Only a third of UK overseas troops could have voted

[T_i_B]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/06/06/narmed06.xml&sSheet=/news/2006/06/06/ixuknews.html

Ministers were accused of "staggering complacency" last night after it emerged that only one in three service personnel serving overseas were registered to vote in last year's general election.

As a result, thousands of soldiers, sailors and airmen sent to the Gulf to bring democracy to Iraq and Afghanistan were denied a say in the British general election.

New figures released out by the Ministry of Defence yesterday reveal that only 60 per cent of Britain's 202,000 service personnel were registered to vote in the general election, compared with 93 per cent for the overall electorate. But this figure plummeted to 34 per cent among the 48,000 serving overseas at the time.

As a result, only 46 per cent of servicemen and women - or just 28 per cent of those serving overseas - actually voted in the election that returned Tony Blair to power for a third time.

[Greeby]

1. Thats OK

If they're anything like us UK civilians, they wouldn't have bothered voting anyway :eyes:

[T_i_B]

2. Not much of an excuse really

Even Squaddies deserve the right to vote, especially as they are the ones on the front line who get all the shit as a result of what the likes of Tony Blair do on the world stage.

[merwin]

3. Why do servicemen even need to register? It's not like we don't know who

they are and where they are at all times! Soldiers should automatically be registered to vote. Hell, anyone with a SSN in the USA should be registered to vote automatically.

[T_i_B]

4. Interesting idea

But in the UK I don't think anyone is automatically put on the electoral register. You get your form, you fill it in and you send it back to the council. It's a question of getting the forms out to our squaddie friends really.

And while I'm on the subject, I must admit that the idea of registering as a democrat or a republican when you register to vote has always seemed a little odd to me. I'm not sure I'd want people seeing what way I'm likely to vote on the electoral register. Mind you, I'm a non-US DUer whose parents installed into me a great amount of respect for the whole principle of the secret ballot.

[muriel_volestrangler]

5. Ahh, but that depends on the accommodation you live in

For normal citizens, one form is sent to each house, and someone fills it in - and the others may never see it. For forces living abroad, you may well assume that the organiser of the living quarters does it for you (I'm trying to remember what happened when I was in university accommodation - I know I voted there). And the article seems to say there was a change from registering once, and the military keeping track of you after that, to one where it's your responsibility to register every year.

[T_i_B]

6. I'm not sure if it's the same as student arrangements.

I voted when I was in halls, and that was a matter of getting the form for my part of the halls and putting my name on it. In fact I was the conciencious one who went round trying to get others to get on the electoral register to vote, although most of my fellow students were apatheic, apolitical or both and as such were not all that interested. Let's just say that I did not attend a campus that was very big on politics.

However I don't think it's done in barracks in the way it's done in Uni halls of residence. Maybe there is somebody out there who can explain how British Squaddies register these days but as this is DU that much I doubt.