Briefly, I was almost grateful to live in a Tory safe seat.

[nanila]

Our constituency's UKIP candidate canvassed my doorstep today. Too late, I remembered I had a full watering can in my hand. Opportunity: missed.

Although I was like, "I'm a non-white non-EEA* immigrant. You're done here, bye!"

* European Economic Area

Armando Iannucci, creator of such brilliant pieces of satire as The Thick of It and Veep, reminds us that this election is wide open. So if you haven't registered to vote yet, please do it today (20 April 2015) because it's the deadline. Remember, you don't need your National Insurance number to do so (explained here).

Comments

[cmcmck]

I am so looking forward to these idiots coming a'callin' and well done you! :o)

[clanwilliam]

Oh *dear*. What a missed opportunity.

Your actual response was perfect. If he'd had a chance to reply, he'd probably have come out with a gem about how he perceives you as white or something.*

*Yes, I apparently "don't count" as an immigrant, a rage-inducing attitude that I've heard for too many years.

[hilarita]

Damn. What a shame!

UKIP have not been a bit presence in my constituency - we haven't even had a leaflet from them. For which I am duly thankful.

[ankaret]

nanila, 1, UKIP 0.

I gave them my NI number, which I somewhat improbably had found on an old P45 when unpacking a week or so earlier, and they still wrote to me wanting a scan of my passport. If it's this annoying to get on the register when you've voted at every election since 1992, God alone knows how offputting it must be if you're young or don't have a stable address or both.

Registered - by the skin of my teeth

[caulkhead]

I nearly missed because I registered online, requested a postal vote, as I will be on holiday, then thought that was sorted. Luckily, I did my filing this weekend and realised that I had only requested a request form (huh?) and still had to fill that out and send it back. Just in time to do so.

[nanila]

They wanted a scan of your passport? Is that allowed? I mean, I realise a lot more Brits have passports than Americans, but it seems a bit much to me to request a piece of proof of identity that must be paid for (and that isn't cheap).

Re: Registered - by the skin of my teeth

[nanila]

Phew, I'm glad you discovered it in time! \o/

[nanila]

I'm consoling myself with the thought that the plants will do a lot more good with the water.

[nanila]

Oh yes, the classic "let's pit the immigrants against each other so they don't notice how racist we're being" strategy. Works almost as well as the "let's pit the deserving poor against the 'undeserving' poor so they forget to be pissed off at the rich" thing that both major parties have going on right now. *headdesk*

[nanila]

Much as I don't want to wish them on anyone, I look forward to hearing the report if they do find you at home.

[lark_ascends]

Great reply.

[ankaret]

I think there were some other options like a drivers licence or multiple utility bills, but I can't drive and at that point we hadn't been in this place long enough to rack up even one utility bill, so the passport was the only option unless I wanted to go to Bodmin and argue with them in person, which I didn't so much. Then I had to ring them up and tell them that the seller's daughter had moved out when her father did and not to send any more official letters here for her, and finally they delivered us our polling cards in the post along with one for a bloke down the road.

Meanwhile Bristol City Council were sending 'we believe you are not living at this place where you were registered to vote in Bristol and we are going to take you off the register', but only to me, not to Peter, who might still be registered in both places for all I know. It was just a minor nuisance and source of amusement for me, but I can see that it wouldn't feel like any kind of joke at all if your first language wasn't English and you were scared of official letters.

Re: Registered - by the skin of my teeth

[ankaret]

Hooray!

[davidgillon]

Too late, I remembered I had a full watering can in my hand. Opportunity: missed.

But you can treasure the image in your imagination, as indeed can all of us.

Any UKIP canvassers at my door can expect a short, sharp conversation about the paragraph in their manifesto which bewails able-bodied Europeans coming over here and taking jobs we disabled types could have had, and gives a complete bye to the British employers being disablist bigots (not to mention acting illegally) in their own damned example!

[cmcmck]

As I work from home, there's a more than even chance! :o)

[antisoppist]

I accidentally disenfranchised us by presumably pressing the wrong button when confirming the electoral roll was correct on their phone system and then ignoring all the letters because I assumed they were wrong in telling me I wasn't on the electoral roll (Because I had confirmed by phone!) and because last year I was letting all the official post pile up on a corner of the dresser until I was in a state to cope with it.

But I did finally fill in the form in February, with national insurance numbers, and when the next letter saying we weren't registered turned up, I phoned them and a nice lady assured me I was registered and not to panic.

We now have polling cards. Fortunately this time they have not told the EU citizen that he is allowed to vote in the general election, like they did last time, whereupon the polling officer said "oh dear, could you persuade him not to try because if he did it might be embarrassing", fear of embarrassment being how we tackle potential electoral fraud round here.

[sunflowerinrain]

I keep checking, nervously, to make sure I really am registered. Last time they sent out the postal voting forms too late, and this time they will probably be even more disorganised.

[sunflowerinrain]

Because UK doesn't like ID cards (free to citizens), passports (expensive) have become the usual form of proof, to the point that some ditzy HR groups insist that employees have to proffer a current passport to prove that they are working legally. Causes severe hassle to people too skint to afford a passport, or indeed travel.

[sunflowerinrain]

Lovely.

I do wish you had poured it negligently over the front of their trousers. Never mind, the image of such an action is beautifully clear.

[cxcvi]

Causes severe hassle to people too skint to afford a passport, or indeed travel.

And to people trying to live.

I'm not sure how much I've talked about this, but not having a passport prior to mid-2013 prevented me from being able to move out of a very unsafe (and still unsafe) place. And I basically only had one person that I could even remotely possibly ask to countersign my photo. And after all of the mental (and physical; almost getting stuck in a photo booth didn't help matters) hell that I went through, it still has a fucking M on it, something that will cost me even more money to fix...

I'm just glad that, by comparison to all of this, my voting registration process was relatively pain free. Even with all of my feelings about how I might want to vote...