Should it be the law that everyone has to vote?

[Constellationsofmyheart]

Interesting local election results in my city with no overall majority.

Turnout typically very low for the local elections.

It’s got me thinking, should it be law that everyone has to vote?

A lot of people are very disillusioned with politics and a lot just don’t understand or don’t know who to vote for therefore they just don’t bother.

That means that a minority are making decisions for the majority.

If everyone had to vote then people might be more inclined to do their research, but at least everyone would have their say.

No. Not everyone has to be so obsessed with politics as you.

I am in Oz and we have to vote or get a fine. It works quite well, the polls are open for a few days so everyone has plenty of time to rock up and tick a box. Or spoil their vote if they want.

You are not alone in that...

No

I'm 35 and have never been interested in politics, I know nothing about it. If voting was compulsory I would just be voting for someone random I know nothing about

I prefer people having the freedom of choice, but I can understand why people might feel it should be compulsory.

If it were made compulsory, though, then I think that voting should be made more convenient. Instead of people having to make their way to a polling booth, I think there should be an option to vote online from your computer/phone. (I realise you need photo ID, but a number of online things require photo ID.) They could make it so that there's a way to vote with less effort.

It is where I live.

However, in general I don't believe in compulsory voting. It leads to stupid votes.

No, some people don't follow politics and haven't a clue about the policies of any party. Source - some people I spoke to yesterday who didn't bother.

They have this in Australia and its a real nuisance. I know people who who went to vote but the queues were hours long meaning they did not have the time to vote Then had to waste extra time later explaing why they did not vote in order not to be fined.

They think the idea is stupid.

So long as there is an option to tick ‘none of the above’ then I would support compulsory voting. It makes me very angry when people complain about their local council or the government and it then turns out that they didn’t bother to vote. Unless you take the trouble to vote, or spoil your ballot paper, you lose the right ro complain.

@herbalteabag At least 60% didn’t vote yesterday.

It IS very easy to vote without going to a polling station. I’ve had a postal vote for the last ten years so can drop it into a post box at a convenient time several days before the election.

Ive never heard of anyone in Australia saying it's stupid. And the queues IOO cant recall as being any more arduous than the ones at Aldi on pay day.

Voting happens on a Saturday. There is a complete festival atmosphere with usually a sausage sizzle run by local charities and face painting and all sorts outside the polling booth. You can postal vote beforehand if you are working / shift working or away.

I used to be very involved in elections in Australia. here it's all a bit of a nothing in comparison.

Oh sorry, I quoted the wrong person.

Not without a public referendum. Compulsory voting has to come from the people, not the politicians - otherwise, it’s a level of authoritarianism that most countries don’t want.

Yeah.... the UK needs more Democracy Sausage.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy_sausage

I have (several times) not voted in GEs. I refuse to vote for an incompetent liar, whatever the colour of the rosette on their jacket.

I'd rather see the need for people to pass a basic intelligence and general knowledge test and answer some comprehension and inference questions... let's say score more than 20 on an episode of Mastermind... you've got to joke about this haven't you? This is where democracy fails... as it has in the US where any candidate can throw a handful of seeds on the floor and all the hens come running - it's that easy to win the vote of some people!

@mmmarmalade Do you mean 20 in the general knowledge questions on MM? They don’t get 20 questions on that. 20 questions on politics and economics, maybe! It’s a huge issue that we have far too many gullible, ill-informed people with no critical thinking skills or even common sense! Far too
many are reactionary and angry to understand anything!

Terrible idea. Authoritarianism. People have the right to vote and not vote and are free to choose. How will you enforce this? Make sure nobody goes on holiday? Or leaves town? Or has a long shift? Enforce mandatory universal postal voting which is open to corruption and fraud?

Do you think the people who won't vote now are going to suddenly become engaged politically cogniscent sensibles? Oh come on.

I think it should be illegal to complain about politics if you haven’t voted.

Australia and other countries manage. They have a more flexible voting system though - so you can vote eg near work or (big places) in work, postal vote (gets round holidays, infirmity) and, because it's mandatory, people make a thing of it - in certain areas in Sydney, for instance, locals provide snacks/drinks. As for "not interested in politics, would just vote for random candidate" - that would likely randomise itself out across people who don't value their vote, but potentially only if we went for a form of PR rather than FPTP.

No, I don't think it should be compulsory even though I ALWAYS vote (and have had a postal vote for decades to mitigate against me not being able to get to the Polling Station). I think it is really important to vote.

I really liked the campaign they had a few years ago, where people were filmed in the pub or at the supermarket or at the bus stop talking about everyday grumbles (licensing hours, or the running of buses etc) and the point was to demonstrate that almost everything that effects all of our lives is politics, and therefore everyone should have an opinion and vote.

That said, I've no idea how it would work in reality without there being any party bias, but I can't help thinking it would be good if you had to answer a couple of really simple questions to demonstrate you understood the choices and what you were actually voting for. It really is scary just how ignorant of policies so many people are, and, indeed even the fact that (in our area at least) you were voting for local Councillors and it is nothing to do with MPs, and National Government.
One of my adult dc worked at a Polling station and really had their eyes opened by some of the General public.

I always vote, in every election but compulsory voting would be expensive to administer, it would need a whole system of checks and fines and collections.

If we want more people to vote then you need to get young people voting and establish it as a habit.

My DC have been voting since they were 16. Neither of them could make it home this time to vote in our constituency and went out of their way to make sure they had a postal vote.

Perhaps if everyone had to vote it would be easier to educate people as it would become something people are forced to be interested in and think about.

How would it be expensive to administer?

People are on the electoral roll and are ticked when they turn up at the station, as happens right now. So, addresses are known. Then a fine is issued - i would imagine it would be along the lines of difficulty as administering a parking fine.