Three University of York students organised a demonstration for voting reform in York city centre today following recent pledges from the newly formed coalition government to change the parliamentary voting system.
Some 150 people attended the protest and listened to speakers such as Professor Baroness Afshar and Hugh Bayley, the re-elected Labour MP for York Central. The protesters then marched through town, chanting “What do we want? Fair votes! When do we want it? Now!”
Speaking to Vision, first-year PPE student and co-organiser Caleb Wooding said he, Jamie Fisher and Ieuan Ferrer got the idea after attending a similar protest in Manchester last weekend.
“We decided to create a Facebook group and people just got involved. We all worked together in planning the event and it was really a grassroots movement.”
York locals Kim Lofthouse and Nicholas Thomas also helped plan the demonstration, as the students felt it was important to get out of the “campus bubble” and involve York’s local population.
“We had no idea how many people would show up. None of us have any past experience of activism, so we’re really happy with the turnout”.
Baroness Afshar, Professor of Politics and Women’s Studies at York and also crossbench peer in the House of Lords, commented that even students within her own department seem increasingly disinterested in politics and put that down to the feeling that their votes do not count.
“For true democracy, voices of the people need to be heard and reflected in their representation. Whatever new system comes up, it needs to enable people to feel involved and feel that their vote isn’t wasted.”