[Margaret Pilkington]

How can we say that this government is 'democratically'elected when something like 39% of the population failed to vote.....? This Government is almost ruling by default, because it doesn't have a majority mandate.........people need to be educated about their rights to vote and see it as their civil responsibility.

There was an article in the paper today about being 'forced' to vote........if you truly don't want to vote then you can spoil your ballot paper........write on it, or put it in the ballot box blank.......but it means you have to think about that choice......nobody makes you vote for a particular candidate or party. Though I suspect that the Labour party would bring this in hoping that they would get the votes. It is a fair assumption that the disenfranchised youth and the socially challenged would be unlikely to vote Conservative.

The Electorate has lost faith in the politicians....and I speak from personal experience.
Maybe Electoral reform is long overdue.......maybe proportional representation would solve some of the problems......but the main problem is apathy, and that is very hard to reverse.