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Should the age for voting be lowered?
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"There are fresh calls for the age for being able to vote in the UK to be lowered to 16. The campaigners for the move say that youngsters feel disenfranchised by the current political climate and that, with an ageing population, the pensioner bracket will become the most powerful voting block in UK elections. It is also argued that someone over 16 but under 18 can take a bullet for their country but not vote on who governs it. 6 of the first 100 soldiers to die in Afghanistan were too young to have ever taken part in an election. Should 16y/o's be allowed to vote?" no - They shouldn't be out fighting wars either. Are you sure they can Wishy? | |||
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"There are fresh calls for the age for being able to vote in the UK to be lowered to 16. The campaigners for the move say that youngsters feel disenfranchised by the current political climate and that, with an ageing population, the pensioner bracket will become the most powerful voting block in UK elections. It is also argued that someone over 16 but under 18 can take a bullet for their country but not vote on who governs it. 6 of the first 100 soldiers to die in Afghanistan were too young to have ever taken part in an election. Should 16y/o's be allowed to vote? no - They shouldn't be out fighting wars either. Are you sure they can Wishy?" The info I posted above as lifted from the BBC website. The young men in Afghanistan that died were 17y/os. I'm not sure about the law on sending 16y/o troops out to fight, I would imagine that basic training would take up most of the year between 16 and 17 so it's probably just a matter of time elapsed from joining the army to completing basic that prevents them going out to warzones before they are 17. I'm assuming this of course. To throw another argument into the mix against lowering the age it might be said that at 16 a person is old enough to hold a gun and pull it's trigger but with regard to matters more intricate like politics a 16y/o doesn't possess the maturity of thought to cast a vote with the due diligence neccessary to the issues that trouble the country and to intelligently decide who is best equipped to solve these problems. | |||
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They should ban postal votes
Candidates must have proper links to the constituency (no parachutes, no women's lists or any lists really)
Local newspapers must publish the MP/WAM/SAM/MEP etc activities (respect to security, but not to be used to hide things) so we can see what they do, say and vote etc
You must present yourself to the polling station, (Mobility, carers, all sorts of laws and benefits, so not a real issue).
Remove the party names and only have the candidates names, if you don't know the candidates name then...how do you know them?
The polling day should be a national holiday, no excuse for going.
And finally, if you don't vote, don't moan
PS, to those who want, 'none of the above', what if they won, who is the government??????????????
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"They should not lower the age, they should be looking at reducing who can vote
They should ban postal votes
Candidates must have proper links to the constituency (no parachutes, no women's lists or any lists really)
Local newspapers must publish the MP/WAM/SAM/MEP etc activities (respect to security, but not to be used to hide things) so we can see what they do, say and vote etc
You must present yourself to the polling station, (Mobility, carers, all sorts of laws and benefits, so not a real issue).
Remove the party names and only have the candidates names, if you don't know the candidates name then...how do you know them?
The polling day should be a national holiday, no excuse for going.
And finally, if you don't vote, don't moan
PS, to those who want, 'none of the above', what if they won, who is the government??????????????
