The countdown to the General Election on the 4th of July is on. The political parties have released their manifestos, but how many of us really have time to compare them and work out which parties best fit our views?
An online voting tool, WhoGetsMyVote aims to tackle this issue.
Developed by academics at the University of Bath’s Department of Politics, Languages & International Studies, along with colleagues from a consortium of UK and European universities, this useful tool launches on Monday, 17 June.
It allows voters to match their positions on key policy issues to those of political parties.
Voters are asked to state the extent to which they agree with a series of policy statements. Graphical displays then reveal how close they are to the political parties overall, and on each issue.
Dr. Micha Germann from the Department of Politics, Languages & International Studies explained: “Research shows that many voters aren't fully aware of where political parties stand on various issues, and all the political spin just adds to the confusion. WhoGetsMyVote cuts through the noise, helping you quickly find which parties best align with your views.”
Previous versions of WhoGetsMyVote were available during the 2015, 2017 and 2019 General Elections and the 2014 and 2019 European elections. In total the tool has been accessed by more than 500,000 voters.
There is evidence that tools like this, called Voting Advice Applications (VAAs) ,could help to increase voter turnout, particularly among younger voters. There is also strong evidence that VAAs do affect people’s voting intentions.
Dr Iulia Cioroianu from the Department of Politics, Languages & International Studies explained:“WhoGetsMyVote gathers lots of 'big data' on what users think about key election issues, their current voting intentions, and their past voting habits. This makes it a fantastic resource for researchers who want to see how well the main parties are getting their messages across to different groups of voters as the election campaign heats up.”
WhoGetsMyVote is an exclusively non-profit project not affiliated with any political party or organisation.
WhoGetsMyVote represents a collaborative project involving researchers from various universities and research centres.
The project is led by Dr Jon Wheatley (Oxford Brookes University), Dr Micha Germann (University of Bath), Dr Iulia Cioroianu (University of Bath), and Dr Matt Wall (Swansea University).
The Research Group belongs to public universities and consists of the following: Dr. Jon Wheatley (Oxford Brookes University), Dr. Micha Germann (University of Bath), Dr Iulia Cioroianu (University of Bath), Dr. Matthew Wall (University of Swansea), Dr. Roula Nezi (University of Surrey), Prof Susan Banducci (University of Exeter), Prof Ailsa Henderson (University of Edinburgh), Dr Fraser McMillan (The University of Edinburgh), Dr Ed Poole (Cardiff University), Prof Richard Wyn Jones (Cardiff University), Dr Fernando Mendez (University of Zurich), Dr Vasiliki Triga (Cyprus University of Technology) and Dr Costas Djouvas (Cyprus University of Technology)