During the 2007 presidential election, 82 communes representing almost 1.5 million voters, will not use a paper ballot and a ballot box as usual, but a voting machine. This causes a lot of fears and protests and some municipalities, like that of Couëron , regret having already embarked on this adventure.
On 29 March, the Constitutional Council issued a press release and a note on the voting machines . He recalls that they are allowed since 1969 (art. L. 57-1 of the Election Code) for municipalities with more than 3500 inhabitants. It further states that use voting machines to meet three objectives:
- economic: to reduce the costs of organizing elections and expedite the counting of results on the evening of poll.
- ecological eliminate paper ballots.
- Social : allow easier access to voting procedures for persons with disabilities.
short history of voting machines
Act 1: is the law of 10 May 1969 aa authorized the use of voting machines (then electro-mechanical systems) in France. The objective then was to fight against electoral fraud. The first machines were used during the 1973 legislative elections, but in total only 600 units were purchased by the Ministry of the Interior before being scrapped in 1988.
Act 2: After this first introduction of voting machines failed, a debate on electronic voting was developed from the mid-1990s with the advent of the internet. Election.com American society, including the French subsidiary was hosted by Regis Jamin (who has now created Election-Europe.com ) made the promotion of electronic voting and some towns such as Brest, Issy-les-Moulineaux or Vandoeuvre, engaged in this way. However, the Interior Ministry, opposed any use of the Internet for political elections, "the absence of passage in a voting booth does not allow the voter to protect against possible external pressure." For its part the National Commission on Informatics and Liberties (CNIL) issued repeatedly reservations about electronic voting, it does not protect personal data (see his opinion of April 2, 2002 and its resolution of 1 st July 2003).
Act 3: The option Internet voting is dismissed, the interior minister, Nicolas Sarkozy, announced in September 2003 at the Forum in Issy-les-Moulineaux, the revival of voting machines. In the months that followed, three models of voting machines were approved and used by a dozen municipalities in the local elections, regional and European 2004. In the referendum of May 29, 2005, 55 municipalities (Brest, Le Havre, Boulogne-Billancourt, Antony) had well-equipped, which accounted for 837 polling stations and just under one million voters. The constitutional council indicates that the use of these machines has resulted in no rise to any litigation. But will he do the same this year?
A mounting opposition to voting machines
For several years, computer scientists and a few citizens - first and foremost the indefatigable Peter Muller of democratic backsliding, now called computer-to- vote.org and the CREIS - rallied against electronic voting or voting machines. recent months, opposition took some extent and an online petition to maintain the paper ballot has been launched (almost 50,000 signatories to today's date).
Opponents of voting machines to refute the arguments generally advanced in favor of voting machines.
- They note that the savings generated by the voting machines are far from obvious. Certainly, we can print fewer ballots and the salaries of municipal officials will be less important (because will not have to pay for the long hours of counting). But the purchase of machinery which cost about 4000 euros per unit will be shown, if you count one machine per polling station, at least 3.3 million euros (but it would actually close to 5 million euros).
- They stress that the machines probably will slow the voting process, past experience shows that some voters, particularly older ones, find it difficult to practice this new way of voting.
- Finally, one wonders what will happen in case of failure, temporary or permanent, machinery: this mean there that some votes will not be taken into account, is there provision solutions parts and boxes and ballots back?
For these reasons, opponents of the voting machines demanding a moratorium and opening a real debate on the issue. Some also ask that each vote conducted on a machine results in a paper trail (preserved in an urn closed for recount in disputed cases) a clever way to ruin the main supposed advantage of voting machines: savings paper.
For now, the voting machines appear to have only two advantages:
- they remove the phase of vote counting . And that's probably what convinced the mayors who bought the machines because, in many municipalities, it is increasingly difficult to find volunteers to participate in the recount.
- they institutionalize the white vote . The 1969 Act provides that the power of a white vote must be provided on the voting machines. Voting machines are disappearing category "invalid votes" (gathering to cast paper ballots do not conform such as erasures or newsletters, or newsletters of two different candidates in the same envelope) and thus allow those who want to express a vote white to count as such without being confused with those who are wrong.
For information :
- site computer-to-vote.org is a wealth of information to be missed .
- Rubric Electronic Voting Site Padawan.info , very clear and well informed, is also worth a visit.
- The record of e-democracy CREIS (Centre for research and education in computer science and society) that includes some very good links, especially to the CNIL.
- The site of France Election , a company that sells the machines NEDAP in France, where we find answers to opponents of the machines to vote.
Tags: electronic voting - voting machines - presidential - election
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