"I want the "none of the above" option added to the ballot! That way I can vote all of the corrupt money grubbing pigs out! | |||
"....I want the "none of the above" option added to the ballot! That way I can vote all of the corrupt money grubbing pigs out! " The traditional way for 'none of the above' is to stay at home, but then you can't moan, as you didn't vote. I'm sure that many of them are first class representatives  | |||
"There are fresh calls for the age for being able to vote in the UK to be lowered to 16. The campaigners for the move say that youngsters feel disenfranchised by the current political climate and that, with an ageing population, the pensioner bracket will become the most powerful voting block in UK elections. It is also argued that someone over 16 but under 18 can take a bullet for their country but not vote on who governs it. 6 of the first 100 soldiers to die in Afghanistan were too young to have ever taken part in an election. Should 16y/o's be allowed to vote?" Speaking as someone who's son is joining the Royal Marines at the moment, these kids are not allowed to see active service now until they are 18. I personally wouldn't want people who have had no real experience of the realities of life to be choosing who governs us.  | |||
"There are fresh calls for the age for being able to vote in the UK to be lowered to 16. The campaigners for the move say that youngsters feel disenfranchised by the current political climate and that, with an ageing population, the pensioner bracket will become the most powerful voting block in UK elections. It is also argued that someone over 16 but under 18 can take a bullet for their country but not vote on who governs it. 6 of the first 100 soldiers to die in Afghanistan were too young to have ever taken part in an election. Should 16y/o's be allowed to vote?" what difference would it make ? the system at the moment means that all you can do is shift from labour to conservative , and then back again even then the only seats that make a difference are the "marginals" and even if you change the power base from labour to conservative , the same old faces are there on both sides of the house and if the labour party are in opposition , and the conservatives have a small majority ( as expected ) you can have more power in opposition than if your in power , as its too easy to pick holes in any ideas the other side comes up with and make them look twats what with that and worst of all the UNELECTED monarchy being in overall control of proceedings , they have the whole thing sewn up like a box of kippers the amount of MP.s that retire after a number of years , that are NOT milliono **king aires can be counted on the fingers of one hand so to worry about 16 to 18 year olds voting is just giving oxygen , and importance to the biggest farce in history that people who vote can make a difference what a joke | |||
"what difference would it make ? the system at the moment means that all you can do is shift from labour to conservative , and then back again even then the only seats that make a difference are the "marginals" and even if you change the power base from labour to conservative , the same old faces are there on both sides of the house and if the labour party are in opposition , and the conservatives have a small majority ( as expected ) you can have more power in opposition than if your in power , as its too easy to pick holes in any ideas the other side comes up with and make them look twats what with that and worst of all the UNELECTED monarchy being in overall control of proceedings , they have the whole thing sewn up like a box of kippers the amount of MP.s that retire after a number of years , that are NOT milliono **king aires can be counted on the fingers of one hand so to worry about 16 to 18 year olds voting is just giving oxygen , and importance to the biggest farce in history that people who vote can make a difference what a joke " Of course it makes a difference!
If there wasn't a voting system to see who was in Government to tell us what we should, or more often, shouldn't be doing then they would all be 'UNELECTED' and there would be more people moaning about that than just the Monarchy being there!
If you don't like the system then don't vote and if you don't vote don't moan about who is elected into Government, not really rocket science is it!
Those are my views and I am sticking to them | |||
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"well me personally i think they should be allowed to vote. not all teenagers are granny mugging buckfast drinkin knife weilding wee neds there are some sensible ones around! the government that gets elected in this time for someone who is 16 will be there for 4 years at a time that is crucial to them regarding education, health, welfare etc so they should be able to have a say thats if they choose to use the right to vote xx" OK so if you give 16 yo's the vote are you also willing to lower the age at which they can join the regular armed forces and be sent to die on active duty, placed in adult prisons ect? Remember that if you reduce the voting age you also reduce the age of majority making 16yo’s adults and have adult duties and responsibilities. | |||
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"well me personally i think they should be allowed to vote. not all teenagers are granny mugging buckfast drinkin knife weilding wee neds there are some sensible ones around! the government that gets elected in this time for someone who is 16 will be there for 4 years at a time that is crucial to them regarding education, health, welfare etc so they should be able to have a say thats if they choose to use the right to vote xx OK so if you give 16 yo's the vote are you also willing to lower the age at which they can join the regular armed forces and be sent to die on active duty, placed in adult prisons ect? Remember that if you reduce the voting age you also reduce the age of majority making 16yo’s adults and have adult duties and responsibilities. " Oh well spotted. | |||
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"I don’t think that we think they are stupid, I think we know that they are a mass of raging hormones that have them rebelling against everything. As for the idea of having them serve in active duty units at 16, why stop there? Let’s drop the voting age to 14 or 13, maybe 10 or 12, after all they can read and of course carry a gun, all we need to do is let them have a vote and we too can have child soldiers. Maybe we should be thinking of rising the voting age to 21 again and giving our young people more time to mature rather than forcing them to grow up younger. Just a thought. " I do agree with you I think 21 should be the legal age to vote, drink, marry, enlist etc, give them time to become grown ups But not all young people think politics is a waste of time It isnt and its the only system we have so until we find a better one, we have to go with this one | |||
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"what difference would it make ? the system at the moment means that all you can do is shift from labour to conservative , and then back again even then the only seats that make a difference are the "marginals" and even if you change the power base from labour to conservative , the same old faces are there on both sides of the house and if the labour party are in opposition , and the conservatives have a small majority ( as expected ) you can have more power in opposition than if your in power , as its too easy to pick holes in any ideas the other side comes up with and make them look twats what with that and worst of all the UNELECTED monarchy being in overall control of proceedings , they have the whole thing sewn up like a box of kippers the amount of MP.s that retire after a number of years , that are NOT milliono **king aires can be counted on the fingers of one hand so to worry about 16 to 18 year olds voting is just giving oxygen , and importance to the biggest farce in history that people who vote can make a difference what a joke Of course it makes a difference!
