From Benefits & Work Publishing
Election special: should you swap votes with a stranger or support the enemy?
This
is an election in which you may have to make tough decisions about what
to do with your vote, even to the extent of swapping your vote with a
stranger or voting for a party that has helped to slash your benefits.
The
polls, pushed by an endless stream of tabloid hate, may just have begun
to move in the Conservative’s favour. The possibility of £12 billion in
benefits cuts, hitting disability living allowance, personal
independence payment, housing benefit and carers allowance is still very real.
The
Tories themselves are pouring huge amounts of millionaire donors’ money
into identifying and bombarding a tiny number of undecided voters –
perhaps 40,000 – in key marginals. If they succeed in frightening them
into voting Conservative, the election may well be theirs.
And this is a tactic that won’t even show up in the polls.
So, should claimants – who have the most to lose if the Tories get in - also be resorting to ‘under the radar’ tactics, such as vote swapping and tactical voting?
Vote swapping was credited with taking seats from the Tories in the 2001 general election, it could certainly do so again next week.
And tactical voting takes a strong stomach, but it can also achieve results.
Green/Labour swaps
Labour supporters in safe Labour and safe Tory seats are swapping votes with Greens in Labour marginal seats using the Vote Swap website.
This
way the Greens still get the same share of the national vote, but by
voting Labour their supporters also get the chance to prevent a Tory
taking a swing seat.
It neatly solves the issue of whether to vote with your head or your heart.
Vote Swap claims to have arranged over 10,000 swaps already.
Lib Dem/Labour swaps
If you are in a Lib Dem/Tory marginal, you might be prepared to vote
Lib Dem if a Lib Dem supporter in a Labour/Conservative marginal will
vote Labour for you.
After
all, every seat the Lib Dems take from the Tories reduces the
Conservative’s chances of being the largest party. And the Lib Dems have
said they wouldn’t support the full £12 billion in benefits cuts.
There are undoubtedly still some left-leaning Lib Dems left in the country. The Swap My Vote
site gives you a chance to make contact with a potential swapping
partner to check out their political opinions, because you can only
register using your Facebook or Twitter login.
The tactical voting alternative
If you’re in a Lib Dem/Conservative marginal and don’t like the idea
of trusting someone else with your vote, you can simply vote Lib Dem to
try to deprive the Tories of a seat.
For many claimants voting Labour will be unpleasant enough, voting Lib Dem almost unthinkable.
But if it reduces the chances, even by a fraction, of massive benefits cuts it has to be worth considering.
You can read more about vote swapping and tactical voting on the Benefits and Work website.
If you have an opinion on this issue that you’d like to share, you can also complete our Vote Swapping and Tactical Voting Survey.
It’s anonymous, there’s only 4 questions and the results are posted
online as they come in. We’ll also be publishing selection of your
comments.
All parties are not the same
However you decide to vote, please don’t fall for the fiction that
we’re still hearing too often – that it doesn’t matter who gets in, all
the parties are the same.
The difference is immense.
In a report published yesterday,
the Institute for Fiscal studies (IFS) pointed out that the amount that
Labour are planning to cut from the working age benefits bill benefits
is . . . zero. This is because their 1% cap on child benefit uprating is
unlikely to save anything because inflation is so low.
In addition, Labour plan to actually add to the benefits bill by abolishing the bedroom tax.
On
the other hand, the IFS say it’s ‘disappointing’ that the Conservatives
still refuse to say where their massive £12 billion benefits cuts will
fall.
They
described the cuts as ‘extremely challenging’ and ‘painful’ and once
again listed some of the cuts the Tories would have to look at making,
including:
-
Taxing DLA, PIP and attendance allowance
-
Making all housing benefit recipients pay at least 10% of their rent
-
Abolishing child benefit
-
Reducing the child element of universal credit by 30%
The
Conservatives announcement today, that they will pass a law to prevent a
rise in the rate of income tax or VAT in the next parliament, only
makes it more certain that they will have to impose massive benefits
cuts.
And,
regardless of the urgings of Russell Brand, please don’t give up the
fight. Instead, go out next week and vote for your life.
Good luck,
Steve Donnison
Benefits and Work Publishing Ltd
Company registration No. 5962666
Dude Swheatie of Kwug responds to "a Green vote in Hampstead & Kilburn may let the Tories in" arguments
The Kilburn Unemployed Worker's Group is non-party-political and is
divided on the matter of whether to vote Labour to keep out Tories with
£12bn further — and unspecified! — welfare cuts. So this is a personal
view of a KUWG member who is also a Green Party member.
I say
that as a lifelong disabled person in my 62nd year, I am tired of being
serially let down by the other political parties. I have been a Labour
Party member 1980-84, Ecology Party meber 194-86, Lib Dem 1996-98 and
Green Party of England & Wales from October 2005 after voting Green
Party in previous council, European Parliament and General Elections. My
experience of a variety of political parties has taught me that each
political party is a coalition. And yet with its smaller size for
several years while developing policies that reach people the
more-television-advertised parties have lost interest in supporting as
they have sold their souls to global corporate backers.
Online
self-help network for carers and its related Pat's Petition are also
non-party political. They have now released a statement that makes plain
that Labour are not supporting disability benefits testing fodder in
General Election 2015 while Natalie Bennett is commended for doing so. Call for a Ceasefire for ESA. So will voting Labour in Hampstead & Kilburn ultimately do any better for vulnerable people?
Revd
Dr Martin Luther King warned throughout his activism and in his famous
'I Have a Dream' speech against "the tranquilising drug of gradualism."
My experience as a lifling disabled person has been that in many ways
that 'drug' has led to allowing things to get so much worse for
vulnerable people. And by contrast, today I heard that London now has
more billionaires than last year.
I close this comment with a
point about global warming. If and when the Thames flood barrier gives
out, there is likely to be considerable flooding of homes in areas like
Tottenham Marshes and Hackney Marshes. What would that do to London's
housing situation?
To this I would add that my own home parliamentary candidate is Holborn & St Pancras. This seat is traditionally a strong Labour majority constituency but Labour MP for several years Frank Dobson is retiring and the Labour candidate standing as his successor is Keir Starmer, ex-Director of Public Prosecutions. Moving around the constituency, I have been concerned about the 'Vote Labour' posters in the windows of estate agent 'HousePresso'. That seems to me to be a mutual endorsement that suggests that regarding housing, the Labour candidate supports 'exploitation of vulnerable home-seekers as usual'.
I would not be comfortable about doing that.
And ultimately, it is up to voters in their respective individual constituencies to consider their own voting priorities, and whether swapping votes will further proportional representation and an accurate picture of voter allegiances for the next UK General Election which may not be all that far away.
See also:
Vote for Policies interactive portal website comparing party policies with your preferences ()
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