Twelve men and their captain leap into the life boats. The timber ship has broken her back on rocks and they have seconds to save themselves. They manage to reach the beach through the crashing waves, pull up the boats and huddle together, shivering. The place is the Antarctic and the man faced with the problem of survival, Captain Ernest Shackleton. The choice is either escape in the boats, or stay and wait for help. They vote. The result is six/six. Captain Shackleton decides that six should camp there under an upturned boat and the rest take the other boat to get help. The outcome of this decision, in which one half of the crew did save the lives of the others, was not divisive but mutually rewarding.

Democracy doesn’t work that way. With a 50 ½ to 49 ½ result, the majority win. In Shackleton’s case, all would have been morally forced to make the perilous journey in an open boat.  The minority clique would moan all the way and constantly demoralise everyone.

The elephant not in the room, during the parliamentary election process, are those who chose not to vote. If you ask them why the replies are;

‘I don’t trust/like politicians’

‘What is the point, the ****** Party will get in anyway’

‘It’s all a load of rubbish’

‘I’m too busy to vote’

‘It’s raining’

‘I walked the dog already so I am not going out again’

We are all familiar with the responses of those asked why they do not exercise their democratic right. Where would Captain Shackleton have been if one third of his men decided not to vote?

How can democracy engage all it’s citizens, as surely it should?

You can enforce voting by law, as in some countries, but this is too close to autocracy for many.

What can you do to voters who decide not to vote on account of the weather? A large part (sometimes the majority) are so disengaged with politics that the winning party are sometimes a minority of those legible to vote. Democracy in the UK has a problem but there is an alternative.

There is another form of democracy which avoids the voting for representatives. It is called ‘direct democracy’.

In Plato’s time the democratic city consisted of no more than 1008 people. This is the number who can stand in a circle and listen to a single speaker. This is direct democracy; no representatives. By removing the ‘middle man’, who is often the cause of the disgruntled not voting, voters are empowered in a directly personal way.

As a side issue, you might also think it odd that in the twenty first century, we vote by making a mark on a piece of paper with a stubby pencil in a makeshift polling booth at the local library. Isn’t that rather old fashioned in an age of global communication? How is it that viewers can vote for their favourite couple on ‘Strictly Come Dancing’ but can’t vote on whether there are too many immigrants or whether to declare war on another country?

I do not know but I expect there are boffin s in the Civil Service working on an Application that is completely secure and personal to each citizen. With it, citizens can vote on political issues, both local and national, regularly. How regularly? Well Switzerland already has four referendums a year and this system is generally praised across Europe for it’s success in engaging it’s citizens in political choice.

And perhaps an Application is not the solution either. After all, not every citizen has a cell phone and we must wait for the ‘My Vote App‘ to appear on everyone’s voice controlled television

Another method of voting for the present, is not to vote for party’s, policies or people. These are all fraught with over simplification and all that brings. Instead a citizen will be empowered to decide how their personal taxes are divided for different government departments. The tax form will have a box for each department ; education, defence, food and fisheries, health etc. Voting for policy is conducted in fine detail through an existing system; annual tax returns.

A citizen ticks only the boxes to which he or she wishes their taxes to be allocated. Three ticks means your tax goes three ways, six ticks separates it six ways…simple. As a result the different government departments might receive a surge in funding to empower them to address issues that citizens tell them deserve money. Not only the cause but the strength of their belief and desire is acknowledge.

Whilst it may be true that money does not solve problems how often in response to criticism have you heard a Prime Minister defend policy by saying how much money has been spent and how this will be increased?

So particularly in a period of ‘austerity’, allocating money to the NHS proportionately to the will of the people would be a huge step forward for Democracy and calm discontent with central government.

It may not be perfect and perhaps there is another way. Living in an age where artificial intelligence is making the decisions that hold the Stock Market together, isn’t it time for AI to help us voice our political choices?

The Platonic city will live again and instead of dropping black or white stones into a container or scribbling on a bit of paper – citizen democracy will move into the age of technology making the impossible, possible. In doing so it will bring together all citizens instead of just those who happen to own an umbrella or need to walk the dog.