If there wasn't a voting system to see who was in Government to tell us what we should, or more often, shouldn't be doing then they would all be 'UNELECTED' and there would be more people moaning about that than just the Monarchy being there!
If you don't like the system then don't vote and if you don't vote don't moan about who is elected into Government, not really rocket science is it!
Those are my views and I am sticking to them "Sounds reasonable to me! | |||
"But not all young people think politics is a waste of time It isnt and its the only system we have so until we find a better one, we have to go with this one " Absolutely! I grew up in a politically active family, my father was a very active Irish Catholic Nationalist Tory anti union right wing bigot, my mother was a died in the wool Irish nationalist pro union socialist, our best family friends were a Labour party councillor who’s husband was a union leader, an Orange Order black grand master + a Conservative speaker of the house and a quite senior Labour backbencher. Seeing all these “enemies” together most of the time (except elections) and listening to them discussing current affairs and politics was wonderful, I was very privileged to grow up in such an atmosphere and it gave me a true insight into the workings of our country. I believe that politics should be taught in schools to all, so that everyone understands exactly how important it is, and how the system works. | |||
"IF and i say IF people are going to vote then they should have to answer , by ticking about 5 boxes the answer to questions of a political nature to assertain they are competent to vote at the time of polling if the answers are correct there vote goes foward for counting , if not there vote is void that way you could vote at 4 years old and be counted , or vote at 60 and not be counted personnaly i will not vote as after looking at the system with open eyes , and a modicum of intelligence over the last 40 years have come to the conclussion its all a joke you can vote for an MP for the sole reason that you want a by pass for your town , and when he is elected , and the time comes for him to vote on that bypass he votes the other way because he is told to do so by the WHIP , who are doing a deal with the lib dems over another issue the bypass was the biggest thing on your mind so even though that MP was going to push for things you DID NOT want you voted for them anyway so all you ended up with was to be tripple foocked you can tripple fook me once , but you wont do it twice some might say that if you dont vote there is nothing you can do to change things and you will have to lump it or like it well nelson mandela never voted , but he made a difference , he went on to become the president of the country so the proof is there written in history for all to see that you dont need to vote to make a difference those that suggest otherwise just make themselves look like the straw man in the wizard of oz" And pray tell this 'Straw Man' how Nelson Mandela became President? Did they, by chance, change the system that was in place at the time to allow him to be VOTED into power
History is changed by people voting in other people to make the changes!
I am upping my status to 'The Wizard' now lol | |||
"They should ban postal votes " This isn't about how people can vote, it's about whether under 18s can vote at all, but as you've raised the subject I'll mention this: I work away from home and as elections are always on a Thursday I would never be able to make it home in time to vote which means that unless I can vote via post I won't be able to vote at all. You stated that election day should be a national holiday so that everyone can vote without excuse - which would solve my particular dilemma - but then I'd have to travel umpteen miles back to wherever it is I'm working almost immediately after casting my vote. And what about by-elections? Should they be a holiday too? | |||
"But not all young people think politics is a waste of time It isnt and its the only system we have so until we find a better one, we have to go with this one Absolutely! I grew up in a politically active family, my father was a very active Irish Catholic Nationalist Tory anti union right wing bigot, my mother was a died in the wool Irish nationalist pro union socialist, our best family friends were a Labour party councillor who’s husband was a union leader, an Orange Order black grand master + a Conservative speaker of the house and a quite senior Labour backbencher. Seeing all these “enemies” together most of the time (except elections) and listening to them discussing current affairs and politics was wonderful, I was very privileged to grow up in such an atmosphere and it gave me a true insight into the workings of our country. I believe that politics should be taught in schools to all, so that everyone understands exactly how important it is, and how the system works. " well said that man | |||
