Tuesday, January 28, 2014

Votes of Equal Value

One of the fundamental principles of democracy is that each vote is of equal value. Because this is not the case in the United Kingdom our democracy is flawed.   The Western Isles (renamed) has just over 22,000 electors. They elect one MP.   The Isle of Wight have 110,924 electors.   They have one MP so a vote in the Western Isles is worth five times the vote in the Isle of Wight.
In the European Parliament the United Kingdom has 73 members, yet the 15 smallest countries in the European Union with a combined electorate two million less than the United Kingdom has 173 members, so a vote in these smaller countries is worth approximately two and a half times more than in the United Kingdom.
These distortions in our democracy are a scandal and a disgrace.   They distort the democratic process.   When are the politicians going to do something about it?