No.

Tis a dimella Xoch!!!

Normally I reserve my vote to cancel out my hubbies vote... but even my 'tru-blue' hubby is at a loss this election.

There really isn't anyone worth voting for!

So... what to do?   Vote, not vote, or spoil ballot paper with "no suitable candidate" scrawled across it!

I feel the same  I've always voted but feel apathetic this time. The old saying is true "doesn't matter who you vote for the Government always wins"

*** makes no jokes about the Mirror and Labour ***

**cancels joke about member losing his deposit**

I believe that it was the noted philosopher Frank Vincent Zappa III who said, "If you don't vote democracy doesn't work!"
Ladies in particular should always vote after all the trouble your Foremothers went to.

Not voting by more reasonable people gives the likes of the BNP more chance of getting in.

I will be voting For SNP

Its not a case of not wanting to vote, or not bothering to vote... its a case of who on earth to vote for!

Hard to vote when whoever you choose to vote for you don't particularly want to win, or have any confidence in their ability to do the job.

Its depressing!

Snap

I`ve never voted any other way

I agree which is why it's so hard that I don't know who to vote for this time!

I'll be voting Labour, even though it makes sod all difference where I live.

As Joe says, voting, or just getting down there and soiling spoiling your ballot, is a right people died for, so I feel it my duty.

I also drag the kids along to rant to them educate them on their democratic duties.

I'm lucky (?) enough to live somewhere where my vote may make a difference. We've had Tory, and Labour.

.... at least if I spoil my ballot, then they can't add me to the apathetic statistic can they?

or can then?

I'd go for middle of the road lib dem... but their new proposals on lowering family tax credit thresholds would quite literally put us out on the street!  

Though if I vote lib dem then there may be a chance of a hung parliament... in which case they may not get much done... arguing & negotiating & stuff... but they won't be able to do as much harm either!

Ahhh... wish we had someone.... inspirational... you know.. like the US & Obama (not in terms of policy, in terms of excitement)... that kind of feeling... something to get passionate about!

No, I don't think they can.  I would like to see a 'none of the above' category included on ballot papers for people who don't like their choices, but until that happens, if people can't bring themselves to vote for any of their candidates, then they have the option of spoiling their ballot paper.  It shocks me every time how many people don't bother to vote - and then they seriously expect to  have the right to criticise the government or their local council.    As Joe said, women died to give us the right to vote, and I think everyone has a duty to at least bother to turn up at the polling station.

I think this has the potential to be the most important election in our lifetime and could well decide on how our lives are shaped in the future. However I have little enthusiam for Labour or Conservative. I believe that the current Labour regime includes some who are bent on carrying out social engineering which I find very disturbing. There are those who wish to have total control over every single aspects of our lives from birth to death. Several years ago I heard that since Labour had come into power, some 3000 new criminal offences had been created. The number must be much more by now. It's likely that every one in this country has committed some offence not necessarily realising that they are doing anything illegal. But in this country ignorance of the law is no excuse even if we have not had the opportunity to read every single law where a new offence has been committed.

And as for democracy, consider the passing of The Criminal Justice and Immigration Act of 2008. This was a major act which resulted in considerable debate and amendments at the Committee stage. A significant number of amendments were to be made at the Third Reading. (The Third Reading is a key stage in the process and gives the House of Commons the opportunity to discuss the bill and to approve or reject the amendments.) Just before the one day allowed for this stage, there were some sudden new clauses added to the bill relating to prisons by Jack Straw. As a result the one day allowed was devoted just to discussion of the new clauses and no opportunity was given to discuss the other proposed amendments so the bill went through essentially without discussion. This was regarded by many in the Houses of all parties as a travesty. You can read Hansard for the proof.

As far as the Conservatives are concerned, well in view of the present business concerning Ashcroft who can trust who? Which breed of Conservative will we have, the middle ground, right of centre, or right? Who knows?

Personally I will continue to vote for the Liberal Democrats as they are the closest party to my views, though certainly not in all respects, as a minority party they can afford to be relatively honest, and in reality this could be the best opportunity for there to be a hung parliament with them being able to exercise some influence.

I don't think we should abstain in prorest over the expenses scandal as what good would that do? Yes we could vote for one of the other parties, but I have concerns over voting for a candidate with a one policy campaign and although some independents would be outstanding MPs, how could a parliament consisting of independents form a governing party capable of making decisions which would be acceptable to all those in that party? As for voting for BNP, I have nothing but utter hatred for them and in the unlikely event that they had any chance of being elected where I live, I would vote for which ever party had the best chance of defeating that candidate.

End of rant, but I think this is a particularly important election.

ahhhh... I remember some of the stuff they slipped into the Criminal Justice bill (as it then was)...  one of the few protests I ever took part in, organised by Liberty.  was the bits they slipped in to stop raving... and the way they went about it.

Dirtyprettything, I've just noticed your comment on reducing the tax credits thresholds. Accorsing to the Liberal Democrats website, they intend to reduce the credits for those above average income so that they can channel them towards those on below average income. I haven't seen anything to suggest that you are likely to be thrown out onto the street.

yeah... and I agree with that in theory.

But the threshold they have said is really really low.   

I will have a look at their website when I get back in later... and check I have got my facts right...  but if I have then it would be scary for us if that happened.

An article in The Telegraph on Nick Clegg's recent speech concerning tax credits reads:

He said the average wage in the UK was £24,000 and people earning over this would not necessarily always lose out but the assumption should be that only those below that level should be entitled to claim tax credits. Mr Clegg said that people who earn like him, a salary of £60,000 should not benefit from tax credits

He said: "We would certainly take it very aggressively towards those people on above average incomes which would give us just over £3 billion."