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"IF and i say IF people are going to vote then they should have to answer , by ticking about 5 boxes the answer to questions of a political nature to assertain they are competent to vote at the time of polling if the answers are correct there vote goes foward for counting , if not there vote is void that way you could vote at 4 years old and be counted , or vote at 60 and not be counted personnaly i will not vote as after looking at the system with open eyes , and a modicum of intelligence over the last 40 years have come to the conclussion its all a joke you can vote for an MP for the sole reason that you want a by pass for your town , and when he is elected , and the time comes for him to vote on that bypass he votes the other way because he is told to do so by the WHIP , who are doing a deal with the lib dems over another issue the bypass was the biggest thing on your mind so even though that MP was going to push for things you DID NOT want you voted for them anyway so all you ended up with was to be tripple foocked you can tripple fook me once , but you wont do it twice some might say that if you dont vote there is nothing you can do to change things and you will have to lump it or like it well nelson mandela never voted , but he made a difference , he went on to become the president of the country so the proof is there written in history for all to see that you dont need to vote to make a difference those that suggest otherwise just make themselves look like the straw man in the wizard of oz" Rather than not vote, vote for none of them, by that I mean spoil your ballot paper by writing "none of them" across it. Then you will have recorded your view. If the 20/30/40% of people who fail to vote or register to vote did this the politicians would change their attitude over night. While you and others like you sit at home and fail to register your disillusionment with our leaders they have no incentive to change, and they also have no incentive to point out to you that you always have the option of spoiling your paper and it is a powerful option! Again just my opinion and maybe something for you to think about. | |||
"IF and i say IF people are going to vote then they should have to answer , by ticking about 5 boxes the answer to questions of a political nature to assertain they are competent to vote at the time of polling if the answers are correct there vote goes foward for counting , if not there vote is void that way you could vote at 4 years old and be counted , or vote at 60 and not be counted personnaly i will not vote as after looking at the system with open eyes , and a modicum of intelligence over the last 40 years have come to the conclussion its all a joke you can vote for an MP for the sole reason that you want a by pass for your town , and when he is elected , and the time comes for him to vote on that bypass he votes the other way because he is told to do so by the WHIP , who are doing a deal with the lib dems over another issue the bypass was the biggest thing on your mind so even though that MP was going to push for things you DID NOT want you voted for them anyway so all you ended up with was to be tripple foocked you can tripple fook me once , but you wont do it twice some might say that if you dont vote there is nothing you can do to change things and you will have to lump it or like it well nelson mandela never voted , but he made a difference , he went on to become the president of the country so the proof is there written in history for all to see that you dont need to vote to make a difference those that suggest otherwise just make themselves look like the straw man in the wizard of oz" Wow, how did you get to be so cynical! I'm glad you don't exercise your right to vote as you'd probably form a Neo-fascist party and vote for it. So we take away elections and have what to write our laws and argue our case abroad with other countries? Who would organise our local services and alloocate money to the NHS where it is needed? I'm not saying that the people doing those things are doing them correctly at the moment, but that's the beauty of an election - we can eject them and vote new people in to see if they do a better job of it, and they can't, we vote again. You really are niave if you think that Mandela's way is the only way to make a change without using the ballot box. He operated in a country radiclally different to the system we have over here, and he used the bomb to argue his point. The rights and wrongs of that are for a different discussion but to use Mandela as an analogy shows you really don't understand what living in a free democratic society entitles you to. | |||
".....If the 20/30/40% of people who fail to vote or register to vote did this the politicians would change their attitude over night. ..... " as if, they would still be elected. if only 10 people voted there would be someone elected....some councils elections seem to only low 100's voting. elections http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elections_in_the_United_Kingdom explain about voting or not... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_turnout | |||
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".....If the 20/30/40% of people who fail to vote or register to vote did this the politicians would change their attitude over night. ..... as if, they would still be elected. if only 10 people voted there would be someone elected....some councils elections seem to only low 100's voting. elections http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elections_in_the_United_Kingdom explain about voting or not... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_turnout " This is true, but it is the subtle difference between millions being so disillusioned that they do not vote or millions being so disillusioned/angry that they deliberately spoiled their ballot papers. You need to remember that parliament rules by consent, as do all governments and that if the population withdraw that consent then it is not possible to govern. If those who seek power suddenly find that they are loosing that consent they will change or be swept aside! While the majority of us either continue to play our given part in their game of musical chairs by voting for one or another of them when they decide we can or just stop playing they have no incentive to change and will continue to blow smoke in our eyes with inconsequentials like votes for 16yo’s or children being given the right to choose their teachers. After all anything will do to keep the prols distracted!  | |||
