There was an internet campaign by the Government showing people the importance of voting, how to register, even a 3D mock up of a polling booth showing you how to put your cross. The politicians, all of them, said ‘make sure you vote’. The celebrities were pulled out. Some bloggers even made a video with Bucks Fizz singing ‘Making your mind up’.
Even the Electoral Commission helped the publicity, saying ‘Make sure nothing stops you voting’.
And the call was answered: hundreds of thousands of people registered for the first time.
Now we learn that many of them were disenfranchised. It seems that the returning officers, although knowing the numbers registered to vote, didn’t supply enough staff. People queued for hours at the polling station – Good grief! At the last election we’d have prayed for such a thing – and at 10pm were turned away, their democratic rights chucked in the gutter like an empty hamburger box.
Good bloody Grief.
What sort of message does this send out to first time voters, wary that their vote wouldn’t change things, but persuaded to be part of the system? What does it say to the rest of the world? There were observers there from Kenya for God’s sake, what story have they brought back?
We need the following: a quick report (not one of those £20m investigations designed to sweep the thing under the carpet for five years) and we need some heads to roll. Any Returning Officer who did not supply enough staff so that the numbers wanting to vote – and they knew the numbers – could do so before 10pm needs to be sacked, and publicly.
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