Bored of the election yet?

Most people I meet seem to have lost interest in politics some time ago. Partly that's due to the recent MPs expenses scandals, partly because whoever is in government there will have to be nasty tax rises and spending cuts to keep the show on the road, and there isn't the ideological divide we saw in the '70s and '80s. Christians seem worryingly susceptible to this, but let's not kid ourselves that opting out will give us the government God wills. Extremists depend on apathy to thrive.

For me, I think it's vital that we all stay involved, and that we vote, so here's a a couple of ideas to help Christians survive the election and still vote.

Coverage: you could do worse than follow the Ekklesia Christian think-tank coverage. Every day, they are providing an alternative take on the daily election goings-on, providing a timetable of the day. See today's coverage here.

Action: Why not organise and host an election forum with the candidates in your area? Resources to help you can be found on the Churches Together in Britain and Ireland site (CTBI).

Personally I think a new voting system would also help. At the moment, it's calculated that nearly 400 seats are very unlikely ever to change hands under the current system. I would favour the proposed AV as an improvement which would be relatively easy to implement in our existing system. Everyone could then vote for their genuine first choice without thinking their vote was wasted, as they could still exercise a preference between the two most likely winners as a second vote. Of course if people thought their first preference wasn't wasted, it might have some interesting effects anyway!