To consider not voting in the council elections?

[Sittinginthesun]

I ALWAYS vote. Usual reasons (women fighting/dying to give me a right to vote, can't complain if you haven't expressed your opinion etc).

This council election though, I have a dilemma. This area is basically Tory with a strong Lib Dem vote at council level. No Labour councillors at all.

I know of all the candidates locally. Tory guy is actually quite nice, but he's a Tory. I promised myself never to vote Tory after the Miners' Strike.

Lib Dem lady is bonkers.

WWYD?

I think party politics is far less important at a local level and more about voting in the candidate you feel will do the best job for local people.

Put it this way, as you can't vote for labour (your first choice) you could vote for the Tory who you seem to feel is a better peson for the job in order to prevent the bonkers Lid Dem lady getting in.

Abstain. You are still using your right to choose. You choose none. Sorted.

It's a dilemma, but I think you must vote, even if it's for a candidate who can't realistically win.

I live in a solidly Tory area (the proverbial stick of celery in a blue rosette would win round these parts) and at all levels of government, town, district, county, national, europe, it's a blue clean sweep.

I, like you, could never bring myself to vote for a Tory, despite them doing a reasonable job, so I vote for the other candidates, closest to my own views, to encourage them to keep standing. Democracy is stronger with a diversity of views - even if they'l' never, ever, win.

Well I was raised Labour (proper labour, not the new labour shower of shite we have at the minute - yes Ed I'm looking at you) and now live in an area which is traditionally tory. I'm also on my local residents committee and work very closely with our local councillors who are fantastic despite being Tory

I do think at local level you need to look more at the people doing the job rather than the parties involved. I'll never admit it to my family but I think I'll be voting blue this time.

Become a politician

Spoil your ballot paper? It's registering a protest, of sorts and you would at least feel as though you'd done "something".

Either stand yourself.

Or realise that a lot changes in 30 years, and vote for the Tory candidate as you clearly think he's e best representative for you. Whether you make the "X" in the box or not, the act of making the selection in your brain has overtaken your old mantra.

I would abstain in your position.

I woud vote labour even if there's no chance of him/her getting voted in. At least you've gone with ylur conscience and show that there is soe support for this candidate. Not voting helps nobody.

If there were no independents to vote for I think I would write None of the above on my ballot paper.
I was thinking of doing this but my dilemma is that we have had BNP flyers through the door and I may need to vote Tory to keep them out. I will if that's what it takes but it will hurt

The thing to remember is that demographics can and do change.. kids grow up see a diiferent world to their parents ...vote a different way

if everyone thinks the same way you do and dont vote then its never gonna change...

our staunch, never gonna change, always been and always will be labour stronghold fell to snp this year ..

you got to vote for the candidate you want .. if you dont they have less chance of winning

Look at their policies.

Although they may be Tory, I've found that at local council level, their priorities are quite different.

Also, consider contacting your chosen/elected councillor and say "hey, didn't really want you to win but it's a democratic process. So, here's a list of things which I think are important and I'd appreciate it if you could bear these in mind when voting on council".

I was really surprised when I went to vote at a local election that there wasn't a labour candidate. A guy had knocked on my door and asked for my signature as he needed so many signatures in order to stand so I was expecting there to be a candidate. I actually voted LibDem as the independent candidate is a nuisance and I don't do Tory. If I were to be in that situation again I think I would abstain because there really isn't a suitable candidate to vote for, I will never vote LibDem again.

I have never voted, and probably never will. It changes absolutely nothing. It surprises me that anyone bothers. You essentially get the same anyway, due to people voting Lib/Lab/Con like robots. Oh well, at least people think they have a say in things! And yes, people who don't vote have every right to complain, as we didn't vote for it (and nor are we bad losers).
Don't vote...it's the only way.

I don't know what to do this time.

The two Tory candidates round here are both parents of childhood friends of mine and I actually like them as people but both have either had granted, or have tried to obtain, planning permission to build on green belt land that they own. When I say green belt, this is in some fo the most beautiful open countryside, not a patch of land isolated between other developments.

One of the candidates' applications was voted though by his planning committee conservative colleagues before before the chair of the committee refused to accept their vote. The other somehow gained permission to build 3 very large houses which have now been sold.

It really makes me wonder like fuck it does about their motivations.

On the other hand, the Labour councillors in this area have been laughably inept to the point of having to apologise for some of the cock ups they made.

None of the other parties even come close to a majority here.

Vote Labour, if that is what your concious dictates. I don't get the 'oh but they've got no chance round here it would be a wasted vote' is a self fulfilling prophecy.

I've never voted for anyone other than Labour, but at the 2005 election I was so appalled by the Iraq/Afghanistan wars that I spoiled the paper. At the count, the total of spoilt papers is read out and feel that it at least registered my anger, but not voting would be apathetic.

As REM said 'Withdrawing in disgust is not the same thing as apathy'

Stand yourself. All you need is 10 signatures.

concious - conscience

Very interesting, particularly as no consensus of opinion. My gut feeling is that I like the conservative candidate. I just can't believe that I am considering it.

I believe that there is a Labour candidate, but haven't seem them, and I do feel that, at local level, they should at least make some effort to show their faces. I've had both the Tory and Lib candidates knocking of the door, and I have seen them both in action at meetings etc.

Mind you, the Lib flyers are just a joke - it's always "here I am with a pothole", "here I am with an elderly person"...

DH said that if I am concerned enough to be asking MN, I should stand myself, but I think the local nimby politics would be enough to drive anyone insane. A friend is currently in serious dispute with them over a planning issue, and the internal "politics" seems crazy. Maybe the Lib candidate was perfectly fine before she started.

A shame there isn't an Independent candidate and the Labour one isn't more proactive.

I'm in the camp that says people who don't vote have no right to moan. Even if your vote makes no real difference in a safe seat you have at least registered it. In fact I'd be in favour of making voting compulsory, and teaching pupils in school about the different parties, and local and national politics.

I'm afraid the only reason I'd ever vote Conservative would be to keep the BNP out though and I will never vote LibDem again.

People who want to be local councillors are self-important, narcissistic, interfering busy-bodies who think they know better than anyone else. And they read the Daily Mail and believe every word.
Well, that's my opinion and I'm sticking to it

vote for the policies not the person. vote for whichever has policies nearest to your personal beliefs not cos they seem very nice / bonkers. If you believe in Labour vote Labour they will never stand a chance if all voters take the view that there isn't one here so why bother. register a vote its your public duty IMO.

OP - just carry on voting, as you always have done. My DH is in charge of elections in our LA. He and his staff put in bonkers hours in the run up to the election and publication of the register and a good turn out on election day makes them feel the effort was appreciated.

I've done election duty myself and it's just so slow on local election days, and sleep inducing when you've been up since 6.00 am and can't leave the polling station until 10.00 pm. In one election, I was so bored I spent time reading the articles in Hello! magazine, rather than just looking at the pictures.

Sittingsun I nearly didn't vote either. I am generally a Labour voter.

However - we are in an area where it has gone back and forth between Tory / Lib Dem forever. It has generally been recognised that voting for Labour is "a waste" so in the past I have voted Lib Dem because they are not Tories. However, at the moment I feel that they more or less are Tories.

The only other choice was UKIP! (not going there). So, I have voted Labour.