No mean no!

I oppose forcing people to vote. As much as we politicos believe everyone is a s fascinated and obsessed by politics as we are they are not. If people have no view of whom they want as a candidate then they have the right not to be forced to choose, people have the right to hold no particular view and thus not vote. Indeed the right to hold no particular view is essentially the British position on most things and often terribly sensible one.

So we have those who hold a view about candidates and are willing to expresses those views at the ballot are empowered to do so and those who hold not views are respected. Unfortunately those left out in the cold are those who seek no representation, those whose views have no candidate or who have no truck with the dominate politics . In short those who seek to vote but seek to return no candidate at all.

You can debate differing electoral systems all day but there is something they all lack and that is the ability to reject all candidates and enjoy a representative free world. Now those who agree as I do that people should be able to register a none of the above view argue that if there is majority in favour of no candidate there must be a new election (with the same candidate or a wholly new set of ones I assume).
I do not accept this view, it is my view that if a majority of people choose to vote for none of the above they should not be forced to vote and vote until some candidate is chosen. No they should have exactly what they have voted for, no candidate. So instead of having a MP with their resulting surgery and voting on their behalf they would have nothing and the monies spent on the MPs wage redistributed among the representless population.

This is not to punish them, indeed this entire proposal is to treat voting adult like adults. If they seek no representative then that is exactly what they should receive, enjoying both the ups and the downs of their democratically chosen choice. If we are serious about empowering and democratising people and systems then the right to opt out must be part of the new approach.