FIGHT FOR OUR FREEDOM

UK Postal Voting is Wide Open to Corruption

That is the opinion of Andy Hayman. He is assistant commissioner of Scotland Yard - full details about him can be found here .

There is currently an ongoing police investigation of last years' Council elections in Tower Hamlet (other London regions are also under investigation) amid claims that:

• Hundreds of postal votes were stolen from blocks of flats
• Voters being duped into applying for postal votes then handing them to party activists (mainly vulnerable people)
  
• Falsification of nomination papers
• False statements of candidates
• Impersonation of candidates
• Voters who didn't apply for postal votes receiving them
• Voters who DID apply for postal votes not receiving them

This has happened before in the Birmingham area in 2004. The result? - Six Labour councilors were found guilty of vote rigging and were stripped of office. In fact the more digging I do, I find more postal frauds. Councillor arrested in Blackburn, allegations of fraud in Bradford, Burnley, Derby and Woking plus more!!

It seems obvious that the postal voting system is very easy to corrupt.The police simply don't have the manpower to investigate every claim so many people will get away with it. It is bloody hard to prove fraud since we vote in secret.

The reason why postal voting was introduced was to increase turnout (if you want to increase turnout - make voting compulsory!), but it seems obvious this is a simple method of fixing the vote. You only have to look at America and the scandals they have had at the last 2 elections with electronic voting and postal voting. There is a whole load of information out there on the web and in books if you don't believe me.

We are supposed to live in a democracy yet, how do we know for sure that our vote is counted? Or not altered? We don't!

The governments and parties WILL take advantage of this situation . Don't be fooled Power is an addictive thing - Henry Kissinger once commented that:

"Power is the ultimate aphrodisiac".

The problem is that we have a secret ballot and that is open to manipulation . To quote that Commie leader Stalin (and star of Command and Conquer: Red Alert!)

" The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything."

There is a solution though - to have open voting. I can't see why it has to be so much of a secret anyway. I bet you tell you friends and family. You see people on the telly announcing to the nation who they have voted anyway!

Here IMO is a basic blueprint for voting and is far far less suspectible to manipulation.

• You put yourself (can be done automatically) on the electoral roll so to be eligible to vote
• You go to the posting station on the day of the election.
• You go to the official (you will need your passport/driving license to correctly identify yourself) and get your official voting card (this will have your name and NI number on it).(The official MUST NOT have any ties to any of the parties.)
• Tick the box of whoever you want to elect and sign the paper whilst being observed by the official. Official stamps the card.
  
• Official gets one copy, whilst you get the other.
• Votes get counted. This will take at least one or two full days (day after election) so as not to rush the process. (Counting will be fully observed and throughly checked). so this will lower the risk of genuine human error
  
• If there is any dispute, it will be easy to check as you have your receipt and so should the official.
  

It's not perfect but it is a far better and quite simple system! The whole voting system should also be operated by an entirely independent organisation .

More information

Articles about the voting scandal in London and comments from Andy Haymen:

BBC News article
Daily Mail article
Guardian article
Respect party comment and opinion

Also check this out:

Excellent blog about postal voting.

Posted by Bananaramadrama on Thursday, October 26, 2006 at 9:46 pm | Permalink