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"IF and i say IF people are going to vote then they should have to answer , by ticking about 5 boxes the answer to questions of a political nature to assertain they are competent to vote at the time of polling if the answers are correct there vote goes foward for counting , if not there vote is void that way you could vote at 4 years old and be counted , or vote at 60 and not be counted personnaly i will not vote as after looking at the system with open eyes , and a modicum of intelligence over the last 40 years have come to the conclussion its all a joke you can vote for an MP for the sole reason that you want a by pass for your town , and when he is elected , and the time comes for him to vote on that bypass he votes the other way because he is told to do so by the WHIP , who are doing a deal with the lib dems over another issue the bypass was the biggest thing on your mind so even though that MP was going to push for things you DID NOT want you voted for them anyway so all you ended up with was to be tripple foocked you can tripple fook me once , but you wont do it twice some might say that if you dont vote there is nothing you can do to change things and you will have to lump it or like it well nelson mandela never voted , but he made a difference , he went on to become the president of the country so the proof is there written in history for all to see that you dont need to vote to make a difference those that suggest otherwise just make themselves look like the straw man in the wizard of oz Wow, how did you get to be so cynical! I'm glad you don't exercise your right to vote as you'd probably form a Neo-fascist party and vote for it. So we take away elections and have what to write our laws and argue our case abroad with other countries? Who would organise our local services and alloocate money to the NHS where it is needed? I'm not saying that the people doing those things are doing them correctly at the moment, but that's the beauty of an election - we can eject them and vote new people in to see if they do a better job of it, and they can't, we vote again. You really are niave if you think that Mandela's way is the only way to make a change without using the ballot box. He operated in a country radiclally different to the system we have over here, and he used the bomb to argue his point. The rights and wrongs of that are for a different discussion but to use Mandela as an analogy shows you really don't understand what living in a free democratic society entitles you to." i am trully astounded that you cant see why people are cynical i will give you one example first of all i will say that i am against hanging but a number of years ago there was an overwhelming majority of the public that wanted to bring hanging back they lobbyed there MP.s to do just that what happened in the house when they voted on it , you guessed it they voted the opposite way to what the public wanted so if the overwhelming majority of the public want more money spent on the NHS , what makes you think the MP,s will vote the way the public want they will do whatever THEY want to do no matter what you think , so why bother to vote for them in the first place if i went into a restaurant ( the only one in town ) and when asked ordered steak and chips , only to have sausage and mash plonked in front of me , i would be annoyed if the same thing happened the next night i would be annoyed again but dont try and add to that annoyance by taking the piss and asking me what i want on the 3rd night cos the answer would be , just do what you normally do and plonk any old shit in front of me and ill goble it up you say im nieve forgeting that i have been watching what goes on in politics for over 40 years and when you say we can get rid of those that do a bad job by voting someone else in , rolls very nicely off the tounge but it does not address directly the point i made about the hanging vote those idiots who voted all those years back because they wanted to bring back hanging , allready tried to get rid of the ones that would vote against it being brought back in , and voted for the ones who said they WOULD bring it back in what did they get ? sausage and mash mendela would not have been seen dead in a voting booth prior to serving all those years in prison , and his sacrifice changing the system to a fairer one i will just add this and cover the subject of the MANIFESTO after all that is the main thing that you vote for after all said and done what manifesto was it in that fuel duty was going to be linked to a so called FUEL TAX ESCALATOR , and fuel duty would go up a lot more than inflation ? cos i never saw it in any manifesto not that it has made the slightest difference as the oil is being pumped as fast , if not faster than ever so if it is IN the manifesto it doesnt mean they will carry it through , and if its not in the manifesto they will do it anyway / whatever they feel like that is and you think i should take part in that system give me a break | |||
