To think it's your own fault and you've had ages to sort it!

[Hurryhurryhurry]

Heard the news on the radio about up to 1 million people registering to vote yesterday... On the last day!
Then the site crashed and now many people are annoyed that they couldn't register and want the deadline to be extended.

Wtf! Aibu to think why did you leave it until yesterday?!

But there wasn't maria It's common sense! Atleast do it a few days before! How does that make me sound smug?

While you're obviously right when you point out that anyone leaving it to the last minute runs the risk of not making the deadline, surely the powers that be should have taken steps to ensure that the systems were still up and running for the last two hours before the deadline or what is the point of giving a deadline? This just seems to be yet another example of systems falling apart in perfectly predictable circumstances. Recently, Barnet residents who wanted to vote in the Mayoral election found they were unable to do so when Barnet council sent out of date voter lists to staff in Polling stations. That was also unacceptable.

I'm with you OP. But an extension is also appropriate.

I'm staggered so many people aren't registered to vote!

I am too - one of the first things we do when we move house.

I was also aware of the change form head of household to individual voting and I'm not glued to the news. Plus there has been a big push last few weeks to get people registered - so why did so many leave it to the last minute?

Still - they should have been able to register up to the deadline.

I think your user name says it all hurry. You like to do things ahead of time, other people work to deadlines,,

surely the powers that be should have taken steps to ensure that the systems were still up and running for the last two hours before the deadline

True. But experience should tell us it was unlikely.

I moved in February, I re-registered when I moved. But DP only just managed to get his postal vote sorted out, silly bugger left it til the last minute (actually he missed the deadline by a day but they registered him anyway).

I think it's bizarre, we just had elections a couple of weeks ago that will make a bigger difference to our day to day lives over the next few years than brexit. Credit rating is affected by not being on the electoral roll. For me it's part of things to do when I move.

Not everywhere had elections in May, and some people will have moved since then anyway.

I have always registered as I moved too, but I care deeply about the right to vote. Other women died for me to have it so I cherish that right.

I don't think it is reasonable to compare being unable to register for sports tickets 9 to being disenfranchised.

I don't agree with the OP.
Anyone who is eligible to vote and registers within the deadline should get to vote. They should not have to plan for a failure of the State IT systems. If the National Authorities fail to make the registration system available for the full registration period then it is the National Authorities that are at fault for breaching the deadline.

In an ideal world people would be more organised (I already have my polling card) but people shouldn't be discouraged or barred from engaging with the democratic process, no matter how late in the day, due to IT problems.

The more people who get involved and want to vote, whatever their vote, the better it is for democracy.

very coinfusing it was this time round though

being told u have to register then some people stil thought it was the old rules where if one person was they all were

it hasnt been made very clear i dont think

I wasn't comparing being unable to register for sports tickets to being disenfranchised, Liiinooo - I was making the point that, as an adult, I left something to the last moment, didn't get what I wanted, and had to suck it up.

And if voting is so damn important to people, they should have registered long before the deadline! As I said, it's not as if we haven't been reminded over and over again that we need to register to vote.

Maybe we should only allow organised people to vote. We don't want any messy leave it to the last minute voters making decisions about the country. They should accept that the organised know what's best for them and crawl back under their duvets.

In fact it would be much tidier if I voted on behalf of everyone. Who needs democracy...the dictatorship of the organised is much neater.

Lurking, you make a good point but you could also argue that experience has shown that large numbers of people will leave it to the last minute to register so you should ensure that the systems can deal with high traffic. As someone said above, Facebook etc. have systems which can deal with large numbers of users all using the site at the same time.

I did some temp work last year for our council collecting voter details. Every household was contacted by mail at least once, then had a call in person if they hadn't replied, if they weren't there a card was left so it's not as if people haven't been made aware of the need to register individually.

On a side not I had quite a few who refused to register/couldn't be bothered/thought it was a government trick and a few who were incredibly rude - it was any eye opening experience that's for sure!

hmmm

So you would have to do it yesterday if you turned 18 or if you moved house.

There are 70,000000 people in the country...so I reckon about 4000 people turned 18 yesterday and about 20,000 people moved house yesterday...

So that's quite a lot of people who didn't have the chance to do it earlier...

(maths debunking welcome!)

Voter registration changed where its now on the individual to make sure they are registered.

Before one person could register the whole house now its individually meaning a lot of 18yos don't know that they are registered etc

In fact its been a month since the local elections...so I reckon about 600,000 people have moved since the last election - which is a largish chunk of the number (re)registering....and if you factor in that many people can't be arsed with local elections, its been a year since the last general election so maybe as many as 6 million people have moved house since then....

If the Brexit vote is so unimportant to you that you leave it to the last minute to register, then it can't be that important!

However they should extend the deadline by a day or two as the website crashed because of dickheads late registration

Lurking, you make a good point but you could also argue that experience has shown that large numbers of people will leave it to the last minute to register so you should ensure that the systems can deal with high traffic. As someone said above, Facebook etc. have systems which can deal with large numbers of users all using the site at the same time.

That was me.

Again, I totally agree. But given that no UK government IT project has ever delivered a working system, on time and within budget, I'd say you were hoping against hope.

In other news, all IT firms contracted by the UK government have racked up enormous profits for their ex MP shareholders.

UK government IT projects are so toxic that the government has been forced to pay firms to tender, or there would have been no takers.

In other news, the Swiss tunnel (never been done before) was completed on time, within budget and (as of this posting) is still doing it's job.

It's like the people who leave trying to submit their tax return to 11.55pm on 31st January then whine when they get a fine.

I leave everything till the the last minute (home wise not work) some people are just like that.

But they still tried to register with in the time frame.
No one warned anyone that if you try and register on the last day. You might crash the site resulting in you not getting the vote.

I mean if people didn't try and register until today, past the deadline and they were pissing and moaning. I'd say it was their fault.