Spoiling your ballot paper - can anyone confirm this?

[TheListingAttic]

To keep this in the 'spirit' of AIBU: I've always been unashamedly judgmental about people who don't vote. If you can't be arsed to go tick a box (especially as a women, when it's only relatively recently that the men deigned to allow you to do it) then you can't complain about pretty much anything about the society you live in. I fully understand people's disillusionment with the political system in general, and the whole shower of politicians in specific. So like a lot of people, I was of the opinion that if you can't bring yourself to tick a box endorsing any one of them (even as the least worst option) then you should at least go to the bother of spoiling of your ballot paper, to register your engagement with the process but protest against the actual choices it offers you. That's my two cents.

Talking to a friend of mine the other day, who used to do some sort of admin work within the electoral process, and she expressed absolute rage and frustration at people who spoil their ballots. Her point was that these papers don't register with anybody. They're never counted. She implied most papers are counted by machine, and anything that's not readable as a clear vote for a particular party just gets swept into a rubbish pile, and no one actually counts the discrepancy between numbers turning up at the polling station and numbers of valid votes. Your protest doesn't register with anyone at all.

So is it worth it? Is there any point in doing this, if no one actually notices? It seems a bit like holding a protest rally inside a sound-proofed disused warehouse. Is it even correct? Is there really genuinely no record or acknowledgement of the numbers of people turning up to vote but effectively not casting their vote? I probably wasn't going to spoil my ballot paper, but I always thought this was a worthwhile action. Now it seems like it's not recognised as any different to simply not turning up! Am I wrong?

Spolied ballots may be counted, but don't count towards anything .

For myself the two changes you will never see (although they are the easiest to make ) are:

1. Introduce a "None of the above" option
2. Require the winning candidate gets more than 50% of the available vote (not votes cast). If no candidate fulfils the criteria, the constituency doesn't return an MP. It would give us a chance to see if we really need that MP .

If you wanted to be more adventurous, you'd have a proportional representational system whereby the runner-up would be eligible to enter an upper house (c.f. House of Lords) which would have limited power of oversight over the lower house. This would ensure that the people who didn't vote for the winning MP would still have some representation in parliament. Unlike the resounding fuck all they have now.

However, MPs really have no interest in changing the way they are elected. So it will never happen. Especially given the one single chance we as a country had in a generation was pissed away. Notice how nobody is talking about electoral reform now. Except us. Here. Which makes all the difference.

I spoilt my paper in the Police Commissioner election. I don't like not voting but I disagreed with the whole idea so I made that clear.

When my son was a toddler I didn't agree with any of the parties so I let him fill it in, spoilt obviously! Hey, I was hormonal and PND and that. I always thought a spoilt vote was better than no vote.

I spoilt my Police Commissioner vote. No information has been distributed about the candidates so I felt unable to reach an informed decision. It was a common complaint and the high number of spoilt papers was noted at the time. There is potential for a change in the future because of the spoils / criticism.

Not voting at all can only really be interpreted as apathy. I'd rather actively misuse my vote like that where I feel unable to select a candidate.

I used to count votes, many moons ago. As you sort out the papers, candidates and others are prowling around the tables, watching everything you do intently to make sure you're not fiddling the count. All spoilt papers were put to one side for the person in charge to adjudicate on those spoilt papers. Some, e.g. where there was a tick in a box and not a cross, were adjudged to be a vote. Some, where the voter had written 'none of the above' on the paper, were adjudged to not be a vote but a spoilt paper. In my experience, the candidates paid a lot of attention to the spoilt papers (as they would obviously want them to be votes for themselves), so even if they don't 'count' in the traditional sense, they do get a lot of attention paid to them by the people who need to know how excluded the electorate feel.

So OP, I disagree with your friend, and would encourage people to spoil their papers rather than allow themselves to be misjudged as apathetic. Attention is paid to spoilt papers, and they do IMO count, even though they are not included in THE count.

If I decided to spoil my ballet paper I don't mind that it doesn't 'count' as such as it is rejected. That does for me register a protest that many previous posters have noted. I have no idea of the details of voting counting although I've learnt loads reading this thread
For me it's as has been mentioned up thread all too briefly, is it is about the process of being able to vote, to have a say. A right only recently granted to woman, and one I'm grateful to my great great grandmothers generation who fought and died for that basic human right. To have a bloody say...

"vote for the person you dislike least."

This. We generally have a BNP candidate. I may not like any of the mainstream candidates, but not doing my bit to keep the BNP out of power? That's personally morally unacceptable.

Spoiled ballot papers aren't counted and recorded, blank ballot papers are. A blank ballot paper is considered a protest (a 'no vote') and they are counted and recorded. A spoiled vote is considered illegible and is discarded.

Re: postal votes
I have read/been told that these are not counted unless they would make a difference to the result. So, if 300 postal votes are cast and the majority is counted at 500 the postal votes are not counted. If the majority is 250 the postal votes are counted as they could make a difference. Does anyone know if this is true?

Giddy I spoiled my ballot paper in the Police Commissioner election too. I did it because none of the candidates did a sodding thing to canvass. I think that's what I wrote on the paper too.

Spoilt papers are tallied and included in the return and they are great fun to adjudicate on. It's my favourite bit of the election.

Of course postal votes are counted

"vote for the person you dislike least."

But by voting for them I am essentially ratifying policies that I do not agree with.

tiggytape

I understand what you are saying but what are people supposed to do when the second closest party is miles from what you want/need?

I've spoilt my ballot paper in the past, for the same reasons as you OP. I feel like it is a civic duty to participate in the democratic process, and as a woman, I don't take it for granted. I like to think about the amazing work of the suffragettes as I walk to the polling station.

However, when I spoilt my ballot, I didn't like any of the candidates who stood, so I wrote something along the lines of "Better funding for maternity care."