"i am trully astounded that you cant see why people are cynical i will give you one example first of all i will say that i am against hanging but a number of years ago there was an overwhelming majority of the public that wanted to bring hanging back they lobbyed there MP.s to do just that what happened in the house when they voted on it , you guessed it they voted the opposite way to what the public wanted so if the overwhelming majority of the public want more money spent on the NHS , what makes you think the MP,s will vote the way the public want they will do whatever THEY want to do no matter what you think , so why bother to vote for them in the first place if i went into a restaurant ( the only one in town ) and when asked ordered steak and chips , only to have sausage and mash plonked in front of me , i would be annoyed if the same thing happened the next night i would be annoyed again but dont try and add to that annoyance by taking the piss and asking me what i want on the 3rd night cos the answer would be , just do what you normally do and plonk any old shit in front of me and ill goble it up you say im nieve forgeting that i have been watching what goes on in politics for over 40 years and when you say we can get rid of those that do a bad job by voting someone else in , rolls very nicely off the tounge but it does not address directly the point i made about the hanging vote those idiots who voted all those years back because they wanted to bring back hanging , allready tried to get rid of the ones that would vote against it being brought back in , and voted for the ones who said they WOULD bring it back in what did they get ? sausage and mash mendela would not have been seen dead in a voting booth prior to serving all those years in prison , and his sacrifice changing the system to a fairer one i will just add this and cover the subject of the MANIFESTO after all that is the main thing that you vote for after all said and done what manifesto was it in that fuel duty was going to be linked to a so called FUEL TAX ESCALATOR , and fuel duty would go up a lot more than inflation ? cos i never saw it in any manifesto not that it has made the slightest difference as the oil is being pumped as fast , if not faster than ever so if it is IN the manifesto it doesnt mean they will carry it through , and if its not in the manifesto they will do it anyway / whatever they feel like that is and you think i should take part in that system give me a break " Drive a few extra miles and go to another town to get your 'Steak and Chips', if everyone did the same then the restaurant would either need to change it's menu or go out of business. It takes a bit of an effort sometimes to get what you want and not just accept there is nothing you can do to change it! Either that or you sit at home moaning about the restaurant's sausage and mash! | |||
"what manifesto was it in that fuel duty was going to be linked to a so called FUEL TAX ESCALATOR , and fuel duty would go up a lot more than inflation ? cos i never saw it in any manifesto not that it has made the slightest difference as the oil is being pumped as fast , if not faster than ever so if it is IN the manifesto it doesnt mean they will carry it through , and if its not in the manifesto they will do it anyway / whatever they feel like that is and you think i should take part in that system give me a break " No party of government, or opposition party, can possibly include every single law and resolution that it intends to make in a single manifesto. Often, new laws are reactionary and address a specific occurence that has taken place - for those laws it would be impossible to predict that they would be neccessary. The issue of capital punishment has been debated endlessly ever since it was abolished. You do remember why it was abolished don't you? Innocent men & women were executed and politician's know that the public are given to knee-jerk responses to individual acts of brutality - like the Bulger case, for example. It is that public anger that MPs seek to difuse by preventing the public demanding that most harshest of penal systems - capital punishment. I fully support MPs who have steadfastly refused to reintroduce hanging regardless of public outcry. You analogy of sausage & mash doesn't stack up either. If you continually receive such shoddy service you have more than the one option you listed available to you. You can open your own restaurant and serve the public what you think they deserve - but I'd bet my life you'd revert back to sausage & mash at some point. | |||
"what manifesto was it in that fuel duty was going to be linked to a so called FUEL TAX ESCALATOR , and fuel duty would go up a lot more than inflation ? cos i never saw it in any manifesto not that it has made the slightest difference as the oil is being pumped as fast , if not faster than ever so if it is IN the manifesto it doesnt mean they will carry it through , and if its not in the manifesto they will do it anyway / whatever they feel like that is and you think i should take part in that system give me a break No party of government, or opposition party, can possibly include every single law and resolution that it intends to make in a single manifesto. Often, new laws are reactionary and address a specific occurence that has taken place - for those laws it would be impossible to predict that they would be neccessary. The issue of capital punishment has been debated endlessly ever since it was abolished. You do remember why it was abolished don't you? Innocent men & women were executed and politician's know that the public are given to knee-jerk responses to individual acts of brutality - like the Bulger case, for example. It is that public anger that MPs seek to difuse by preventing the public demanding that most harshest of penal systems - capital punishment. I fully support MPs who have steadfastly refused to reintroduce hanging regardless of public outcry. You analogy of sausage & mash doesn't