It's raining - stop voting!

PH01 · 24-05-2007 2:04pm #1

Well it's raining in the west today.

Has the weather ever stopped you, or someone you knew, from voting?

chopperbyrne · 24-05-2007 2:24pm

I'm sure it has stopped thousands in the past and will continue to stop thousands in the future until they bring in a proper e-voting system.

Mike... · 24-05-2007 2:27pm

I always try my best to vote...drove for 3 hours yesterday to get home for it...
Vote for anyone but the P.D'S

dereko1969 · 24-05-2007 2:31pm

think the OP must be a PD supporter! The weather at the last election definitely played a part in reducing voter turnout mixed with the mess that FG were in at the time, given the tightness of the race this time i would hope the rain wouldn't effect turnout but it will probably have some impact. it would be great if we could get 70% turnout.

DeepBlue · 24-05-2007 2:31pm

I doubt it would affect anyone that has a car but may affect those that have to walk, cycle or take public transport to a polling booth.
I'd say a wet day favours the present Government rather than the Rainbow.

Firewalkwithme · 24-05-2007 2:34pm

chopperbyrne wrote:

I'm sure it has stopped thousands in the past and will continue to stop thousands in the future until they bring in a proper e-voting system.

How would an e-voting system make any difference to turnout in bad weather when people would still have to go to a polling station to cast their vote anyway?

chopperbyrne · 24-05-2007 2:44pm

I meant a proper secure online voting system.

It's not likely to happen any time soon given the nature of current internet security, but that is the only time when adverse weather will not affect the turnout.

Firewalkwithme · 24-05-2007 2:51pm

chopperbyrne wrote:

I meant a proper secure online voting system.

It's not likely to happen any time soon given the nature of current internet security, but that is the only time when adverse weather will not affect the turnout.

I don't think that will happen in our lifetime (if ever) because of the security issues you mentioned and a lack of faith in such a system from the general public.

The whole fiasco over Richard & Judy and Blue Peter's phone ins has really dented the publics' trust on issues such as this.

Stark · 24-05-2007 2:54pm

dereko1969 wrote:

The weather at the last election definitely played a part in reducing voter turnout mixed with the mess that FG were in at the time, given the tightness of the race this time i would hope the rain wouldn't effect turnout but it will probably have some impact.

I sometimes wonder how many people in Ireland ever manage to get dressed and feed themselves. "Oh no, it looks a bit crap outside, we can't do anything".

It's only showers. People have the whole day to vote.

gonk · 24-05-2007 3:10pm

chopperbyrne wrote:

a proper secure online voting system.

. . . would be wide open to abuses such as vote selling and coercion of voters. These are precisely the reasons voting by secret ballot was introduced in the first place. They cannot be prevented unless voters are obliged to present themselves at a secure polling station.

dereko1969 · 24-05-2007 3:42pm

worked well in estonia earlier this year, of course it would all have to be tied in with ID cards too so probably won't happen.

alcon · 24-05-2007 4:04pm

dereko1969 wrote:

worked well in estonia earlier this year, of course it would all have to be tied in with ID cards too so probably won't happen.

It happens in Austria too. 4 years ago.
Although it might have been for Vienna municipal elections, but still... I watched a colleague vote from her desk here at work.

And what's the problem with ID cards. Really... I don't understand it.

Crash · 24-05-2007 4:11pm

See, what you really need to do is link the voting ID number with secure information such as online payments etc. - thus it would become a security risk for anyone to give away their sign in information, as a large amount of personal information and abilities would then be granted to the buyer.

jhegarty · 24-05-2007 4:12pm

alcon wrote:

I watched a colleague vote from her desk here at work.

The reason we should never have it because of a Boss making sure all his employees vote the correct way at their desks....

upmeath · 24-05-2007 4:15pm

DeepBlue wrote:

I doubt it would affect anyone that has a car but may affect those that have to walk, cycle or take public transport to a polling booth.
I'd say a wet day favours the present Government rather than the Rainbow.

True. It's not raining here (Meath West) today, thank God, and the officials in the station I voted in here earlier said that they were surprised by the number of first time voters turning out, not a bad sign, although by 3 o'clock only one sixth of the voters on their list had appeared. Guess things will heat up later when commuters come home!

24-05-2007 4:20pm

PH01 wrote:

Well it's raining in the west

Has the weather ever stopped you, or someone you knew, from voting?

Isn't it always raining in the West?

PH01 · 24-05-2007 4:26pm

Myth wrote:

Isn't it always raining in the West?

Not true. I was there once and it wasn't raining.

TwoShedsJackson · 24-05-2007 5:19pm

Rain is the reason the divorce referendum got passed because it lashed in the West on the day and all the auld Catholic types down there didn't bother voting because they thought it would be defeated

gonk · 24-05-2007 5:19pm

jhegarty wrote:

The reason we should never have it because of a Boss making sure all his employees vote the correct way at their desks....

Precisely.

Or spouses forcing spouses to vote the way they direct . . . Or queues at the local internet café to sell votes at €20 a pop . . .

Even if the Internet connection between voter and voting system could be reliably secured, which it can't at present, the loss of the secrecy of the ballot makes this a non-starter as far as I'm concerned.

upmeath · 24-05-2007 5:28pm

gonk wrote:

Precisely.

