Tag Archives: Electoral Reform

NOTA UK to present NOTA/VETO proposal at Electoral Reform Society AGM on 3rd December

November 28, 2022 Leave a comment

We’re very pleased to announce that NOTA UK have been invited to make a presentation on the urgent need for inclusion of a formal and binding NOTA/VETO option on ballot papers for all UK elections at the Electoral Reform Society’s next AGM in Cardiff on 3rd December 2022.

Myself and active NOTA UK supporter Rohin Vadera will be making the presentation online then taking part in a brief debate about the benefits of this essential democratic pre-requisite.

We intend to use this opportunity to highlight why, in our view, campaigning for a formal and binding NOTA/VETO option should be the number one priority for all genuine democrats, not only as a necessary reform in and of itself, but also as a logical first stepping stone towards the society’s objective of replacing First Past The Post with a form of Proportional Representation.

Obviously, the more pro-NOTA voices we have at this event the better. This is a real opportunity to make our case and perhaps influence the future direction of arguably the most significant UK electoral reform group.

We encourage all NOTA supporters to register to attend the AGM online or in person before this Friday 2nd December (please note, in order to attend you will need to join the ERS, at least temporarily, membership is by donation starting at £2 per month).

Click here to register: https://www.mi-nomination.com/electoralreformsociety

If you’ve not done so already, please do also sign our petition and follow us on social media (links below).

Thanks in advance for your support. Onwards!

Jamie Stanley
Founder of NOTA UK
28/11/2022

SUPPORT THE CAMPAIGN FOR NOTA ON BALLOT PAPERS HERE:
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Open Letter to BBC Question Time

October 20, 2022 Leave a comment

Dear BBC Question Time,

I recently applied to be in the audience of an upcoming November recording of Question Time in my home town. I have yet to hear anything back. I also put myself forward to appear on the panel of that show in my capacity as the founder of electoral reform group NOTA UK.

We have been campaigning for a formal and binding ‘None of the Above’ (NOTA) option to be added to ballot papers for all UK elections since 2010. I have appeared on BBC Radio 4 show ‘PM’ (2013), 5 Live’s ‘Ballot Box Brigade’ (2015), Matthew Wright’s ‘The Wright Stuff’ on Channel 5 (2017) and also on his Talk radio show (2019) as well as making a number of other media appearances over the years.

In 2014, we successfully lobbied the parliamentary Political & Constitutional Reform Committee (PCRC) to include NOTA as a proposed reform in a survey and public consultation on ‘voter engagement’. The huge show of public support for NOTA that this provoked compelled the PCRC to recommend in it’s final report (published 05/02/15) that the next government hold a public consultation before May 2016 specifically on inclusion of NOTA on ballot papers.

Instead, the incoming Conservative government promptly scrapped the PCRC and tore up all of it’s recommendations.

You are coming to my home town in November. At a time when the country will undoubtedly still be reeling from the utter chaos of the last few weeks (and years) while coming to terms with either yet another unelected (or previously ousted!) Tory prime minister or the grim prospect of yet another general election in which only two parties, both representing the establishment class first and foremost, can ever wield any power.

That is the exact same paradigm that got us in to this mess in the first place. Despite all the chaos of Brexit, Covid and the very public implosions of both the Labour and Tory parties, nothing has fundamentally changed about the undemocratic system that somehow passes for democracy in the UK since we launched our campaign in 2010.

Enough is enough. People are angry. Really angry. There are millions of disenfranchised, unrepresented people up and down the country who aren’t going to take this any more. Of all the possible ways that those people’s feelings could be expressed, supporting our campaign for formal and binding NOTA on ballot papers is by far the most benign, peaceful and ultimately transformative.

Clearly then, the time has come for our non-partisan, neutral campaign for real electoral and democratic reform to finally get the respect and coverage it deserves. With that in mind, I again formally request that you invite NOTA UK to the table this November.

For reference, our extensive white paper explains in detail what we are campaigning for and why.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Yours sincerely,
Jamie Stanley
Founder of NOTA UK
20/10/2022

SUPPORT THE CAMPAIGN FOR NOTA ON BALLOT PAPERS HERE:
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THE FUTURE OF NOTA UK

September 26, 2021 Leave a comment

Hi all, just thought I’d check in with some thoughts. I’m going to go ahead and assume that most people reading this on our site and profiles will recognise a) the total absence of any meaningful true democracy in the UK, b) the urgent need to do something about that and c) how crucial inclusion of NOTA on ballot papers will be to any kind of fightback.