stack up either. If you continually receive such shoddy service you have more than the one option you listed available to you. You can open your own restaurant and serve the public what you think they deserve - but I'd bet my life you'd revert back to sausage & mash at some point." by talking about a specific occurence that might take place AFTER the manifesto is evading the fuel tax issue the goverment was half way through its term when it decided unilaterally to raise the cost of fuel to reduce global warming even if you believe global warming is taking place they could have waited till the NEXT election and brought it up then and PUT IT IN the manifesto to be voted on the reason being its going to take 100 years before it warms , so hardly the need for desperate , rush decitions to mention some event like a volcano exploding in manchester , that they need to take action on , and compare that with the fuel tax issue is a deliberate trick using smoke and mirrors to squirm out of directly tackling the question in hand i said from the outset that i do not agree with capital punishment but if the public decide that thats what they want then thats that or where do you draw the line oh the public dont want to join the euro but we think its a knee jerk reaction so bollox to them lets scrap the pound oh the public want to keep the national heath system but we think its a knee jerk reaction lets get rid of it anyway and make it BUPA only once you go down that road of riding roughshod over what people want and doing the opposite its a very dangerous route to take put it this way , they could just have easily gone the other way and decided to hang people when the public did NOT want them to and for all you know i might well be opening my own restaurant one day , after all its been done before the ANC do a nice mango pie and Sinn Féin do a lovley frothy guiness flambo | |||
"i will give you one example first of all i will say that i am against hanging but a number of years ago there was an overwhelming majority of the public that wanted to bring hanging back they lobbyed there MP.s to do just that what happened in the house when they voted on it , you guessed it they voted the opposite way to what the public wanted " That was your first post about MPs and hanging! "once you go down that road of riding roughshod over what people want and doing the opposite its a very dangerous route to take put it this way , they could just have easily gone the other way and decided to hang people when the public did NOT want them to " This is your latest! The 2 don't match up
So to get back to the original point, if someone your age (no offence meant, it's just a fact) can't follow Politics without getting confused, how is a 16 year old meant to at their age and know who to vote for?
Again no offence meant just quoting from your posts. | |||
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" Wow, how did you get to be so cynical! I'm glad you don't exercise your right to vote as you'd probably form a Neo-fascist party and vote for it. So we take away elections and have what to write our laws and argue our case abroad with other countries? Who would organise our local services and alloocate money to the NHS where it is needed? I'm not saying that the people doing those things are doing them correctly at the moment, but that's the beauty of an election - we can eject them and vote new people in to see if they do a better job of it, and they can't, we vote again. You really are niave if you think that Mandela's way is the only way to make a change without using the ballot box. He operated in a country radiclally different to the system we have over here, and he used the bomb to argue his point. The rights and wrongs of that are for a different discussion but to use Mandela as an analogy shows you really don't understand what living in a free democratic society entitles you to." Saved me typing it! Thanks wishy | |||
"Are you kidding! Have you seen the average 16 year old? Most of them couldn't find their own arseholes with both hands and a mirror! Would you really trust them to vote for anything that would affect you ffs?
XXXX"i know a lot of so called adults like that shall we remove there right to vote? but i know a lot of 16 yr olds that can hold a political debate better than many adults and they also have a better grasp of what happens now can affect their future. people are sayin about them voting for someone THEY dont want doesnt that happen every election people come in that they didnt vote for?? whos to say it would make things any worse than they are now if 16-18 got the vote? think the same worries were bandied about when women wanted the vote xx | |||
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"most 16 year olds couldnt make thier minds up,whether to have a wank, or a bag of wotsits.now they get a say in who runs the country.i hope it never happens.ok i know most of them would go for the wank. " You've just described most men | |||
"most 16 year olds couldnt make thier minds up,whether to have a wank, or a bag of wotsits.now they get a say in who runs the country.i hope it never happens.ok i know most of them would go for the wank. You've just described most men "very true  | |||
"You’ll always get this argument, perhaps 16 to 18 year olds should be excluded from paying taxes? " Anyone who earns money is subject to paying tax, including babies... Of course the argument could be, if you don't pay you can't vote (unemployed people, children). No clear cut, can't just have the good bits without the other bits that comes with it | |||
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