Or spouses forcing spouses to vote the way they direct . . . Or queues at the local internet café to sell votes at €20 a pop . . .

Even if the Internet connection between voter and voting system could be reliably secured, which it can't at present, the loss of the secrecy of the ballot makes this a non-starter as far as I'm concerned.

I'm a first-time voter so this may sound extremely ignorant of me, or it might indicate I have little faith in the current system, but are there countermeasures in place at the count centres to make sure the people counting the votes aren't acting the mickey? Like is each vote checked once, by one person, or twice, or how does that work? Because I'd hate to think somebody with tendencies towards one party or another was throwing their party an extra vote in every hundred or something like that, hoping they wouldn't be caught.

DeepBlue · 24-05-2007 5:41pm

upmeath wrote:

I'm a first-time voter so this may sound extremely ignorant of me, or it might indicate I have little faith in the current system, but are there countermeasures in place at the count centres to make sure the people counting the votes aren't acting the mickey? Like is each vote checked once, by one person, or twice, or how does that work? Because I'd hate to think somebody with tendencies towards one party or another was throwing their party an extra vote in every hundred or something like that, hoping they wouldn't be caught.

The counts are conducted in public under the watchful eye of "tallymen" from all the parties who watch each vote being counted and try to predict which way the result is going to go.
It would be very difficult to get away with trying to pull any stunts while they are noting each vote being counted like that.

upmeath · 24-05-2007 5:45pm

Thanks DeepBlue, I have (some) confidence in Irish democracy again. Now for the issue of 2000 people in my constituency being without ballot cards... hmmm...

Gobán Saor · 24-05-2007 5:53pm

upmeath wrote:

are there countermeasures in place at the count centres to make sure the people counting the votes aren't acting the mickey?

There are. Each candidate is allowed have scrutineers at the count. They are allowed right up next to the counting tables, in theory behind a rope, but in practise leaning over close enough to smell the papers. (They're allowed look but they can't touch!) They can see that every vote is being put into the correct pile. Then the piles are counted in front of them. (Usually into piles of 100 and collated with a rubber band) Then the piles of piles are counted. The returning officer will gather up any ambiguous looking papers and decide on their validity while being watched by all the candidates agents. The scrutineers are able to challenge any stage of the count. All the papers are then kept under secure storage in case there's a court challenge to the validity of the result.

upmeath · 24-05-2007 6:03pm

Ah it's all good so. It's just when I remember seeing images on ExitPoll or RTE News from the count centres in Navan at the by-election 2 years ago I remember thinking "that's an awful lot of people counting votes at that big long table there, and it doesn't look like anybody's keeping tabs"
Thanks again!

Sum1 · 24-05-2007 9:16pm

After seeing Galway City on RTE news it's stopped raining - start voting!

Victor · 24-05-2007 9:25pm

gonk wrote:

These are precisely the reasons voting by secret ballot was introduced in the first place.

In some countries the secret ballot was introduced to exclude illiterate voters.

JackieChan · 24-05-2007 10:52pm

This has been my first time to vote(and I'm 32!).
Missed it in my early 20's as I was in University.
And later moved to Galway and never registered there, only in the last 2 years have I registered.
It felt good to do my part for democracy and a nice walk to the polling station with my son!

seamus · 24-05-2007 11:08pm

gonk wrote:

Even if the Internet connection between voter and voting system could be reliably secured, which it can't at present

I'll have to be pedantic and say that the technology to create a secure* connection does exist. It's the logistics of making sure that every citizen at any computer can do it, which causes a problem.

My biggest argument against it would be what's happening to the information before and after it's cast. It's much easier to keep an eye on someone counting paper votes than to rely on the people monitoring data security, and to keep out people who may steal voting IDs in order to cast ballots.

* Let's not go mental here. Anything can be cracked. But the effort required to intercept/crack the secure connection for just a single voter would make it unfeasible for rigging an election

LostinBlanch · 24-05-2007 11:17pm

Victor wrote:

In some countries the secret ballot was introduced to exclude illiterate voters.

Ah but here there is still a mechanism which allows "illiterate" voters to publicly state which candidates they want to vote for. Has been used in the last 20 years if newspaper reports are to be believed.

A throwback to days gone by.

gonk · 25-05-2007 10:01am

seamus wrote:

I'll have to be pedantic and say that the technology to create a secure* connection does exist.

There's a good piece on e-voting by Karlin Lillington in today's (25/05/07) Irish Times.

She quotes, inter alia, 'from renowned security expert Bruce Schneier: "A secure internet voting system is theoretically possible, but it would be the first secure networked application ever created in the history of computers." (His emphasis, not mine.)'

Leaving aside the question of the security of the connection, as I have already said, remote Internet-based voting would be subject to abuses such as vote selling and voter coercion. No amount of technology could prevent this.

RainyDay · 25-05-2007 5:19pm

seamus wrote:

I'll have to be pedantic and say that the technology to create a secure* connection does exist. It's the logistics of making sure that every citizen at any computer can do it, which causes a problem.

Let's not forget the slight drawback that not every citizen has a computer, or access to a computer.

It's raining - stop voting!

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