13

So how many £millions do you think is acceptable to spend on the extra servers etc needed to ensure that every person could vote 2 mins before the deadline? I'd rather that money was spent on public services personally rather than pandering to the whims of people who can't be arsed getting their act together.

Report
FrozenAteMyDaughter · 08/06/2016 11:14

Yes although I think it was madness to leave it so late, a deadline is a deadline and they should have been able to register. It should be reopened for a couple of extra hours or however long it crashed for.

Report
Laquila · 08/06/2016 11:17

Totally agree that it would have been sensible to do it before now, but that doesn't take away from the fact that they haven't done anything wrong in leaving it to the last minute. As others have said above me, the deadline was midnight last night, not midnight last night but we might decide that it's actually I my first come first served (which you might say is effectively what we've ended up with).

And whilst voter apathy makes ME very frustrated, it's completely unethical, IMHO, to deny someone the rift to vote on the basis that they haven't voted in other elections! That's not how democracy works, surely? How will we ever increase voter turnout with that approach?!

Report
MrsBlackthorn · 08/06/2016 11:18

A new voter registration system was introduced only this year. It's not inconceivable that people could think they were registered under their household registration, and only through the publicity in the last few days learned that they have to register as an individual.

It's been argued that the government deliberately avoided publicising the change in order to improve their chances in the May locals. Over a million people have fallen off the electoral roll. They haven't been told they have - many will only have found out if they made a point of checking.

Report
Laquila · 08/06/2016 11:19

Oh FGS.

"It's actually I my first come first served"
Not sure why "me" is in caps
Rift = right

Report

Don’t want to miss threads like this?

Weekly

Sign up to our weekly round up and get all the best threads sent straight to your inbox!

Log in to update your newsletter preferences.

You've subscribed!

shitchef · 08/06/2016 11:30

Trevor exactly, I even voted in the Police Commissioner election last month (even though I think Police Commissioners are a pointless waste of money - to not vote would feel wrong to me). I'm amazed by the number of people who were apparently not on the electoral register until yesterday - are they completely unaware of how much that can bugger up their credit rating?

I think what actually annoys me about all this is that large swathes of the rest of the world live under dictatorships and have no vote at all whilst some people are moaning that simply because they couldn't be arsed acting earlier they're in the same boat with regard to democracy. Really pisses me off actually.

Report
DorynownotFloundering · 08/06/2016 11:35

Calm down OP they are looking at extending the deadline because it was a technical fault.

I think Farage making a right racist twit of himself (again) stirred non voters to register so all good but yes very last minute .

Report
shitchef · 08/06/2016 11:40

Mrs Blackthorn, I've heard it being talked about for months. I think most households (who haven't moved etc) are unaffected. It is people who move round a lot e.g. students who will be affected and with universities and other organisations (including the Glastonbury organisers) plus loads of TV adverts publicising the changes, I don't think many (if any) have any excuse not to know.

Report
Please create an account

To comment on this thread you need to create a Mumsnet account.