I’ve been involved in helping facilitate two UK General Election campaign websites. I’ve supported on sites for both Scottish parliamentary elections. And I’ve worked on the Northern Ireland Assembly elections as well. Part of my role was to look at the data: what pages were people engaging with the most?
Every time it was the same. The most popular part of CARE’s election sites is the manifesto analysis we provide. This is both unsurprising and also, I think, really encouraging.
It is unsurprising because it is the manifestos that tell us what a political party aspires to do if they get into power. It sets out their legislative agenda but it also gives you a sense of their political philosophy and helps you better understand how they plan to realise their ambitions.
For example, in 2019, the leading Conservative pledges, which ultimately got them elected were things like: leaving the EU by January 2020; introducing a points-based immigration system; no rises in income tax, VAT or National Insurance; pensions to rise by at least 2.5% per year, as part of retaining the Triple Lock; and achieving Net Zero by 2050.
For concerned Christian voters, who genuinely are seeking God’s wisdom on how to vote, engaging with the party manifestos is an absolute must!
I also find it really encouraging, because it suggests a seriousness from some Christian voters. They want to understand and assess what the party’s are saying.
Maybe this is just to check the party they already plan to vote for is not planning something horrendous! Or maybe it is because they are a real ‘swing voter’ and need help discerning and deciding who to go for. But it suggests they take their responsibility seriously. Whether it be the environment, the economy or education, the issues parties are making pledges on genuinely matter.
There is one more reason to engage with the manifestos. Our relationship with the election should extend beyond the result.
Not only must we pray for those who get elected (1 Timothy 2:1-4), but we also have a God-given responsibility to hold them to account. This is part of the privilege of living in a democracy.
And one of the main ways we can hold parties, politicians and Prime Ministers to account, is to look at what they promised to do in their manifesto and hold them to it! As Christians, we believe in keeping our promises, partly because we follow a God who always keeps his promises to us!
You can use this in dialogue with your MP. If the party they represent is failing to keep a promise, you can warn your MP that this will impact your vote at the next election. At the very least, this might prompt them to raise it with the government.
Parties who don’t keep their promises tend to be punished at the ballot box. Just think of the Liberal Democrats in 2015, after they had reneged on their promise to vote against any potential rise on tuition fees. Indeed, in some quarters, people are turning away from the Conservative Party in particular in this election, due to a perception that they haven’t kept to their manifesto pledges (although in fairness to the Conservatives, all their grand plans were rather quickly disrupted by a global pandemic!).
Manifestos normally come out a few weeks from decision day. This election, CARE’s site will not only feature analysis of what parties are saying on ‘our issues’. It will provide a broader analysis, which we hope will be doubly useful to you.
