Oh! to be able to plough through the figures with such easy but then I'd hate to give you any competion to worry about

I'm not sure whether you're suggesting that a 'none of those listed' option should be compulsory on ballot papers or that voting should be compulsory, with voters able to vote for none of those listed.


That assumes that not voting is a NO vote, which isn't the case. For none of the listed candidates to be elected would require voters to tick that option.


No one can assume that you feel that way. You have to register that choice.


Should no candidate be returned, the constituency would have to pay for a bye-election using a new list of candidates from which the previous lot were excluded. In the event that no one is returned by a second ballot, the constituency would have to be deemed to have decided that it had no concerns, until a referendum determined otherwise.


I echo that.

I never realised that there were so many ways of not understanding something simple.

It is this; If you vote for 'none of the above' in a system where voting is mandatory then 'non of the above is elected' and no one actually sits as the MP for that constituency.
Or, in a system where turning up to vote is not mandatory then not voting is deemed to be a 'vote' for no MP.
In either of the above circumstances the 'no MP' is deemed to abstain from all motions in the House.

Re. ".........Should no candidate be returned, the constituency would have to pay for a bye-election using a new list of candidates from which the previous lot were excluded. In the event that no one is returned by a second ballot, the constituency would have to be deemed to have decided that it had no concerns, until a referendum determined otherwise............."

It is a very large assumption that just because constituents fail to return a candidate they have no concerns. It is more likely that they don't think that any of the candidates are fit to address those concerns.

To quote from The Bleak Age by J L and Barbara Hammond, 1934: "The art of government may be described in one aspect as the art of making men and women think that the world they inhabit obeys in some degree their own idea of justice."

Evidence of democratic apathy is the complete lack of sales of Referism badges, the profits from which go to fund the Harrogate Agenda. It's enough to have made Arthur O'Neill resort to asterisks in frustration.

"I can see no point in arguing further with you."

I know how you feel.

I must do something serious about promoting them!

Although I agree that in today's world, there arn't many candidate in UK, or US, or in my country (which is China haha) that really represents the people, which in thise case meaning none of them are worth voting for.

Yet on the other hand, I doubt this idea of "non of the above" actually going to solve this situation, especially for a person who is a libertarian like me or you. I believe as a libertarian, the most fundemental problem of politics is how to prevent tyranny from controlling the country and the people inside it. This actually includes the tyranny of the majority, which their choises will affect the liberty of the other minorities. One may ask, how will this problem ties in to the idea of "non of the above"? Well imagine a scenario when every single party in UK actually believe global warming is a hoax, and in their electorial campaign they swore to remove all those previous self destructing regulation on enviroment. (If one follows this blog, one knows this is impossible, but let assume it happens.) Yet after so many generation of brainwashing, the majority of electoriate refuses to support such idea of forgetting climate change, and hence they voted "non of the above". The result will be countries being devastated by such decision of the majority, and the minority of the people who knew about this shall suffer..

One may ask, am I trying to suggest that the majority of the people are stupid? Or unable to make any decision? Well if any one who understands the idea of libertarianism, they will not think so. The main idea of libertarianism is, people should be allow to do anything, unless it severely affects the ability of other people of doing so. This is not only a intellectual ideal. In fact in the modern era where tasks in the society are so diverse that it must be organized in a division of labour, people are often ignorant of the trades other then their own profession. This means no matter how smart to population are, people will not be able to vote rationally since they can not understanding the whole system.

I believe this notion of democracy is never the solution of this problem (which I believe North had hinted before). The real solution is the accountability and regulation of the people who has the power accross the state. As I mention since people are engaged in a division of labour in the society, it should be alogical conclusion that some people are better mangaging the country then other people. The only problem that one might worr, is whether these people will abuse their power. Yet if the legal system of accoutability works well enough to prevent these people from doing things that the law forbites them from doing so, or able to punish those people who gives false promises, then what is there to be worryin!

One might say, how can one ensure such legal procedure function without problems, well I will say, how can one ensure such law will work well in democracy in the first place?

First one sold at 10:45 pm, 30 November: I will post it tomorrow morning. The movement marches onward!

Ah, but your Betters would NEVER tolerate such a scenario.

It's a simple idea. Currently we have the choice of voting or not voting for one of the candidates. All I'm suggesting is giving the 'not voting' or 'none of the above option' some force. In other words we don't find any of the candidates acceptable, or not acceptable enough that we could be bothered to turn up and vote. In the event that the non voters out number the voters it is a perfectly reasonable that no one is elected. And just as reasonable that the Non MP is deemed to abstain on all motions in Parliament.

Edited by user 01 December 2012 15:31:39(UTC)  | Reason: typo