Their discussion covers a range of implications including what would happen in the event that NOTA topped the poll. Would there need to be a re-run with different candidates, etc? This got me wondering.
What would actually happen if a constituency didn't have an MP at all? If the largest group of people actually voted not to have a representative in parliament, would would happen if they didn't elect anyone?
The business of governing the country, passing laws, scrutinising the government etc. would continue as long as most constituencies returned MPs. As MPs have no statutory function within their constituency there wouldn't be anything that would grind to a halt without them.
And if someone from that constituency had a problem that they wanted to bring up with an MP or have someone champion a local issue in parliament, they couldn't.
If people in an area genuinely don't want to be represented in parliament, should we make them be?
Posts
4 comments:
I did a Bachelor of Laws, and I am currently doing a Masters. However, I still don't have a scooby how the returned MPs comprise the legislature, i.e. how MPs opinions actually get drafted into the statute? Of course I understand the mechanics of the readings, but shouldn't there be more public knowledge of who words these Bills in the first place? Long-winded, but I hope there's some sense in my comment somewhere,
Brazil, where voting is optional from 16 but compulsory from 18, has a 'blank vote' on the ballot paper, which basically means none of the above. It always surprises me how many people here make the effort of going to the polling station only to spoil their ballot paper - at least it livens up otherwise quite dull counts (especially the electronic ones).
The revolt by the American colonies began because the legislative body which passed the taxation laws had no representatives elected from the colonies. The colonies wanted to either have their own parliament to levy taxes or to be able to elect representatives to the House of Commons in London.
Those who do not learn from the mistakes of the past are doomed to repeat them.
It would be better to have no representative than to have a BNP protest vote representative. NOTA would prevent them gaining power in many council elections. While people vote for extremist parties as a protest against the establishment parties they should be encouraged to express their protest in a more meaningful way rather than voting for scum.
We already have a number of constituencies where their elected representative does little to champion local issues in parliament - the Speaker cannot ask questions (except in written form, I believe) and I don't believe that Sinn Fein take part in any votes in the UK parliament. Then there are the hoards of useless MPs who can't be bothered to do a decent job or who so focused on their goverment career that they would not dare rock the boat. Compared to them 'nobody' sounds like a good and cheap alternative.
Post a Comment