Salma Yaqoob: abolish postal votes to cut fraud

Posted on 3rd May, 2007 by

Comment is free: The secret to success

Salma Yaqoob (Birmingham Respect party activist) is calling for the postal vote to be abolished in order to cut out the electoral fraud which plagued recent elections in areas of the UK with high Muslim populations; the fraud was aimed at stopping people voting for other than the “community’s candidate”, which often meant Labour, at a time when many youth did not want to vote Labour due to the Iraq war. She rightly says that it removes the privacy that the voting booth provides by exposing one’s vote to family scrutiny (and, as also happened, allowing unscrupulous activists to get hold of many people’s votes before it even reaches their houses). To be fair, activists of the other two parties have been associated with dishonest postal vote practices also.

I don’t agree with abolishing the postal vote altogether, though - it should be restricted to those with a need, such as the disabled, those too sick to get to the polling station, or their carers.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...

Possibly Related Posts:


FacebookTwitterIdenti.caDeliciousDiggStumbleUponWordPressShare
PoliticsPermalink
  • Old Pickler

    For the first time I find myself agreeing with Salma Yaqoob. For the cases Yusuf mentions, the postal vote should be retained. Otherwise, however, the secret ballot is the cornerstone of our democracy, and was introduced precisely to avoid the kind of corruption that the postal vote brings.

    A postal vote is a witnessable vote, and therefore open to corruption. A vote in a ballot box avoids this. It can’t be bought, and the voter, however intimidated, may, at the end of the day, vote how he - or, more to the point, she - likes.

    I am glad to see the penny is dropping.