let me climb on my soapbox for a minute

[suryaofvulcan]

35%

That's the proportion of registered voters who could actually be bothered to turn out and vote on Thursady. Which means that 65% felt they had something more important to do than spend half an hour of their day deciding who would run their local council and who would represent them in Europe. On the 20th anniversary of the day people died in

Comments

[suryaofvulcan]

It's a sad day when extremists think, 'I've got to get out there and make my vote count,' while the mainstream voter thinks, 'Somebody else will do it for me.'

It's still crazier when you think that those people who didn't go out and vote on Thursday are probably the same ones who pay for the privilege of voting for their favourite contestant on Big Brother, Britain's Got Talent or Strictly Come Dancing. It boggles the mind.

Unfortunately, I'm not surprised the BNP got in (although I feel for you Sparky - I'm really glad they didn't win in my region). And as you say the European election was important - for one thing it shows our neighbours who we are. I'm also in favour of European statehod - as a stepping stone to one world government. (No lynchings here.) 90% of the legislation I deal with is European in origin - it has a huge impact.

But the council election was probably even more important - councils have an impact on most of the services we use every day, from bin collecting to education to social services to fixing potholes in the roads. And people probably complain about council services a lot more - yet 65% of them can't be bothered to get off their arses and choose who runs the damn thing.