The primary barrier to building this movement has always been mass awareness of how central NOTA is to the concept of democracy, and this basically comes down to funding. NOTA UK has built the current awareness, and achieved the things we have over the years (see here: www.notauk.org), with virtually no funding and in our very limited spare time – all involved should be very proud of that.

But if we want to break through that barrier and go to the next level, we will need proper funding and a full time committed team. The problem then becomes keeping it truly independent and free of outside agendas. History shows us that this is usually far from straightforward.

Basically, as things rapidly go from bad to worse in our faux-democracy, I’m extremely open to working with anyone who is qualified and equipped to help us secure the resources and personnel we need to take this forward, while necessarily remaining fiercely independent of outside ideological or anti-democratic agendas. Email is stan(at)nota-uk.org

NOTA UK online:
https://www.notauk.org
https://www.facebook.com/groups/notauk
https://twitter.com/NOTAcampaign

Jamie Stanley
NOTA UK
26/09/2021

DEMOCRACY IS IMPOSSIBLE

October 30, 2020 Leave a comment

I started NOTA UK ten years ago because it was clear to me then that a system that offers up two indistinguishable political parties of establishment power, and nothing else, is plainly undemocratic and not fit for purpose in a world of clearly ineffective and failing systems of governance – failures that have real world, often devastating implications for many millions of people.

A lot has happened in UK and world politics since then. Plenty of reasons for true democrats to be hopeful and despairing in equal measure.

But I think it’s fair to say that now, fully immersed in the shit show that is 2020, we have officially come full circle.

This is not democracy. It’s perception management. It’s propaganda dressed up as discourse. It’s the drip feed normalisation of lying, cheating and bullying as a way of life. It’s the elevation of the values and agendas of a small minority of hugely privileged and powerful people over and above the day to day needs of millions of ordinary citizens, all living at the sharp end of the massively unstable and unsustainable world that these people have created.

Enough is enough. A serious and prolonged fight back is long overdue.

At the VERY LEAST we need to be able to reject all that this plainly rigged and utterly corrupted system has to offer at the ballot box in a formal and binding way. That’s what ‘None of the Above’ represents (read all about why this simple reform is so important here).

But more than that. We need to take on and dismantle any and all anti-democratic forces that hold humanity back wherever they exist.

Democracy is impossible all the while our elected representatives can twist, distort and outright lie with impunity. It should literally be impossible to do that in any truly democratic system.

Democracy is impossible all the while bought and owned media can twist, distort and outright lie with impunity. It should literally be impossible to do that in any truly democratic system.

Democracy is impossible all the while powerful vested interests can control elected representatives and manipulate people’s perception of reality to the point where they believe in pure fiction and are willing to vote against their own interests year in, year out. It should literally be impossible to do that in any truly democratic system.

So – as much as I continue to believe in the democratising power of a formal and binding NOTA option on ballot papers as the start point for reforming any and all electoral systems, I hereby propose to expand this campaign to encompass all that is plainly wrong with the sorry state of affairs that passes for democracy in the UK and the wider world.

KEY ISSUES:

REFORM OF PARLIAMENTARY STANDARDS – provable outright deception by elected representatives should be 100% illegal and punishable in the harshest terms.

MEDIA REFORM – provable outright deception by supposedly independent media entities should be 100% illegal and punishable in the harshest terms.

LOBBYING REFORM – attempting to exert influence on government policy for purely selfish gain should be 100% illegal and punishable in the harshest terms.

Seriously, this is basic stuff. Why do we put up with it? Why do any of us go along with the pantomime lie of periodic elections between awful and ever so slightly less awful establishment puppets/muppets?

IT’S RIDICULOUS.

Get involved. You can find out more and support our campaign for formal, binding NOTA in the UK by following the links below and signing our petition:

Facebook
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NOTA UK website

Jamie Stanley
NOTA UK
30/10/20


NOTA UK: Ten Years On

May 1, 2020 Leave a comment
Firstly, thank you to everyone who has supported our campaign for real democracy over the years. If you’d like to make a donation you can do so here: https://www.paypal.me/notauk
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Ten years ago, I set up a Facebook page called ‘The None of the Above Movement’ to try to find out how many people shared my view that democracy in the UK is a sham – a Hobson’s Choice between two parties of the establishment with no way to register any kind of meaningful protest against that system at the ballot box.

