The Parish Council Electoral Farce
The present method by which Parish Councils are elected is one which has troubled rural reformers for a long time. In particular, the Councils of Social Service and the Federation of Women's Institutes have passed resolutions condemning the archaic system by which councils are elected on a show of hands instead of by a properly supervised electoral ballot. Under this system what happens is almost ludicrous. If nominations are sent in, as they should be, then voting takes place ; if nominations are not sent in—as, unfortunately, in smaller villages they rarely are—then the clerk must ask for persons to be proposed and seconded, must afterwards wait for a period of fifteen minutes, and then declare these persons elected. The whole thing is calculated to produce the usual heavy-handed village humour. " Now, then, 'Arry, how about you? " " Me? No thanks. I can sit at home and look at the missus for nothing any day." In smaller villages especially the atmosphere often gets farcical, the most reluctant and often the wrong persons are elected, or, what is sometimes worse, the same old dry and drowsy council goes back for another three years. The reformers naturally seek to change all this. A secret ballot is most obviously needed, for it is
still a plain fact, in this twentieth century, that many a farm- labourer puts up his hand or does not put up his hand purely out of fear, however unfounded it may be, for the conse- quences. Fortunately, the country-squire-dictator is now less common than he used to be ; but the large owner of property still holds power. A reform which will give equality and secrecy of voting is long overdue.
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