I think I’ll vote for … the funny-looking candidate

Friday 7th November 2008, 2:57PM GMT.

From Ruth Curzon.
REGARDING the letter (JEP, 22 October) from Lauren Perkins, a disappointed young voter, I noticed, when queueing to vote at St Brelade, a young girl in the queue with her mother.

I turned and congratulated her on using her vote and the queue then carried on a general conversation.
The girl first of all expressed surprise that there were two papers to complete. She had never heard of the difference between Central European Time and UK time and was very unsure what to vote.

Also, regarding the candidates, her opinion was that one of them looks funny and one was a friend of a girl at school’s parents. She quite obviously had done no research at all and was just going along for the occasion and to put her random X wherever.
La Cachette,
Mont du Ouaisné,
St Brelade.

1
Sean

November 7, 2008 at 4:24 pm

I think that your correspondent will find that outside the tiny group of the politically obsessed that attend hustings, read manifestos, find out which way their Deputy voted on important matters etc, most electors make up their minds on a whim.
Candidates can be selected or rejected on the basis of if they have beards in the case of men or are they wearing a dress or skirt in the case of women!
Despite the huge GST campaign plenty of electors would have told you that their choices were against GST despite having voted for it on several occasions!
Jersey politics is heavily personality led because of the absence of a strong party system.
For example, I read Ian le Marquand’s manifesto carefully and I asked several people who voted for him why they did so. Reasons varied from him being a clever chap to looking nice. No one could outline any policy of his that attracted them to him.
And one last big secret; the went to school with the candidate, played in the same football team etc vote can be the clincher in the country districts.

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2
Debbie

November 7, 2008 at 6:24 pm

Despite possibly having done no research it’s good to hear that the young girl took advantage of her opportunity to vote. It doesn’t matter where she placed her X, the good thing is that she did. Whereas many others didn’t bother to vote at all.

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