A healthy democracy depends on people participating in it. In the UK, the number of people doing so is falling. Voter turnout in general elections stayed above 70% from 1945 to 1997, and was more than 80% in 1950 and 1951. But it collapsed to 59.4% when Tony Blair won his second term in 2001 and, though it rose again between 2010 and 2019, it has not reached the 70% mark since 1997. In the 2024 election, turnout was 59.7%.
The decline has been acute enough to trigger concern among Labour officials - before July, the Guardian revealed they were drawing up plans to introduce automatic voter registration (AVR). In the 2024 election just 52% of adults living in the UK exercised their right to vote - the lowest proportion since universal suffrage was introduced. Crucially this statistic counts all adults eligible to vote in the UK, not just those who are registered on the electoral roll.
This story is from the January 02, 2025 edition of The Guardian.
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This story is from the January 02, 2025 edition of The Guardian.
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