I'm not happy with the party system anymore but there doesn't seem to be any chance of major political reform on the horizon so unless anything drastic happens in the next few weeks I'll be voting Labour. I could never bring myself to vote Tory and the Lib Dems just seem so, well, pointless.

We don't get the option to vote for labour/lib dem/conservative.... No darn say in the matter.

This election reminds of the South Park episode where they rip on the Bush v Gore campaign over in the states by having the school kids decide between two offensive choices for the school mascot, the message being that you'll more often than not be choosing between two people you don't really like, but you should still choose or else the system fails....

I honestly don't know who I'm going to vote for, the Tories have been sending me mail at least once a week for a few months now, both from my local candidate and from DC himself, but all it seems to contain is details of where Labour have gone wrong rather than what they are actually going to do to sort it out, which IMO, is where they've gone wrong since they had that massive lead in the polls a while back.

Furthermore, I realise that we are supposed to vote for our local candidates, but the fact that Gordon Brown would be PM again puts me off voting for Labour, and the less said about the rest of the choices the better.

Maybe I'll employ the tactic of eeny, meeny, miny, moe...

lib dems have the wrong leader from  stuff i've read, clegg seems decent enough, if a bit wishy washy in appearance, but i've read and listened to a fair  bit of vince cables views, respect to him.fair chance of lib dems picking up the local seat here, the tories have been a disaster in local govt. for us,spent  hundreds of 1000's destroying the town,ploughing  money into pet projects,that no one wants, but they insist on going ahead to ruin the place just a bit more.everything is mock victorian , a half arsed pedestrianisation  scheme,shoppers now getting mowed down by buses,shops going out of business not only because of the recession but also because the council in it's effort to tart up and sanitise the town centre means roads constantly being dug up ad nauseum,so no one can get to the frickin shops anyway,sanitised or not, and to pay for all this carnage, lets stop travel concessions for pensioners..nice one..

We have both a Liberal Council (useless) and a Liberal MP (totally useless)...this time I'll be voting against Brown and his bunch of liars and fiddlers, but not for Cameron and his bunch of fiddlers either....I'm hoping for an Indedepenedent on the ballot paper

I will be voting labour

If I were to base my vote on local councillors only.. then it would be Lib Dem.   We have a lib Dem Councillor in the next ward (the ward I live in is a Tory stronghold...  and the councillor is a complete nob imo) who has got to be one of the hardest working people I have ever seen.   I reckon the other councillors groan when they see him approaching... he is like a dog with a bone, won't be fobbed off.... and from what I can tell, I think he pretty much stands up to the rest of our Council on his own.    He looks a bit mad...  quite Michael Foot like actually...  but there's no doubt his heart is still very much in the right place.

Going back to the Lib Deb Family tax credit thing.... Thank you El Loro... for that Telegraph article.   Yes, its the £24k figure that scares me stupid.  We are over that... but not by much.  There is an ambiguity in the statement as to whether our tax credit would or would not be affected.

*sighs*... I am actually going to have to do my homework if I want to make an informed vote aren't I?

Me too Marg..

oh god.. I hear ya!   We have this white elephant called the VAF (visual arts facility)... they are ploughing millions into it!  For who?  No-one wanted it... well not enough to pay millions for it.  & insult to injury... someone has decided to change the way the traffic runs through our town AGAIN.   It was two way down the high street... then it became one way (with huge knock on effects throughout the town)... and its just been announced they are going to change the direction of this one way system next year!

WTF!  It makes me sick!

No grit on the roads or pavements in the town centre during the first cold snap this year though... not a single grain of salt!

This country has been brought to it's knees.To get out of this mess is going to take a very long time,if the damage can ever be repaired.When labour came to power 13 years ago this country was in credit,now we have the worst debt this country has ever seen.

I have to say I agree with this....There were no such thing as tax credits when we were raising our family, we both worked and managed to live within our means quite comfortably.....In some instances I have saw folk in receipt of these TC relying on them to fund holidays private schooling etc which imo are a choice not a necessity.

I'll be voting Labour, I couldn't possibly bring myself to vote Tory ever. The Liberals seem to have lost their way a bit, I did like Charles Kennedy but he naffed it up by having the odd bottle tipple too much, but I did like his passion and he talked a great deal of sense when he was sober

My constituency is the safest Tory seat in England.... I will turn out to vote against Mr. Hague, despite it technically being a waste of time!

Dirtyprettygirlthing, re the tax credits, don't forget that the Liberal Democrats would also intend to increase the personal allowance to £10000. That's roughly a saving of £700 for the lower and average earners.

thank you El Loro...  hubby was just saying about the increase in personal allowance... though he didn't convert that to actual money... so thank you xx

Just for the record (in response to an earlier post by a different FM)...  we use the tax credits as a temporary crutch..  to get us through what has been a really scary time... redundancy, unemployment & now my husband has a job.. but it pays less, a lot less, than his previous job.   & no, I don't "work"... not right now..  I have worked (& paid tax into the system), I will work again (& happily pay tax once again), but for a lot of reasons, I don't have a paid job right now.

Oh... & there are no holidays for us.... & I can barely afford my kids school uniforms let alone pay for their education.

Il be voting Labour, simply to keep my Dad in a job... currently is a manager of a childrens centre and conservatives plan to cut funding, which could result in a closure and he would be out of a job.

You would have received family allowance though Lee and at that time, no matter what a family earned, everybody in the country received the same amount. This is now called child tax credit, which is means tested. The more you earn, the less you get.

Yes Scotty I did get family allowance but it was a pittance in comparison to what some folk are claiming in WTC....They also are in receipt of FA too but if it's taken into consideration in calculating the amount of TC I don't know.