First let me say I have no time for any politician of any party/country. I think they're all only interested in their own advancement.
It's not compulsory to vote in the UK, but I've always thought how fortunate we were to be able to vote when so many in the world can't, so I've always voted - up until the last European elections this year. The new candidate at our last local elections proved that no matter how high his principles when he stood as a candidate, he sooned decided to toe one of the part lines in order to foster his own ambitions. So I'm not going to bother any more. The average turnout at elections nowadays seems to be between 35 and 40 per cent. As we have a first past the post system, ie most number of seats won by a party which doesn't necessarily mean more than 50 per cent of the vote, that means that Tony became prime minister with his party having been elected by about 47 per cent of the 37 per cent of the eligible population who voted. And now he speaks and decides for us all. When I was teaching - up to 1997 - there was 'Personal and Social Education' at ages 14-16 in the school I was at, which included politics and the practices of a variety of religions alongside how to use a condom. Citizenship as a subject is supposed to be going to be taught in schools, but I don't know how far that's got. Imigrants will have to pass a citizenship exam some time in the future, which it was proposed did include the ability to speak some English. There had been no ceremonies for those taking British citizenship until earlier this year, when they were introduced and the format of those shown on TV thought by many to be rather silly. Jean in Poole To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace-chat [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
