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CHAPTER FOUR: PUBLIC INVOLVEMENT AND VOTING

Chapter aims

This chapter addresses four key questions:

• Do people think voting is important and are some elections seen as more important than others?
• Who is most likely to think voting matters?
• In what other ways have people registered their views about issues of concern and what kinds of people are more likely to do this?
• To what extent is devolved government perceived to be more open government?

Introduction

Voting

4.1 This chapter looks at the issue of public involvement in three ways. First it examines people's attitudes to the most formal and long-standing way of registering views - voting in elections. The survey asked people to rate the importance of voting in four types of elections:

• Scottish Parliament elections
• elections to the UK House of Commons
• local council elections
• European Parliament elections

4.2 Declining levels of turnout at all types of election in recent years have led some to raise the possibility that civic duty is perhaps on the wane and that voting is becoming a minority pastime (Bromley and Curtice, 2002). Such concerns have been particularly notable in Scotland; with turnout at the second set of elections to the Scottish Parliament in 2003 falling to just 49%, more people abstained than actually voted (Bromley, 2005 forthcoming).

Registering views

4.3 There is more to political engagement than voting, however. The survey also presented people with a list of fourteen possible means of registering their views about an issue and asked if they had ever done any of them. The list included a mixture of both direct and indirect activities such as contacting a politician, signing a petition, responding to a consultation document, or giving money to a campaign. One of the stated aims of devolution was to allow greater public participation in the decision making process (Scottish Office, 1999) and this question is one way of measuring the extent to which people engage in such activities at a local, Scottish or UK level.

Perceptions of openness

4.4 To understand whether people feel the Scottish Executive is meeting its objectives in terms of having a more consultative and open style of operating than the UK Government the following questions were asked:

In general how good would you say the Scottish Executive is at listening to people's views before it takes decisions …

And how good would you say the UK government is at listening to people's views before it takes decisions …
...very good,
quite good,
not very good,
or, not at all good?

Following a similar theme, the next question was asked in 1997, 1999 and 2000 to tap people's expectations:

Will a Scottish Parliament give ordinary people ...
... more say in how Scotland is governed,
less say,
or, is it making no difference?

It was then replaced in 2001 (and asked annually since) by a slightly different format of wording which asked people to evaluate devolution's performance in this respect:

Do you think that having a Scottish Parliament is giving ordinary people ...
... more say in how Scotland is governed,
less say,
or, is it making no difference?

In these questions the term "having a Scottish Parliament" is used as a proxy for "having devolved government".

Perceptions of the importance of voting in elections

4.5 Figure 4.1 presents the answers people gave in relation to the four types of election mentioned in the introduction. The first point to note is that, with the exception of European elections, a large majority judge voting to be either "very" or "fairly important". The second thing to note is that views about the Scottish Parliament, Westminster and Council elections are very similar. In each case the answers people gave vary by no more than two points which suggests that for these elections at least what sense of civic duty exists does so in equal measure. European elections clearly fare less well. Fewer people think they are important and, conversely, at the other end of the scale people are in fact twice as likely to judge these elections as "not very" or "not at all" important as say this about the other types. The fact that people were less likely to say that voting in European elections was important suggests that these questions also measured people's feelings about the institutions in question and not just their attachment to the principle of voting.

Figure 4.1 Importance of voting in elections

Are some elections more important than others?

4.6 It is clear from Figure 4.1 that for three of the four elections people did not seem to differentiate between them in terms of their importance. But are some people more likely to judge voting to be important than others? And do some people view certain elections to be more important than other types? Table 4.1 makes it possible to investigate both these questions. It presents the proportions of people who said it was "very important" to vote in Scottish Parliament and Westminster elections . These have been selected because they are arguably of greatest interest in terms of comparing actual turnout and voting patterns. Multivariate analysis using logistic regression (see Annex 2 for a full description of this method) was used to explore which factors were significantly and independently associated with the view that voting in Scottish Parliament elections is "very important". The table presents the factors that were found to be significant in order of the strength of their association.

4.7 Table 4.1 looks at those who believe it is very important to vote in Scottish Parliament and House of Commons elections. Table 4.1 shows that there is a gulf in attitudes to voting between certain groups, the most notable of these being political interest, age, and party identification. The relationship between people's level of political interest and their commitment to voting is particularly stark. Eight in ten (79%) people with a high level of political interest say that voting is very important compared to around one in six (15%) of politically uninterested people.

