For a politics junkie and a technology junkie like myself, the EU Elections produced results that were really, really interesting to watch.
First off, how about the wacky U.K.? Labour, which currently is the dominant party in the U.K. Parliament, wins only 15.7% of the vote – a third place finish behind the Conservatives and the Euroskeptic UKIP. The UKIP, which seeks withdrawal from the EU, only got 2.2% of the U.K. national vote in 2005, though it’s tough to figure out if the radical change over the past four years is due to the recent expense scandals, the EU having a proportional representation election system while the U.K. uses “winner-take-all” voting, a great sea change in the voting populations’ opinions, the idea that a Euroskeptic party would naturally receive more prominence in an EU election than a U.K. one, or some combination of the above.
Some days, I wish we had a NetVoyant for voters, so that we know what’s going on when they vote. I suppose we’ll have to make do with the more traditional type of polling for now.
Another interesting election result from the U.K. was the establishment of the BNP – the British National Party – getting 6.2% of the vote, putting them in 6th place overall, and entitling them to two seats. If you are not familiar with the BNP, they are, without exaggeration, the Nazis. That’s not a joke – the BNP’s political party platforms are expressly based on racism (including but not limited to anti-Semitism) and fascism. In fact, the BNP is so universally loathed that membership in the party is grounds for dismissal from serving as police officers, as the BNP is “totally incompatible with the duties and values” of police forces.
6.2%. Damn. Where’s Indiana Jones when you need him?
Well, at least there’s some good news; the Pirate Party of Sweden (PiratePartiet) won its first seat in the European Parrrrrrliament, and came close to a second one with 7.1% of the Swedish vote. This is huge. The Pirate Party did not exist four years ago – now it has a MEP (Member of European Parliament). Even if you disagree with the Pirate Party’s stances, it will bring more prominence to technology issues which have too often (for us techies, anyway) been relegated to the backburner of political concern.
Representation means more coverage of technical issues in the mainstream press, as well, which will hopefully cut down on the number of conversations you have with people asking you “What is this BitTorrent thing,” or “Why can’t you have ‘Born to Run’ playing in the background of the corporate Web site if Springsteen himself put it on YouTube?”
PiratePartiet also claims that they received more votes than any other party among under-30 year olds; which, if true, may make this a generational sea change.
Or it could just be a flash-in-the-pan, who knows.
The BNP got two seats not because of an increase in the number of people voting for them but because many Labour voters decided to stay home and not vote.