Within days it had over 6000 followers – most of whom were culled in a Facebook update a couple of years later, forcing us to start again with a new group.

Since then, I have worked with various people to hone our vision of the one thing, above all else, that many of us feel our electoral system needs in order to be fit for purpose: a formal and binding bonafide ‘None of the Above’ (NOTA) option ‘with teeth’.

We’ve lobbied parliament, managing to get a select committee to include NOTA as a reform in and of itself in it’s 2015 recommendation to government for a public consultation (the committee was promptly scrapped after that year’s general election). I’ve appeared on various media platforms to try to raise awareness of our campaign and the need for NOTA. We’ve created a video series outlining the case for it. We’ve seen the Green Party of England & Wales develop a manifesto policy to include NOTA on UK ballot papers. All of this has culminated in our extensive and definitive NOTA UK white paper, published last year.

Brexit and the rise of Jeremy Corbyn – both seeming to represent genuine resistance to the status quo to different people – have made it very difficult over the last three or four years to cut through with our message.

As I write this – in lockdown due to Covid-19, witnessing the Labour and Conservative parties once again tearing themselves apart over their allegiances, their PR people and supine media spinning and propagandising everything as usual while people die in their tens of thousands, knowing that the undemocratic system I felt the need to rail against in 2010 remains exactly the same, if not worse – it is clear to me that now, more than ever, we need to come together and start banging the drum for real and lasting democratic reform once again.

NOTA is just one, albeit it crucial, part of that process. Recent years have revealed to me beyond doubt that, quite aside from NOTA’s absence, democracy is completely impossible when outright lying, amplified by totally unaccountable media and virtually untraceable dark ads online, is legal. The genie that Cambridge Analytica let out of the bottle is clearly never going to go back in, while a two horse race voting system in a multi-party landscape remains, in my opinion, a nonsense (although I remain critical of the Make Votes Matter campaign and their reliance on Proportional Representation to solve all of these problems).

I’ve written at length before about why I consider a formal and binding NOTA option on ballot papers to be the logical start point for full democratisation of any system of government (read our white paper for the low-down on that).

To summarise, properly understood, NOTA is an essential game changer that cannot be argued against without arguing against democracy itself. It’s achievable because it’s a democratic pre-requisite. If enough people understood that and were calling for it, it should only be a matter of time before its continued absence became politically untenable.

Once in place, NOTA wouldn’t have to ‘win’ any constituencies to be effective but if it did, it should trigger by-elections wherever that happened. But even if NOTA came second or third, any party that polled worse than NOTA would have serious questions to answer. The knock on effect of this would be that all parties would have to take stock, listen to what NOTA voters are saying and adjust their policies accordingly. Leading to a political landscape in which further democratic reform and the maximisation of the common good ought to become inevitable.

NOTA has never been about ‘not voting’ or encouraging people to try to ‘wreck’ the system. Once NOTA is in place, we wouldn’t then set about trying to persuade people to use it. If you believe a party deserves your vote, you should vote for them. But millions of people don’t and they are currently completely unrepresented. NOTA would give them a voice for the first time in history.

On the ten year anniversary of me embarking on this journey, I am committed more than ever to taking this campaign forward. But I need your help. We have no funding, no friends in high places. If you’d like to support this campaign, please consider making a one off or regular donation here to help fund the following:
  • PR costs (publicist, media co-ordination)
  • Campaign materials (social media ads, video content, leaflets)
  • Website maintenance/upgrade (domain costs, admin)
  • Time spent lobbying MP’s (emailing, phoning, meeting in person)
  • Travel costs (to meetings with interested parties, potential media appearances etc.)

Additionally, if anyone with experience of co-ordinating large scale campaigns shares our vision and wants to get involved, please don’t hesitate to contact me at stan(at)nota-uk.org

We’ve come a long way. But there is much work to do. Join us.

Jamie Stanley
NOTA UK
01/05/20

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You can find out more and support our campaign for formal, binding NOTA in the UK by following the links below and signing our petition:

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NOTA UK website

NOTA UK White Paper Updated

May 29, 2019 Leave a comment

In response to feedback, we have today republished our definitive ‘None of the Above’ white paper with a new summary clarifying exactly how a formal and binding NOTA option would work in practice and why we believe it to be such a game changer. View and download it here.

