British E-Voting Pilots Announced

rimberg writes "The Department for Constitutional Affairs has announced it is going to trial Electronic voting using the internet and/or telephone. Bridget Prentice, Elections Minister at the department said 'We need to make sure that people can vote in more convenient ways consistent with a modern lifestyle. [...] More and more people, and particularly young people, are using the internet everyday. We need to see if we can use this to encourage people even more to participate in the democratic process.' The Open Rights Group (Think British EFF) have responded by saying 'E-voting threatens the integrity of our elections and we oppose its use in our democracy.'"

Comments

Open, Receipts

[mfh]

I hope they open up the code so people can see how it works (or fails to work). A paper or electronic receipt system would be crucial, as stated time and time again.

Has anyone ever...

[popo]

Has anyone ever come up with one really good reason why a paper record of all votes is a bad idea?

Re:Has anyone ever...

[Virak]

It makes it way too difficult to slowly take over the world, one government at a time. We should welcome our new overlords, not try to make it harder for them.

Re:Has anyone ever...

[kfg]

Has anyone ever come up with one really good reason why a paper record of all votes is a bad idea?

It leaves a record on paper.

KFG

Good God, they mean for Parliament elections?

[saskboy]

e-voting is unsuitable for anything more serious than who people think will supplant Britney Spears as the next queen of teen pop.

Diebold voting is a fraud, and it happens right in front of the user, on a dedicated machine. The voter can't even see their marked ballot go into a container for verification in the event of computer fraud! It's a sham.

Sounds Great

[Radon360]

Now when someone tries to cast a vote from home on their spyware-riddled PC, later to find out it wasn't counted or cast incorrectly, then what? Or worse a whole bunch of voters are disenfranchised and don't even know it because of their clunky equipment.

Sorry fellas, you have to leave the internet out of this idea for now. Get the bugs worked out of the stand-alone electronic voting machines first.

Re:E-voting is the future and it should stay there

[CRCulver]

Eventually, through the use of Internet voting, it will be possible for people to vote on proposed legislation directly. If there's some issue you care deeply about, e.g. a declaration of war, then you can vote directly. If it's not an issue you care deeply about, you can let your elected representative cast a vote on your behalf.

The founders of the United States intentionally avoided letting people vote directly on legislation in order to avoid mob justice and ensure that the law was formed by those with at least some training in principles of governance. You'd let people vote directly on a war? Remember that the U.S. initiative against Iraq was helped by the confusion in the popular mind that the 9/11 hijackers had significant ties to Iraq. If the public is emotionally stirred up and ignorant enough, all kinds of bad things can happen if you give them the change to go wild. Furthermore, the people would instantly vote away their liberties if they thought it would gain them some security, and they would then turn on that portion of the population which rejected calls for tighter restrictions on whatever matters.

Why must it be stupidly convenient?

[cliffski]

"We need to make sure that people can vote in more convenient ways consistent with a modern lifestyle."

We are trying to make voting as convenient as buying a bag of crisps. why?

If someone can't be bothered to walk or drive half a mile to a polling station and put a cross in a box, do they really *care* who they are voting for? Far too many people treat voting flippantly (I don't like the look of him, I never vote for a woman, He has horrible hair etc) as it is. Would we be any worse of if voters had to take a simple test before voting? If you can't name the leaders of the main 3 parties, and pick their faces out of a lineup, are you really informed enough about the issues to vote sensibly?

Politicians in the UK panic about low turnout and think its because voting is hard. Its not, its just that a
First-Past-The Post system means that most of us have wasted votes, even if the main 2 parties were different, which they aren't.
Proportional representation FTW.

Just a thought.

Or another way to put it

[Colin Smith]

Most people are really dumb.

How to vote is not the problem

[Anonymous Coward]

The falling turnout at elections has nothing to do with the technology of how we vote. The problem is the type of people who are foisted on us as our politicians. We have come to expect that politicians never answer a question directly, give misleading answers, resort to ad hominems, and generally give the impression of being thoroughly dishonest and untrustworthy, with the "bonus" of superficial, irritating charm. In the UK there are several shining examples in the upper echelons of political power. They are intrinsically unable to command respect and trust. And before any politician brings up the complaint that if you don't vote, you don't get to change the politicians, one has to say politicians are all of the same distasteful character, so there is no choice. The policies may differ, but the fundamentally slimy character behind the mask remains the same.

--Cynic Central

Re:Increased turnout

[VJ42]

It's interesting that both you and the OP are talking about who to vote against. Is the political situation both here in the UK, and over in the States so bad that a vote is no longer a positive statement for a political party? I know I'm having a hard time deciding who to vote for.