I’ve always loved voting. No matter how many times I’ve been disappointed, I’ll be out there next time round getting all misty-eyed as I put my X on the ballot paper and embarrassing the poor people running the show by blurting ‘Thank you for everything you do for democracy!’ before bolting for the door. It’s something to do with feeling connected with history and the bravery of people before me – the Suffragettes getting force-fed – but also feeling linked to the people fighting and dying for the right to vote all around the world. As Peter Robins wrote in The Spectator back in 2014: ‘If you want to see the places where civil society comes into being – in church halls and at school gates – you could do worse than look for polling-station signs. If you want to feel yourself part of civil society, I know of few moments better calculated to create that feeling than that of giving your name to a polite old lady, having it crossed off in the roll, and being sent on, no ID required and your polling card waved away, to help decide who runs your city or your country.’
There is only contempt for the Conservatives
But that was a decade ago, when we were still somewhat innocent; before the vision of Brexit, before the betrayal of Brexit, before lockdown and the culture-war capture of the great institutions. These are sour times for this happy breed; once so cheery and resilient, now we are as overcast as the weather we always took in our stride.
There is only contempt for the Conservatives, who have done nothing to improve life after almost a decade and a half in power, but there is no belief in the Labour opposition, which will win the imminent election, to make things any better. (The difference in the public attitude towards Tony Blair – for all his faults and falseness – and towards Keir Starmer – right now, a monkey would perform well in the polls against Sunak – is striking.)
The Tories’ last-minute discovery of the trans-attack on women’s rights and the woefully light punishment of ‘domestic’ murderers only raises the question, ‘Then why did you let things get into this awful state?’ Henry Hill of Conservative Home said it well: ‘They have on so many issues talked loudly and carried a very small stick indeed.’ My attitude is best summed up as believing that Labour will make things worse, but that the Tories are rubbish for letting it get this bad and must on no account be rewarded for doing so.
Still, no point crying over the spilt milk of human kindness; there will soon be a ballot paper with my name on it somewhere in Hove, itching to be crossed. I’ve never not voted and I don’t intend to start now. Growing up in the constituency of Tony Benn, I was a tribal Labour voter all my life until Comrade Corbyn took the helm. In 2019, I experienced the thrill of crossing the floor along with my Red Wall brethren – but Boris is gone, and with him the lure of the Tories to independent-minded, un-corralled people like me. Now Reform seems the only sensible and spirited option.
We have been regularly reminded by our betters and wetters not to vote for single-issue parties, as if this is somehow irredeemably childish – the political equivalent of blowing raspberries – but the longer one looks at the two main parties, the more they meld into one big single-issue party, that issue being a dedication to doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result while instructing the electorate not to notice this insanity. And don’t tell me that single-issue voting doesn’t bring results, after Labour lost safe local council seats over, of all things, Gaza; that half-wit shouting ‘Allahu Akbar!’ – and the party’s subsequent toadying to the pro-Palestine mob – will send more Red Wall votes Reform’s way than even Nigel Farage’s legendary likability.
I won’t be voting Reform with any of the sense of joy that I did when I switched parties in 2019, though I like their interesting mixture of politics which, as appeals to any sentient person these days, combines both left-wing (re-nationalisation) and right-wing (stop mass immigration) beliefs. We would appear to be, as a people, ‘post-hope’, which for this country especially seems such a sad way to end up. So I’m going to vote for whoever has the most chance of making us hope for something – anything, which seems a bit desperate, but these are desperate times. When I step into the polling station on 4 July, will my teary love of the democratic process come back? I do hope so – but if not, I suppose I’m a nihilist now. When I was young, I thought that being a nihilist would be glamorous, but it’s not: it’s sad. So I’ll be voting Reform and hoping for a miracle, against all odds.
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