Make Voters Matter – a critique of the campaign for PR

January 7, 2019 Leave a comment

Alongside our white paper, we also publish today a critique of the Make Votes Matter campaign for Proportional Representation.

You can read and download it in .pdf format below (other formats are available on request):

Make Voters Matter – with NOTA

Feel free to share!

You can find out more and support our campaign for formal, binding NOTA in the UK by following the links below and signing our petition:

Facebook
Twitter
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NOTA UK website

Onwards!

Jamie Stanley
NOTA UK
07/01/19

Open Letter to the Green Party re: GE 2017

April 29, 2017 1 Comment

Dear Caroline Lucas and Jonathan Bartley,

I wrote to you last year, and then again in reply to your response, but have yet to receive a further response from you. In your first reply, Caroline stated:

“…the Green Party fully backs having a “re-open nominations” (RON) option on the ballot paper and I’d agree that a “none of the above” (NOTA) option is in the same spirit. It’s not possible for us to campaign on everything and I don’t think we’ll be doing anything proactive on this in the immediate future, but I’ll let the campaigns coordinators know about the open letter and your calls.”

I’m writing to you again now as it strikes me that with a snap general election coming up and talk of progressive alliances (that could, in theory, see the Green party forming part of a coalition government after June 8th) the time may well be now for you to do something proactive on the issue of NOTA / RON.

If you were to bring your NOTA / RON policy out of the shadows and in to the limelight, putting it at the heart of your election manifesto, this would, in my view, not only do wonders for our cause but also be a sure vote winner for your party among those who would dearly love to see a formal and binding NOTA option on ballot papers in the future.

I sincerely believe that to not do this at this time would be to miss a trick.

I also still feel strongly that the policy would carry more weight with the general public if you reworded it favouring the often used and self-explanatory NOTA acronym over the more jargonistic RON.

I look forward to hearing your thoughts on this and hopefully taking an important step forward with you towards real electoral reform in the UK at this upcoming election.

Your sincerely,
Jamie Stanley
NOTA UK
29/04/17

NOTA CAMPAIGN: 2017 General Election Strategy

April 20, 2017 Comments: 5

NB: This is a hastily arrived at assessment of the state of play. More detail to follow!

So, the largely meaningless binary ‘choice’ season has been brought forward with Theresa May’s announcement of a snap general election on June 8th 2017. As with any election, this will inevitably lead to increased interest in our campaign to get a formal and binding None of the Above (NOTA) option on UK ballot papers. It therefore presents an opportunity to further establish the urgent need for electoral reform as a mainstream talking point in the coming weeks.

So here’s my initial strategy thoughts from a NOTA point of view. Clearly, the chances of getting NOTA on ballot papers by June are zero and we will need to take the fight to the next government. As I see it, with the First Past The Post system being what it is, there are only really four possible outcomes at the upcoming election with some more likely than others:

1: A Tory government, either with a majority or as a minority government – LIKELY
2: A Labour government, either with a majority or as a minority government – LESS LIKELY
3: A coalition government with the Tories in the driving seat – POSSIBLE
4: A coalition government with Labour in the driving seat – POSSIBLE

Neither an outright Tory government or a Labour government are likely to be open to the idea of introducing NOTA any time soon. Currently, the only pro-NOTA party in a position to possibly end up in power in some small way after June 8th is the Green party, who have an official policy to get a form of NOTA (RON – Re-Open Nominations) on ballot papers. Clearly, the Green’s are not in a position to win the election outright and form a government.

So from our point of view, the best possible strategy, it seems to me, would be to support the so-called ‘progressive alliance’ with a view to getting a ‘rainbow coalition’ government with the Greens and others in a position to influence the Jeremy Corbyn led Labour party.

With that in mind, I propose that NOTA UK and its supporters spend the coming days and weeks:

a) lobbying the Green party to bring their pro-NOTA policy to the forefront of their manifesto, rather than hide it in the shadows as they have up to now, in order to show that they mean business when it comes to electoral reform and representing the currently silent majority

b) lobby the Labour party to commit to the progressive alliance being put forward and

c) lobby all other parties that could possibly wind up in a ‘rainbow coalition’ government to publicly declare where they stand on the issue of NOTA and electoral reform in general.

As stated, this is a swiftly arrived at strategy for the benefit of those asking what our plans are. Much more detail and rationale to follow! Feel free to share.

