13 Comments

• Vicky Syred 10th Oct '11 - 10:10am

  Wow, just wow. There’s someone in complete denial about his own’s party in Government. Yep, he criticises Tony Blair for chucking out Labour ideologies but he says this about the Tories:

  expect the Tory counter-attack to be vicious, not surprisingly since the Tory party has no ideology or sense of purpose other than to hang on to their power and wealth at any cost

  So Labour wasn’t clinging to power when they were in government? News to me.

  There is no justification for the bill, since every decade the Boundary Commission already re-draws the constituences to try to equalise their numbers and did so less than 5 years ago. The only rationale is to fiddle a gain over Labour by administrative legerdemain, gerrymandering pure and simple.

  Right, so Labour never tweaked with the borders to get advantage over the Tories? Odd that, considering that my own ward, Bassett, was moved into a different constituency because it was too Tory so threatened a safe Labour seat. Happily for me, in the next bi-election for our new constituency, Sandra Gidley took the seat.

  Next they intend to force through a reduction in political donations to no more than £50,000 apiece and maybe less. Same tactic, an administrative wheeze to hit Labour harder than themselves by cutting off large-scale union donations.

  My, my, my, I’m laughing so much my sides are almost splitting. Surely he’s not suggesting it’s a good thing for Labour to be in the pockets of the unions? Rather than moaning it would threaten the sway the unions have on his party, shouldn’t he be trying to work out how to diversify the appeal of the party? Also, should he not be celebrating that this means the amount the Tories can raise from each of their business donors would also be restricted?

  Mark: Yeah, you’re right, he’s expressing his ire about “individual electoral registration” without explaining why the legislation may be a problem, which is that it would no longer be compulsory to register to vote. Actually – what’s currently in place to deal with those who don’t register to vote under the current system?

• Dan Falchikov 10th Oct '11 - 11:18am

  It’s not just over voter registration that Mr Meacher appears to be somewhat confused.

  He writes: ‘destructive consequences of a deeply unjust capitalist system’ – I assume by ‘unjust capitalist’ he means the sort of person who owns multiple properties while overseeing a rise in homelessness…

• Stephen W 10th Oct '11 - 12:32pm

  What’s that you say? Labour party massive, dishonest hypocrites. Surely not.

• g 10th Oct '11 - 2:16pm

  I think the issue is more that this registration reform is being tied to the redrawing of the boundaries in a way that effectively means the changes are, to Labour eyes, a massive gerrymandering effort by the Tories. Indeed Lib Dems should be concerned that those most disenfranchised by poverty, disability or social circumstance are already the least likely to vote, and under the Coalition’s proposals will be even less likely to do so in the future. They also tend not to vote Tory.

  Still, why address the issues when you can chuck personal abuse at an opposition politician?

• Geoffrey Payne 10th Oct '11 - 8:36pm

  I do not know if Michael Meacher is hypocritical over this or not, but it does bother me that this is being introduced. Wouldn’t it be better to judge the issue on it’s merits rather than point score over an opposition politician? It is yet another bias in the system that favours the Tories, so why are we supporting it? Surely MPs have to represent all their constituents, not just those who are registered?

• Alex Macfie 10th Oct '11 - 9:07pm

  Geoffrey: We are discussing the issue on its merits. From a liberal point of view, individual electoral registration is an excellent idea, because it helps ensure that the right people are on the electoral role, in both directions:
  — it ensures that all individuals in a household get the opportunity to register. In other words, registration is not in the hands of the “head of the household”. Therefore, others in the household are not disenfranchised becasue the householder doesn’t want them to be able to vote. It also prevents the situation where non-resident landlords themselves at the address, and withhold the form from the actual residents.
  — it makes it harder to register non-existent voters. Under the current system, I could write that Mr Michael Mouse and Mr & Mrs Donald & Daisy Duck lived with me in my flat, sign the form and send it off, and these “people” would be registered as voters, so I have 4 votes for the price of one. If each individual has to sign their own registration form, it’s much more likely that the people on the electoral roll are actual voters.

  It’s Labour who are point-scoring on this issue, given that it was the last Labour government that started the ball rolling on individual registration. I suspect that there are also elements in the Labour party who do not wish to lose the opportunity to “vote early and vote often” that the current household registration system provides.

• Alex Macfie 10th Oct '11 - 9:11pm

  The only concern I have with the current proposal is that it is for voluntary registration, rather than making it compulsory. But even so, it is still an improvement on the current system, which puts people’s right to vote in the hands of their landlord or head of the household.

• Mark Pack 10th Oct '11 - 10:20pm

  Geoff: If you look back to my post on the subject yesterday (on individual registration) and the one last week (with my response to the government’s consultation), they both talk about the merits of the proposal. I don’t see why in addition to talking about the merits, we shouldn’t also point out the hypocrisy of some of the claims being made by Labour?

• Andy Dowland 11th Oct '11 - 7:08am

  @Mark

  As g has pointed out, making voter registration more time-consuming at the same time as having a policy of redrawing the constituency boundaries every five years on the basis of registered voters is the argument Michael Meacher is making.

  Being in support of policy A, but not of policy A & B being introduced together does not make someone a hypocrite.

• Mark Pack 11th Oct '11 - 8:13am

  Andy: Except that isn’t what Michael Meacher says in his piece. Those phrases I quoted are all directed only at individual electoral registration. If he really meant something different from what he wrote, shouldn’t he have written something different (or at the very least responded on either of the two occasions I’ve contacted him to say ‘I didn’t write that right’)? If the view you expressed is your own personal – fair enough – but it’s not the view that Meacher has publicly expressed.

• g 11th Oct '11 - 5:16pm

  Hi Mark, given that Nick Clegg has now decided that the registration, as proposed, is flawed will you change your mind? Or do you think Nick Clegg is wrong, and your argument still stands?

• Mark Pack 11th Oct '11 - 5:38pm

  G: If you look back to the blog post that has my own response to the government consultation, you’ll see that I didn’t agree with all of the proposals (and that’s a point I’ve made on more than one occasion). Nick Clegg’s announcement today addresses the main point I’ve criticised, so although I doubt he had me personally in mind when he talked about “others” who had commented so far, his response was worded as if he had 🙂

• Andy Dowland 11th Oct '11 - 6:07pm

  @Mark

  Many thanks for taking the time to respond. For the avoidance of any doubt, I’m not Michael Meacher and I wouldn’t seek to speak for what he meant, but it looks clear to me.

  Here’s what the Labour Manifesto 2010 says:
  “We have already legislated to enable the individual registration of voters. We will now act, legislating further if necessary, to end the unacceptable situation where three million eligible voters cannot vote because they are not registered to do so.”

  The Conservative Manifesto 2010 says:
  “We will swiftly implement individual voter registration, giving everyone the right to cast their vote in person and making it easier for UK citizens living overseas to vote.”

  So Labour’s promising to implement individual registration if it’s going to get the three million eligible voters that aren’t on the electoral register to be registered. The Tory plan is to bring in individual voter registration in order to increase the number that are disenfranchised for partisan reasons. It’s not hypocrisy to point that out.