How Cheaply Can Your Vote Be Bought?

[Hypognosis]

In recent political debate, statistics have been thrown up such as the Independence for Scotland vote being worth about £500 per year to those who vote to separate from the UK. This week, we have the Tory party offering to spend about £600m (of -our- money) on a £200 p.a. tax break for married couples.

Something tangible in the wallet is always going to be a vote-winner, obviously enough. A large number of you who stand to gain from Osborne's latest policy announcement were probably planning to vote Tory in any event and will simply trouser the extra money. To be honest, this question is not aimed at you.

So, if you were genuinely a floating voter, my question is: could your loyalty at the ballot box -seriously- be bought for as little as £200?

As a secondary question, are you insulted by such a paltry offer?

[DaisyNonna]

Have no intention of voting.
Why support any group of power hungry money grubbers?

[ichkeria]

I'm not a floating voter, but if I was I hope I would not be bribed by Osborne's £200 pa tax break, even though i would benefit from it.
In fairness I doubt if it's actually the money per se that the evil one is tempting the voters with, but the rather woolly idea that the Tory party is the party of "the family".
Actually I can't really make any sense of it at all, but that's the best I can do :-)

And if I was voting in the Scottish referendum (where I probably would be a "floater") I certainly wouldn't be considering statistics such as the one quoted above - for a start I don't see how such figures can be confidently arrived at.

[Wharton]

ichkeria - Scottish referendum vote - what price pride?

[ichkeria]

On Scottish Independence I don't really have an opinion. I'm not Scottish and therefore don't feel it is up to me. If Scotland wants independence I will support it. If not, fine also.
But as I say, I hope I wouldn't be swayed by dubious calculations by either the Yes or No campaigns. I just hope the canvassing is of a higher standard than the disastrous AV referendum in the UK a couple of years ago.

[jno]

I did very well out of the Thatcher years but would never have voted for her.

[askyourgran]

No amount of money would persuade me to vote for Flappymouth Miliband and his crew.

[Hypognosis]

@DaisyNonna,

It's not easy to come up with a convincing counter-argument to the "don't vote: it only encourages 'em" stance. The best I can offer is to suggest that you DO exercise your vote but make it out for the party you expect is going to come second or third (in your local constituency, not the nation as a whole).

This way, you are not registering your passive acceptance of the winning candidate - which I believe the act of not-voting represents. By voting, you actively register your disapproval of the winning candidate and you shave another vote off their majority.

If their majority is squeezed, they may eventually be replaced with a 'safer' candidate by their party. To escape that fate, you may find your candidate becomes more attentive to local matters... ;-)

[Hypognosis]

@ichkeria,

yep. If anything, the point I'm making is you should accept the gift with good grace but still decide who to vote for on the basis of the entire package of polocies; what's going to be best to fix the debt crisis and so on.

Likewise, I feel that the Scots should vote for independence or not purely on principle and not allow themselves to be swayed by whether they, personally, or Scotland as a whole will be quids-in, afterwards, or not.

[Hypognosis]

@askyourgran

//No amount of money would persuade me to vote for Flappymouth Miliband and his crew. //

The Labour Party's bribes to the electorate usually take the form of policies, offers of new public services to be introduced. Things which always sound good but no-one knows exactly what it's going to cost in terms of tax revenue. We are left having to work out for ourselves whether we're going to use it, or benefit from it.

If you were promised a local library, or some other substantial public facility that your town currently lacks, would that ever sway you towards a party you hold a long-standing ideological opposition to, even if only for the single 5-year term it takes to erect the building and get it running?

Holding to your ideology and avoiding expediently voting in someone else just to gain personal short-term advantage for yourself is a stance I fully understand. If only I could persuade politicians to stop making their dumb promises though ("bribing us with our own money" as some Americans like to call it) then I'd feel I'd achieved something useful.

A £600m giveaway, at a time when the National debt needs to be paid down as fast as possible, is just irresponsible. Even more so when there are no shortage of people, like yourself, who will be voting for the Tories, regardless of any offers of a tax break.

