The Electoral Reform Society blog

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19th November 2012

PCC elections: What price democracy?

Over the weekend we helped the Mail on Sunday with a few numbers.

They asked us how much it cost to get a single person out to vote for Thursday’s Police and Crime Commissioner Elections. Easy we said.

Fifteen minutes later and the results were stark: £14 a vote. The results were even starker when we had a look at every major national vote in the last decade:

	Estimated Costs	Total Turnout	Cost per vote
PCC 2012 Elections (Estimate Costs)	£75,000,000	5,357,437	£14.00
Euro Elections 2009 (England and Wales)	£64,400,000	14,032,420	£4.59
2010 General Election	£84,600,000.00	29,687,604	£2.85
2005 General Election	£80,000,000	27,148,510	£2.95
2001 General Election	£80,000,000	26,368,204	£3.03

Democracy costs money, but value for money matters.

This election has been the very definition of a false economy. The Government splurged on a November election knowing it would add millions to the price tag, penny pinching on the vital information that could have got voters to the polls.

Nov 2012

Tags: Police and Crime Commissioners

3 Comments

Comments

Optical

Why not make your protest on the E petition at http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/41806
http://www.facebook.com/patbillchapman Hilary Chapman

Not all the independent candidates were as independent as
they appear. The successful PCC candidate in North Wales, Winston Roddick was a
member of the Liberal Democrats all along, but “forgot” to tell the electorate
this. See:

http://www.dailypost.co.uk/news/north-wales-news/2012/11/20/new-police-commissioner-says-he-didn-t-try-to-hide-lib-dem-membership-55578-32266040/

The whole election has been an omnishamble from beginning to end.
- Paul
  
  Hilary; The Lib Dems know that many people voted for them in the last election because they couldn’t vote labour and would not vote Tory, then the Lib Dems handed all those votes to the Tories; the result is that very few people will vote for anything Lib Dem again after having their votes stolen – and the Lib Dems know that.