There was also the Glenrothes election where the list of voters disappeared.
CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Debate!
VOTE BIKE
(107 posts)-
Posted 9 years ago #
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@Steveo were the Adder Party standing on your ballot paper by any chance? Sounds a bit like 4 voters and 16,472 votes for Baldrick.
Posted 9 years ago # -
@chdot - If you're registered for a postal vote, your details aren't on the list at the polling station...
...as the chap in front of me found out yesterday.
During the exchange, I learned that if you haven't used your postal vote you can bring it to the polling station and it will be counted.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Got to add, though, that when you see what's going on in Ukraine I am immensely proud of the civilised activity that is voting in the UK. I like the fact that it's based on trust and that it just works.
(Falkirk and stuffed postal ballots notwithstanding)
Posted 9 years ago # -
"If you're registered for a postal vote, your details aren't on the list at the polling station..."
OK, thanks.
Hadn't realised that part was so well organised!
Posted 9 years ago # -
A friend was nearly disenfranchised yesterday by applying for a postal vote for September. He was told "you know you're too late for May", and he said that was OK as he was around in May, but discovered at the polling station that he was down for a postal vote this time too...
A hurried phone conversation between the polling officers got him sorted out with a ballot paper in person.
Robert
Posted 9 years ago # -
kaputnik, I suspect if there are any more than 100 votes cast at my polling station alarm bells will be rung!
Posted 9 years ago # -
"During the exchange, I learned that if you haven't used your postal vote you can bring it to the polling station and it will be counted."
Last time I voted, the officials seemed very baffled by my request. This time, the first sign I saw on entering the polling station was a direction to give any postal ballots to booth 1.
(I ask for a postal ballot just in case, but realised last time that it meant the kids didn't get to see the polling stations etc, which i thought was important for them. so have dropped in the ballot each time, with child accompanying me)
Posted 9 years ago # -
"(I ask for a postal ballot just in case, but realised last time that it meant the kids didn't get to see the polling stations etc, which i thought was important for them. so have dropped in the ballot each time, with child accompanying me)"
My parents always took me and my brothers from a very young age with them to vote. Speaking to others it seems to be quite a common way to instil the importance of voting and it appears to work.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Besides it had the wean's red bike protecting it.
East of the Campsies, it's 'bairn' or 'wee yun'. Definitely not the western contraction 'wean' (usually drawled 'wayne').
Posted 9 years ago # -
"None of my prospective MEP's have bothered to engage with me during the campaign. I've had no info through the door except from UKIP who certainly won't be getting a vote, so I'm just not going to engage with them by giving my vote."
First of all, you might want to speak to the Royal Mail about that - every party is entitled to have one leaflet delivered free by them, and all the bigger parties take that up. You ought to have had a mailing from all of them.
Second, each party has 6 candidates. There are nearly 2 million households in Scotland. How are they supposed to get round every door, exactly?
So you could ask, well, why doesn't an activist come instead. How many activists do you think the parties have?
Because the fact is, even the biggest party in Scotland, the SNP, has nowhere near enough activists to get round more than a very small fraction of households during an election campaign. In fact, they have so few that they can't even try - they do their canvassing outside of election cmapaigns, along with blanket leaflet and newsletter drops, and during campaigns they target their identified support. They haven't got the people to do any more than that.
Then there's the number of elections. Euros, UK, Scottish, local, and referendum too. It's a huge drain.
Sorry, but one way to guarantee annoying me is when someone who sits on their backsides and does nothing to improve the state of their democracy or to get their voice heard moans about no-one courting their vote. There's a small number of dedicated people who are juggling work and family and everything else we have in life, and on top of that putting in countless, thankless hours to promote their cause, and if it's not good enough for you then you could always get out and give them a hand. They might even listen to your opinions.
Posted 9 years ago # -
@bax "this i do (if there is no GREEN candidate), but its better to cast a blank vote instead of actively spoiling the paper, as they have to actually count the blank votes.
http://www.blankvote.org.uk/blank_votes_count.html"
Not true, I'm afraid. there is no requirement to seperately declare blank votes. Here's an example from West Lothian's declaration in 2011:
http://www.westlothian.gov.uk/media/downloaddoc/1799465/2289876/SPResults2011Posted 9 years ago # -
@gembo "I tried to level the playing field as lottery millions meant SNP had two placards to every one else's one."
It's almost certain those boards were handmade from cheap wood by someone in the SNP years ago, and a few nights ago some poor If you're registered for a postal vote, your details aren't on the list at the polling station...b* was up till the wee hours pasting the posters onto them.
Those A-boards would have been put out by someone who drove round every polling station in the constituency (at his/her own expense) at 6am, and who will be back round after 10pm to pick them all up.
The effect at grassroots level of the Weir's money is that we don't need to do fundraising, which means we have more time for campaigning. We also don't need to buy materials from HQ, we get them for free. And that's it. The idea that we are awash with money is laughable.
For years Labour outspent every party in Scotland at elections with money from HQ in London. They have never been self-sufficient in cash. It seems that this history has given them an inflated sense of entitlement when it comes to spending in elections.
But if it made you feel better to push over someone else's A-boards, you go right ahead. Fight the powers that be, bro.
Personally, I've put up thousands of lamp-post posters and put out hundreds of A-boards, and I would always treat the stuff from other parties with respect, because I know they're out doing all that work for nothing for the same reasons I am.
Posted 9 years ago # -
...and last post for now. Great thread BTW.
@wee folding bike "There was also the Glenrothes election where the list of voters disappeared.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glenrothes_by-election,_2008"
It was the marked up register that disappeared. This is what the people in the polling station mark you off on when they give you a ballot paper. This is then made available to all the parties after the election.
If you knew that the marked-up register was going to go missing, then, so long as one person had access to ballot papers, it would take no more than 2 or 3 people to rig an entire election in a constituency. So if you had three guys - one working at Kirckadly Sheriff Court, and a couple at Fife Council, you could fix the whole thing.
It's also worth noting that the table at which the postal votes were being counted at the Glenrothes count was at the head of the hall and not available to scrutineers from any of the parties. I've seen Fife Council's map of the hall layout and spoken to people who were there.
I am not for a second saying anything fishy happened. But things like this need to be watched very, very closely. The way I know our elections are fair is because people from all parties get to see all the steps in the process and if anyone say anything dodgy they'd scream blue murder. That wasn't possible at Glenrothes.
And don't get me started on 2007...
Posted 9 years ago # -
Not true, I'm afraid
ach... back to mickey mouse drawings it is, then
Posted 9 years ago # -
FWIW I strongly believe there should be a "none of the above" option, or at a minimum some way of marking a non-vote or abstention that doesn't lump you in with the numpties who put crosses against multiple candidates and other daft mistakes.
My favourites are the people who sign it.
Posted 9 years ago # -
While we're on the subject of nuclear ("it's pronounced nuke-u-lar")
No, it's pronounced "nu-kle-ar"! Only George Bush and Tony Blair say "nuke-u-lar" - say no more...
Posted 9 years ago #
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