4.8 Much has been written about turnout in recent years and in particular about young people's voting levels and interest in politics (see for example Park, A. 1999; Children and Young People's Unit, 2002; Russell, et al 2002). It has always been the case that younger people are less likely to vote than older people but as younger generations age they eventually get into the habit of voting. However, in recent elections the declining number of young people voting has lead some commentators to express concern that this might no longer be the case ( ibid). Table 4.1 illustrates the stark difference that exists between younger and older people when it comes to their attitudes to voting: just a quarter (24%) of 18-24 year olds and three in ten (31%) 25-34 year olds ⁸ say that voting in Scottish Parliamentary and Westminster elections is "very important" compared with almost two thirds (63%) of people over 65. These questions were asked for the first time in 2004, so there are no earlier measures against which to compare change over time.

Table 4.1 Importance of voting in elections, by sex, age, education, party identification, constitutional preference, interest in politics and trust in government

Note to table

*The figures in the Scottish Parliament column relate to trust in the Scottish Executive, the figures in the House of Commons column relate to trust in the UK Government.

4.9 As elections are highly politicised events it is perhaps not surprising that there is a relationship between the parties people support and their views about voting in elections. Almost two-thirds (63%) of Liberal Democrat supporters say that voting is important while barely anyone with no party identification says this (7%).

4.10 The other main differences that can be drawn from the table follow fairly predictable patterns. For example, supporters of devolution are the most likely to say that voting in elections to the Scottish Parliament are important while people who would prefer the parliament not to exist in the first place are the least emphatic. In a similar vein, those with high levels of trust are also more likely to rate elections as important than people with low levels.

4.11 Of greater interest, perhaps, is the second question - that is whether certain people rate some elections as more important than others. There is very strong evidence that this is indeed the case. For example, almost two-thirds (63%) of Conservative identifiers say that voting in a Westminster election is very important whereas just half (49%) say this about Holyrood. The views of Labour and Liberal Democrats are pretty similar for both elections. In contrast, more SNP supporters say that Holyrood elections are important than say this about Westminster elections. Constitutional preferences clearly play a part in mediating such views. Independence supporters are the least likely to say that Westminster elections are important while those who would prefer Scotland to be governed from Westminster (as it was prior to devolution) are the least likely to say that Holyrood elections are important.

4.12 People with little or no interest in politics make no distinction between these two types of election, whereas more people with high levels of interest say that Westminster matters than say this of Holyrood. This perhaps echoes Chapter Two where it was shown that people with greater levels of political interest were more likely to have heard about the activities of the UK Government over the past year than the Scottish Executive.

Registering views

4.13 Turning to look at other ways of having a say about an issue apart from voting. Table 4.2 shows the options presented to respondents in descending order of how commonly they were reported. ( See Table 30 in Annex 3 for the list in the order shown to respondents).

Table 4.2 Different ways of registering views about an issue

Note to table

The column does not sum to 100% as people could choose as many options as applied to them.

4.14 Table 4.3 looks at the proportion of people who said they had not registered their views in any of these ways and, by way of contrast, the proportion who mentioned having done three or more. The pattern is very clear - people with no political interest, young people, those with no qualifications, people with no party identification and those with routine or semi-routine occupations are the most likely to have never done any of these things. So, although the number of initiatives aimed to encourage people to express their views has increased in recent years, certain sections of the population have yet to register their views in these ways.

Table 4.3 Number of ways people had registered their views by interest in politics, age, education, party identification and social class.

How good are the Scottish Executive and UK Government at listening to people's views?

4.15 Chapter Two discussed the fact that slightly fewer people said they had heard about the work of the Scottish Executive over the past year than had heard about the UK Government. In Chapter Three it was shown that many more people trust the Scottish Executive to work in Scotland's best interests than trust the UK Government. Here, perceptions of how well each body listens to people's views before taking decisions are examined. As with trust, people tend to perceive that the Scottish Executive is better at listening to people before taking decisions than the UK Government. As Figure 4.2 illustrates, twice as many people rated the Scottish Executive to be "very good" or "quite good" than did so for the UK Government (32% and 15% respectively) ⁹.

4.16 Prior to devolution there was a belief that devolution could lead to a more open and consultative style of government and as discussed above in comparison with the UK Government, the Scottish Executive has performed well. However, when asked how good the Scottish Executive was at listening to people's views 58% of respondents felt that the Scottish Executive is either "not at all good" or "not very good".

Figure 4.2 How good is the Scottish Executive / UK Government at listening to people's views?

4.17 Table 4.4 presents some of the key differences found in people's views about this issue. Multivariate analysis using logistic regression was used once more to identify the factors that were independently associated with the view that the Scottish Executive was "very good" or "quite good" at listening to people's views.

4.18 Trust in the Scottish Executive is by far the most significant factor associated with the belief that the Executive is good at listening to people - almost half (48%) of this group took that view, the highest proportion for any of the groups in the table. The regression analysis showed that the odds of someone who has a high level of trust saying this were five times that for people with low levels of trust once other factors (including education, age, party identification) had been controlled for. This kind of study cannot determine the direction of the relationship between two variables so it is not possible to conclude whether having a high level of trust leads people to think governments listen to people's views, or whether the reverse is the case (people who think governments listen, also trust them). And while it is highly unlikely that a government that puts specific effort into being seen to listen to public opinion will be rewarded by declining levels of trust, this alone might not be enough to actually boost levels of trust.

