Thread by @jonworth

A quick thread on voting rights and UK General Elections

Who has been able to vote in UK General Elections until now?
- Brits over 18 y old, resident in UK
- Brits overseas for less than 15 years and who were once on an Electoral Register
- Commonwealth citizens resident in the UK (note: includes 🇲🇹🇨🇾 in 🇪🇺)
- Irish citizens in UK

Who I would *like* to have the voting rights in an ideal world?
- Brits over 16 y old, resident in the UK
- Brits overseas, regardless of how long they have been away
- Anyone with permanent residence in UK (Commonwealth, EU citizens, indeed from anywhere else)

Questions that would need to be solved
- how many years should someone have been resident before being able to vote? Immediately? After x months? after x years? (I don't know the answer)
- in which constituencies would overseas Brits vote (those never on the Elec Register)

- should additional constituencies be made for the Brits overseas? (as France, Italy do)
- should voting at Embassies and Consulates also be allowed?
- should the right to stand in elections be applied to exactly the same groups as the right to vote?

Right, now it is clear how it works, what I want, and what questions need to be answered, here is the catch

NONE of these changes should be attempted with amendments this week, or be done for a December election

There is no EU country that gives voting rights at national elections to citizens of all other EU countries. Yes, a Brit can vote in Ireland and vice versa, but a Pole cannot vote in Irish national elections and a Portuguese cannot in Finnish elections

Expanding the mandate like this is *right* in my view, but is massively radical and needs to be done with care, and to make sure the administrative processes work

Impact assessments and budgets for these things are good, right? 🤔

Just because the UK has lousy procedures, and you legally could make these changes in an afternoon, that does not mean you *should* do so

Changing these things needs to be part of wider political reform

So please be careful for what you are looking for here

And just because you are sympathetic to the case for votes for 16 and 17 year olds, or for EU citizens, or for Brits overseas, does *not* mean hurrying this through in an afternoon is a good idea!

/ends