[jno]

depends on your principles, though. If one of your principles is that govefrnments ought to provide public services like libraries, does it make sense to vote against a party that offers them just because you'd sooner die than vote for X? A lot of people's "principles" seem to be no more than "I hate Labour/Tories", and I suspect that isn't principle, that's just blind prejudice.

[FredPuli43]

No, because I'd look for longer term gains And, by Jove, you can't buy a decent box of cigars for 200 quid! I am therefore thinking of voting Labour because the working man obviously benefits from landowners having 200,000 houses a year built on their land.

[seekeerz]

we have to, here in Ozland, I'm yet to be convinced that any other system gets a true response from the voters and they don't have to bribe us to get us there [ well not directly, anyway !! ]

Mind you, a Scots expat friend goes diligently down each time, gets himself ticked off, lord knows what he writes on the ballot papers and goes serenely on his way....just his small protest against the scheme !!

[Hypognosis]

@jno,

I also see nothing wrong in, like you said, reaping the benefits of conditions set by the party you didn't vote for and yet still not voting for them.

I also agree with your other point about some people adopting the stance of "I hate X because [list of reasons]". That is I share your observation that there are plenty of people who say things like that. What I don't like is that they vote for Y, the polar opposite of X, not because Y is inherently any good in its own right but purely to distance themselves as far as possible from the X supporters' camp.

I see this as akin to buying a product purely because it's on special offer, not because you actually like the item, or that the discounted asking price is fair for what the item is actually worth.

We are so easily led, as consumers and, I regret to think, as voters too.

[FredPuli43]

Sounds good to me methyl ! Is this antipathy to Labour life long and from an early age? And which Labour don't you like? Milband's , I understand you not liking; it is Mr Foot's Labour dressed up; but Blair's Labour? My ex, a prospective Tory candidate in a general election, was asked the standard question "Is there anything which might be embarrassing to the Party and which you have not told us? " and replied "Yes, I am to the left of Tony Blair". She was selected. Think on that. Mind, Alan Clarke was asked whether he had any 'skeletons in the closet' and answered "Madam, some days it is so full that I can hardly get the door shut" He was selected too, but his reply may not be definitive in such matters

[ludwig]

// So, if you were genuinely a floating voter, my question is: could your loyalty at the ballot box -seriously- be bought for as little as £200? //

I don't think anyone's vote will be bought by the monetary value of this. What some people might do is like the fact that they appear to be supporting the institution of marriage. Again, that in itself probably wouldn't be enough to clinch a vote, but added together with another couple of policies they like the sound of, and a floater could be swayed.

Personally I don't think my vote is buyable with cash because it'd have to be a considerable sum to make me think about it, and if a considerable sum was promised, I wouldn't trust them to deliver on the promise - they'd have to be lying.

For example if someone promised to abolish all university tuition fees and go back to a grant system, for the sake of my children I'd think, yes - you get my vote. Then I'd think about it about for a while and realise no-one could feasibly deliver on such a promise.

[cassa333]

Looking at the £200 married couple allowance... It isn't nessisarily about the money it is the show of support for marriage that could sway voters.

It is a tangible way of showing support for an institution, or life style if you like, that some think is being eroded.

What I haven't read as yet is, does this include same sex married couples? Because if you are promoting marraige then all marrages should be included.

All the screeming by the left about stigmatising unmarried couples etc is laughable. It doesn't stigmatise anyone. There is no shame left in this country and having children when unmarried, living together or going from partner to partner is everyday life and no one cares.

[sp1814]

cassa333

You asked:

"What I haven't read as yet is, does this include same sex married couples? Because if you are promoting marriage then all marriages should be included."

Yes, it does include same sex marriages and those who are in civil partnerships.

[Hypognosis]

Yep, the only minority group being left out, on this occasion, are the 'sad loners' of the world, who no-one gives a monkeys about, let alone wants to have voting for them.

Or not, as the case may be. ;-)