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VOTING


In a recent Radio Four documentary Adrian Chiles discovered that some 18 million adults did not vote in the UK 2017 election. If we explore the figures for 2019 we discover this figure has grown to 21.6 million or 40.4% of the 18 to 85+ population. These statistics also indicate that there were 7.6 million more non voters than conservative supporters.


The percentage poll figures quoted to justify the government’s mandate are calculated from the number of people who have voted. If we consider the non voters we find that rather than the 43.6% of the vote, the Tories have support from just 26% of UK adults.


Adding together the votes of the main parties we also find that 53% voted for Remain parties.


Most of the non voters are young or the very poor who feel that politics is just too complicated, they may have little faith in politicians or they ‘think their vote won’t count’. There are also some who, for their own reasons, are ‘keeping under the radar’ but there are others, perhaps less poor, who simply feel they are too busy or their constituency outcome is a forgone conclusion.


Ben Page CEO of the Ipsos Mori poling company adds that ‘because these people don’t vote they don’t matter’. Politicians appear to have little interest in them because they have no affect on their political lives. However  in a truly democratic society surely we have a duty to ensure that all citizens understand the political process and are involved in the selection of the MPs who govern our society.


Sources - BBC Radio 4, BBC Website, Wikipedia, Agediscrimination.info


18 - 85 + adults 53,409,606

Registered voters  47,587,254

Votes cast  31,829,630

Non voters 21,579,976

Tory voters 13,966,565


Main Remain parties  16,657,952 [52.9%]

Main Brexit inc DUP 14,852,996

1,804,956  more for remain parties