4.19 Those with degree or higher education qualifications are more likely to say the Scottish Executive is good at listening compared to those with fewer qualifications, though this is not the case when assessing how well the UK Government listens.

Table 4.4 Perceptions of how good the UK Government / Scottish Executive are at listening to people, by trust in government, party identification, education, and sex

Note to table

*The figures in the Scottish Executive column relate to trust in the Scottish Executive, the figures in the UK Government column relate to trust in the UK Government.

Has devolution given people more say in how Scotland is run?

4.20 Figure 4.3 presents the findings from the early years of devolution. The first point to note is that aspirations about this aspect of devolution (and indeed about all the items asked about) were particularly high in 1997. At that time eight in ten people (79%) believed devolution was going to deliver on this front. By 2000 this almost halved to 44%. However, while these high aspirations declined they were not matched by an equivalent growth in the belief that devolution would give people less say. Instead there is a steady increase in the perception that devolution was simply going to make no difference to how much say ordinary people have in the governance of Scotland.

Figure 4.3 Will having a Scottish Parliament give ordinary people more say in how Scotland is governed? 1997, 1999, 2000

4.21 Once devolution had bedded in the question wording changed and from 2001 and asked people whether devolution was making any difference to the amount of say ordinary people have. So while Figure 4.3 looked at people's perceptions of what devolution might achieve, Figure 4.4 presents evaluations of actual performance.

Figure 4.4 Do you think having a Scottish Parliament is giving ordinary people more say in how Scotland is governed? 2001-2004

4.22 Figure 4.4 shows that in each year to date the proportion who believe that devolution has afforded ordinary people more say has fluctuated between around three and four in ten. In contrast the proportion who believe that it is making no difference has moved between 54% and 62%. Again, very few people think that having a Scottish Parliament has given ordinary people less of a say.

4.23 The fluctuating pattern evident in Figure 4.4 is similar to that found with trust in the Executive ( see Chapter Three). There is a strong relationship between levels of trust and perceptions of how much say ordinary people have: almost half (46%) of those with high a level of trust say that devolution is giving ordinary people more say compared with just a sixth (15%) of those with low trust. It is, therefore, unsurprising that levels of trust and attitudes on whether devolution is giving people more say follow a similar pattern.

Chapter Five examines evaluations of devolution more broadly.

Key points from this chapter

• When asked about Scottish Parliament, Westminster and local council elections around half said it was "very important" to vote and a further three in ten said it was "fairly important".
• European elections were seen as less important, just 35% said it was "very important" to vote in these.
• People with high levels of political interest, older people, Liberal Democrats, supporters of devolution (as opposed to independence or direct rule from Westminster), those who trust the Scottish Executive, and women were the groups most likely to say that voting in Scottish Parliament elections is "very important".
• The difference between the views of people with high and low levels of political interest, and between political party supporters and those with no affiliation were particularly stark.
• Although the same proportion overall said that voting in Scottish Parliament and Westminster elections was important, some groups saw Westminster voting as more important. These included: people with high levels of political interest, Conservative supporters, people who would prefer Scotland not to have devolution.
• When presented with a list of fourteen possible ways of registering their views about an issue a quarter (26%) said they had never done any of them.
• The most common things people had done were signing a petition (59%), attending a public meeting (31%), and giving money to a campaign or organisation (27%). The average number of things people said they had done was 2.4.
• Certain groups were more likely to have never done any of the things, for example: 18-24 year olds, people with low levels of political interest, people with no qualifications, people who do not support any political party and those in routine or semi-routine occupations.
• 32% said the Scottish Executive is "very" or "quite good" at listening to people's views before taking decisions, just 15% said this about the UK Government.
• The most common answer given to the question about the Scottish Executive was that they were "not very good" (41%) while a further 15% said they were "not at all good".
• People with a high level of trust in the Scottish Executive were the most likely to think it is good at listening to views. Labour and Liberal Democrat supporters, people with higher education, and men were also more likely to think this.
• Young people are more likely than older people to think the Scottish Executive is good at listening, but this is in part related to their high levels of trust. It is not yet possible to say whether young people's views will change as they get older or whether this generation will carry their more positive outlook with them as they age.
• Since 2001 between 31% and 39% of people have said that having Scottish Parliament is giving ordinary people more say in how Scotland is governed. Between 56% and 62% say that it is making no difference.
• Very few people think devolution has meant that people have less say, but it is clear that the high aspirations registered in the years preceding and immediately after the establishment of the Scottish Parliament and Executive have not yet been met.

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