The Huffington Post printed a headline – “Sir Vince Cable attacks elderly ‘martyrs’ who have “shafted the young””. Vinnie was making the point that elderly voters thought that economic damage to the UK economy was a price worth paying for Brexit and that they were less sensitive as ‘few have jobs to lose’. This is stump-speak as Vinnie is standing for the vacant post of Lib-Dem leader as a septuagenarian, so he’s trying to energise his voter-base and broaden his appeal.
Vinnie, however, is a self-serving douche-bag and he misses the point. But he’s not alone.
Don’t blame the voters for the outcome. They voted. That’s what they do when asked. That’s democracy and we pride ourselves on it and on free speech. How dare you question the will of the people, you arrogant shit-heel? How dare you suggest an “old” vote has a lesser value than a “young” vote? They are pari passu. However, if you eat your own cooking, then you undermine your own position as a leader. If you’re looking to blame something, blame the voting apparatus because if you’re looking at the consequences of demographic imbalance (my words to try and describe your contention), every single politician in Parliament is responsible for this outcome – leavers or remainers. They are ALL culpable. But it’s easier to deflect blame than accept accountability, isn’t it?
Why? Because the system, the plumbing, the methodology to reflect the will of the people was unfit for purpose. No politician questioned it, yet they now happily or unhappily use the outcome to support whatever point of view they choose to adopt.
Firstly, the voting age should have been lowered to 16, for this and future voting purposes.
You can get a provisional moped licence at 16. You can legally have sex at 16. You can fight and die for your country at 16. You could receive the Victoria Cross at 16.
You can’t vote at 16 (although, the Scots did address this in the independence referendum, interestingly to no avail re: the final outcome…). It’s absurd.
Get off the stump, fess up and fix it, Vinnie.
Secondly, the terms of reference were too narrow, set by lazy-thinkers and irresponsible legislators i.e. the House of Commons AND the House of Lords. No one is beyond reproach.
Simply put, if this were a matter of corporate governance and the Brexit vote were equivalent to a vote by debenture or bond holders, it would be a “reserved matter”, a matter of higher importance than an “ordinary matter”.
The Brexit question was anything but ordinary.
Reserved matters typically have more stringent quorum terms to allow the vote to proceed in the first place, and the voting threshold thereafter typically requires a super-majority i.e. 2/3 or 3/4 instead of a simple majority. Brexit should have required a supermajority vote because it was of fundamental, long-term, existential significance to the country and to future generations. Don’t blame the voters; blame the structure of the voting system. YOUR system.
Get off the stump, fess up and fix it, Vinnie.
If you did that, then you would differentiate yourself and give people a real reason to vote for you and your Party. Until then, you’re just another vacuous, Westminster douche-bag, quietly poccling your expenses, milking privilege and looking for cheap, quick, easy scores. Please, please, STFU.