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May 5, 2007
Scotland has voted
Two things struck me as odd when I cast my vote in this week's Scottish Parliament and Council elections. You can vote without the official invite that you get in the mail (that's normal), but all it takes to say your name and address. Since there is no official form of ID in this country, you can basically impersonate anyone else at the polling station. Going from polling station to polling station, you could cast a lot of votes. (Not that it would make a difference in the end.)
Secondly: ballot papers aren't folded or stuck in an envelope. So your vote is not all the secret. Funnily enough, the people manning the polling stations could see who you voted for - if they cared enough. That's according to my friend Gaya, who helped out at one of the polling station. (Gaya had her "big day out" from her office shared with other computer scientists.)
After two days of broken down helicopters brining in ballot papers from remote isles and malfunctioning scanners, the results are finally out. The Scottish National Party won (marginally). Their main goal: Scottish independence from the United Kingdom. Interesting times ahead.
Posted by dr at May 5, 2007 10:56 AM