NOTA UK is a volunteer run organisation, if you’d like to donate to our campaign you can do so via the paypal button at the top right of this page. For an overview of our campaign and its aims check out our explainer videos.

You can also support the campaign for formal, binding NOTA in the UK by following the links below and signing our petition:

Facebook
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NOTA UK website

Onwards & Upwards!

Jamie Stanley
Founder NOTA UK
20/04/2017

Trump: Don’t despair, don’t get angry – get wise and organise!

November 9, 2016 Comments: 2

https://notaukdotorg.files.wordpress.com/2016/11/41351-6a00d83451bc8b69e2019aff686334970c.jpg

An estimated 55.6% of eligible voters voted in the 2016 US election that saw Donald Trump elected as the next US president. That is an abysmal turnout, but an entirely understandable one, given the state of the candidates and the level of debate in the run up.

It also transpires that Clinton, much like Gore in 2000, won the popular vote nationwide but, due to the First Past The Post (FPTP) voting system and the vagaries of the 100 year old electoral college system, lost out when it came to securing the all important 270 delegates.

Naturally, there is now much belated talk, again, of electoral reform and the ‘state of democracy’ and, inevitably, the focus has fallen on efforts to introduce a more proportional voting system. This is a red herring plan, in my view, that would involve tearing up a tried and tested system that directly benefits the two main parties of power and that can always be presented by them as ‘democratic enough’, even if plenty of people disagree.

But there is a much simpler, much more achievable and much more immediately transformative reform staring everybody in the face. One that actually already exists in some form in the US, setting out a clear precedent and an opportunity for expansion.

Does anybody truly believe that many of those who turned out and voted for Trump or Clinton, having opted for the perceived lesser of two evils, did not do so through gritted teeth? We’ll never know how many for sure, but I’m willing to bet that a great many of them would instead have made use of a formal & binding ‘None of the Above’ (NOTA) option on the ballot paper / voting machine had one been available.

It also stands to reason then, that many more of the over 100 million who didn’t vote at all would surely have considered doing so if they’d had the opportunity to formally tell all candidates and parties where to go in a way that could’ve affected the result if enough people had chosen to do so.

One US state, Nevada, already has a form of NOTA, but unfortunately it is a non-binding kind of faux-NOTA that cannot in any way affect the result and is therefore of little interest to disillusioned voters, some of whom are campaigning for it to be made binding and extended across the rest of the US. This is an initiative that we must whole heartedly support.

In my view, there is absolutely no rational argument for keeping a formal, binding NOTA option off the ballot paper in a world where pseudo-fascist populism and yet more neoliberal Wall Street / City of London puppetry are the only available options (if you agree, please help us to help you by signing this petition on the 38 degrees website and sharing this post).

But we cannot make this argument and take it to the mainstream without serious numbers and serious support. I have, more than once, tried to impress upon various organisations such as 38 Degrees, Make Votes Matter, Unlock Democracy and the Electoral Reform Society the importance of our campaign and why NOTA should be the priority of all progressives and democratic reformists.

Surely this point has now been made beyond all doubt. Donald Trump is the next US President, after all. Have another go at trying to let that sink in for a minute.

NOTA, properly implemented, is a democratic pre-requisite, representing as it does the essential ability to be able to formally withhold consent and reject all that is on offer at an election, if deemed necessary, in a way that can affect the result if enough people do it. This mechanism, in its fully fledged form, is currently absent both in the US, the UK and indeed everywhere, when it should be central to any and all systems claiming to be truly democratic. When understood this way, you cannot argue against it and still be pro-democracy, meaning that all the while there is a need to present the various systems we have as paragons of democracy, NOTA is 100% achievable.

A form of NOTA is already UK Green Party policy. We now need to get this essential, transformative reform seriously recognised and firmly on the table across the board. In my view, as a matter of urgency.

With this in mind, I implore anyone reading this to familiarise yourself with the current state of play and recent articles on our website and start the all important conversations with your friends and families about how coming together and campaigning for NOTA presents a golden opportunity for us all to meaningfully push things forward at this critical time.

Again, you can support the campaign for formal, binding NOTA in the UK by following the links below and signing our petition:

Facebook
Twitter
YouTube
NOTA UK website

If you live in the US, you can support and help draw attention to the need for a formal, binding NOTA option on ballot papers here.

Onwards & Upwards.

Jamie Stanley
NOTA UK
09/11/16