Why I'm abstaining
David Shayler, former MI5 officer
Guardian
Friday May 25, 2001
www.guardian.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,4192475,00.html


In this election, much has been said about what could be the lowest turnout since working class men gained the vote in 1867. But it is disillusionment, not apathy, which keeps the average voter away.

Even Labour luminaries like barrister and writer John Mortimer, comedy writer Lawrence Marks and record producer Alan McGee are shouting their disillusionment from the rooftops. Many others watch in disbelief as new Labour has not so much drifted as marched rightwards to the tune of the Tory press. Few though have found themselves vilified in that press, persecuted across Europe and thrown in prison as a result of standing up to the government.

I have. I know first hand how Blair's contempt for basic democracy and human rights, combined with a control freakery of which Margaret Thatcher could only dream, has allowed the British state to become a sponsor of international terrorism. When I disclosed that two MI6 officers had conspired to murder Colonel Gaddafi, the government told lies, yet no one in the media seems remotely interested.

It's not just me. There are many others on both the right and the left who share my sense of anger and frustration at cover-up after cover-up. Despite the Human Rights Act, Britons still have fewer rights over their government than citizens in other western countries.

At the same time, institutions which could notionally hold the executive to account, like the House of Lords with its unelected but occasionally independent-minded peers, have been weakened. Is Tony Blair the only person in Britain who could have abolished the traditional Lords and come up with a system which makes hereditary peerage look like a meritocratic wonder? Yet, none of the major parties are properly addressing these constitutional issues.

In 1987, I travelled 500 miles just to record a vote against Margaret Thatcher in Conservative Beaconsfield. Now I can't actually vote against Blair because the alternatives are so dire. But we shouldn't laugh at the failure and feeble-mindedness at the heart of our democratic system. We should act. It will only change if we all stay at home this time or put a line through our ballot papers.

Just don't vote. It only encourages them.