First things first. Euro-elections do not have any influence on the outcomes of general elections. That’s official. Mike Smithson says so. And despite being a Liberal Democrat and never getting introduced in this capacity when he does media, Mr Smithson does have an uncanny knack of predicting election outcomes.
Mike raises a point on his web site today that I’d not thought about. In the last Euro elections, Labour took about 22% of the vote. Mr Smith reminds us that in the last elections, Labour did better where there were all-postal-vote elections. That’s not happening this time around.
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So there will not be a “Glenrothes effect” then, or will cartloads of votes mysteriously turn up while other cartloads equally mysteriously disappear and no one can find the records of who voted?
As you say, first things first. On the subject of the European Election to be held on 4 June 2009, there is the issue of 80,000+ members of the EU who are unlikely to be able to cast their vote because of the government’s insistence on breaching their human rights. Prisoners are members of the EU, and given that Matthews v UK (1999) was decided after Labour came into power and a statute was passed by Parliament to give effect to the judgment, “ignorance of the law is no excuse” in the Prisoners Votes Case. A failure by Labour to pull its finger out on this issue, may result in the courts awarding damages between £15M and £60M to the disenfranchised prisoners. If they still have not pulled their finger out by the next General Election, the bill to the taxpayers will be doubled. Are you sure, given the economic downturn, that the public will thank you for this unnecessary waste of money?
Are you referring to the same Mike Smithson @ politicalbetting.com? The one who would not give any odds for convicted prisoners to get the vote by the next General Election? I can report that William Hill’s has given me odds of 20/1 @ £20 staked, for all or the majority of convicted prisoners to get the vote by the next General Election. So you see, I have a personal stake on this issue. And having put my money where my mouth is, I don’t intend to lose out because of Labour’s atrocious record of human rights violations! Therefore, as “Gordon Brown’s little helper” according to Iain Dale, why don’t you help him out of this mess?
Getting the excuses ready a bit early aren’t you Comrade?
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