General / Off-Topic Identity checks in polling stations ? The project does not please to the British

[Boomer Kay]

voter ID of any kind is only of use in preventing in person voter fraud i.e. turning up and pretending to be somebody else who is entitled to vote.

1:1 voting is just one minor benefit of having a general ID instead of depending on evidence of an identity.

All the talk of uncontrolled immigration and (at the moment here) "multiple identities to commit social security fraud" are successfully combatted by having one legal document to identify youself against any state agency.

The security risk you have to cover of course is that it doesn't make you completely transparent and is not used in big data applications to tie all your other profiles together (that's why I have not activated the "e-government" function of my Personalausweis - let's be realistic, state employed IT goons are a bit on the weak side).

 

[Lianachan]

Ao a piece of paper mailed to you is sufficient proof? In the same way that utility bills at easy to steal so would this be.

Go to any block of flats, and go through the piles of post left in the lobby to get utility bills and polling cards.

As I said, inperson voting fraud is very rare because it is so inefficient. ID requirements are a sledgehammer to crack a nut, a sledgehammer that conveniently helps the conservatives.

The security of our voting system is important but things like postal fraud, religious or community leaders coercing voters etc are far more pressing issues.

In person voting voting fraud is inefficient, indeed, but it does happen. Quite a few people in the Scottish indy referendum were turned away at the polling stations because they had apparently already voted, for example.

 

[beelbeebub]

In person voting voting fraud is inefficient, indeed, but it does happen. Quite a few people in the Scottish indy referendum were turned away at the polling stations because they had apparently already voted, for example.

agreed it happens, but the numbers are small (in relation to overall turnout and typical margins).

It's true that t could be important in a very close (say 100 or so) constituency, however they would do a recount and extra scrutiny of the votes would take place. if the majority is a few thousand a few dozen impersonated votes are irrelevant.

in the case of a referendum it's even less vital as it's the popular vote rather than per constituency, so you would need several hundred thousand impersonated votes (clearly impractical).

As I mentioned, if you are told you have already voted, you should be able to raise the issue with the returning officer and make some sort of provisional vote. Every ballot paper is tallied on a register of who (supposedly) cast it, so the could open the box, retrieve the fraudulent paper and substitute the real paper.

Not every time it happens is the result of fraud. Good old human error also happens. People with similar names or a slip of the pen by an election official can result in mistakes. People with similar or the same names as their parents who also live at the same address can cause issues.

The point is that the level of in person fraud is very small (literally in the order of a couple of confirmed cases each election) but the number of legitimate voters who would be disenfranchised by the proposed counter measure (ID) would be in the thousands.

 

[Lianachan]

agreed it happens, but the numbers are small (in relation to overall turnout and typical margins).

It's true that t could be important in a very close (say 100 or so) constituency, however they would do a recount and extra scrutiny of the votes would take place. if the majority is a few thousand a few dozen impersonated votes are irrelevant.

in the case of a referendum it's even less vital as it's the popular vote rather than per constituency, so you would need several hundred thousand impersonated votes (clearly impractical).

As I mentioned, if you are told you have already voted, you should be able to raise the issue with the returning officer and make some sort of provisional vote. Every ballot paper is tallied on a register of who (supposedly) cast it, so the could open the box, retrieve the fraudulent paper and substitute the real paper.

Not every time it happens is the result of fraud. Good old human error also happens. People with similar names or a slip of the pen by an election official can result in mistakes. People with similar or the same names as their parents who also live at the same address can cause issues.

The point is that the level of in person fraud is very small (literally in the order of a couple of confirmed cases each election) but the number of legitimate voters who would be disenfranchised by the proposed counter measure (ID) would be in the thousands.

There were only something like a dozen examples in our referendum, which is obviously very small potatoes. I'm not sure what investigation, if any, took place.

 

[beelbeebub]

There were only something like a dozen examples in our referendum, which is obviously very small potatoes. I'm not sure what investigation, if any, took place.

I imagine somebody turning up to vote must trigger some "alarm bells"

A person turning up to vote when they are marked as having voted means something has gone wrong.

either

the person turning up is an imposter and the previous vote was legit - a crime has been committed
or
the person turning up is legit and the previous vote was fraudulent - a crime has been committed
or
there has been an administrative error - which must be resolved.

I imagine the vast majority are the latter and resolved "on site" by someone rechecking the register, checking ID etc. I can't imagine the reaction is "you can't vote because you have already voted, tough"

as you said the numbers are small beer. This must be considered when looking at applying the remedy so the cure isn't worse than the disease.

You could cure a corn by amputating the leg, but that would be daft.