Election Soon - How do we get NON VOTERS to VOTE

[just4ever]

In most constituencies FF have a core vote of 20 - 30% in my opinion who will consistantly turn out. I'm not sure any other party can match that which means the opposition are depending on swing voters to turn out. VOTE OR A FF PLAGUE ON ALL YOUR HOUSES!

[DeputyEdo]

Voting should be compulsory, as in Australia. The forefathers of our proud democracy did not lay their lives down for a generation to sit around smoking cannabis. Voting is a sacred duty. I have not voted yet - the next election will be my first, when it comes. I will be thinking of Pearse and Collins and De Valera and the forefathers of our country as I proudly cast my ballot in the national interest.

So you reckon a "proud democracy" should force people to vote?? How is that democratic?
How is it a sacred duty?

[just4ever]

So you reckon a "proud democracy" should force people to vote?? How is that democratic?
How is it a sacred duty?

He's one of the new breed's of troll, ignore him and he'll go away.

[Telemachus]

Randon thought.
How do you get non registered voters or non voters - TO VOTE - citizens of this country, to get up of their arses and VOTE and please don't make this thread be derailed by "they are all the same crap"
If and when there is an election, I was thinking as a Non Party Voter, of just simply popping through the "letterboxes" of my area - a canvas in the lines of USE YOUR VOTE !
Any thoughts/ideas ?

What you do is survey a thousand people of voting age and ask them 2 questions; Do you vote? and If not why don’t you vote? Do this survey by email to reduce sheepishness in the answers and give people the chance to compose their reasons.

Then you do a Pareto analysis of the people who answered they didn’t vote, to do this essentially is you divide up the responses into similar groups and rank them by the number of people saying the same thing.
Pareto analysis - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Then what you have is the top 3 reasons why voters don’t vote.

Then you come up with some ideas to address each of these 3 reasons, like your letter drop idea.

Say reason 1 is: I don’t know enough about candidates in my area to consider voting for them.

You can then as an attempt at a solution set up a website and survey all the candidates running and ask them 20 or so questions about their positions on various things. Publish this info to the website. Therefore a non-voter would be able to look at such a site and be matched with someone running who may broadly match their opinions.

Then you go out and survey people the next election and see if your plan had any impact.

This is called continuous process improvement aplpied to gradually addressing the issue of voter engagement.

There should be a group in the government doing this, but of course its in the governments interests to keep disaffected voters from voting.

[MsAnneThrope]

How much would it cost for every polling station to issue a sticker, along the lines of "I Care, I Voted"? Might bring some semblance of shame to those who don't? Apart from Ah Well's suggestion of free beer I can't really think of anything else practical. Maybe a tax credit of some type but we can't afford to be giving money away these days.

Much as I loathe the 'Celebrity Culture' that seems to have overtaken the country, I agree with the earlier poster that some of these people should be rolled out to try encourage people to vote, especially the younger, newer voters and the apathetic of all generations.

We could also of course do an 'Ash Wednesday' in reverse. Go to every registered voter's house before the election and daub their foreheads with a stubborn paint that can only be removed using a solution available at the polling stations

[ifreannach]

The only way to CHANGE the current Political System, is within the system. So for me, you must use your vote on which ever party appeals to you in regards to their view point on political reform and besides the economy etc, I do think this issue will be a hot potato in the forthcoming election

its a non issue, is there not more important things to do with our time ?

No party or candidate appeals to me, I have talked to them and given them plenty of opportunity to woo me yet they always always fail

[CookieMonster]

How much would it cost for every polling station to issue a sticker, along the lines of "I Care, I Voted"? Might bring some semblance of shame to those who don't?

Ironically, the lower the turnout the lower the cost!

[PUFF DADDY]

its a non issue, is there not more important things to do with our time ?

No party or candidate appeals to me, I have talked to them and given them plenty of opportunity to woo me yet they always always fail

I agree there are more important issues i.e. economy/jobs/health etc. BUT, I do think that political reform will also be up there, people want change, an end to the expense culture and gombeenism, for example, maybe a look at the way we vote etc, so lets just wait and see when the campaign properly begins, if I am right on this.

In regards to party/candidates don't appeal to you, is that to say that out of all the current members of the Dail - none of them appeal to you ? just curious. Granted a lot of gombeens there but I can think of a few that do good work and if given a chance to get into power, may turn out ok or I could stand to be corrected - ************************e, who knows. Election has to come first.

[Fed Up]

Voting should be compulsory, as in Australia. The forefathers of our proud democracy did not lay their lives down for a generation to sit around smoking cannabis. Voting is a sacred duty. I have not voted yet - the next election will be my first, when it comes. I will be thinking of Pearse and Collins and De Valera and the forefathers of our country as I proudly cast my ballot in the national interest.

Did they die so you could tell me what i can and can't put into my body?

[fool]

The only way to get people to vote is to persuade them that candidates in their area are worth voting for.
It's all very well talking about voting in the abstract, but nobody will go to the polling station unless they think a specific candidate or party can help them.