Poll: distrust in politics is the reason for low voter turnout

According to the opinion panel of EenVandaag, distrust in politics is the reason that never before have so few voters cast their votes in municipal elections. That distrust would also be an important reason to vote for a local party.

Aversion to politics is said to have caused a record low voter turnout of about 51 percent, and a record well over a third of the vote for local parties. This is the conclusion of EenVandaag after research conducted on Thursday among nearly 15,000 members of the Opinion Panel. Of the non-voters, 55 percent cite distrust in politics as a reason to stay at home. The second reason was ‘no trust in local politics’ by 34 percent, followed by the feeling that the vote has no influence (18 percent).

Only 5 percent cited the war in Ukraine as a reason not to vote. Political scientist at Leiden University Simon Otjes previously suspected that the war was an important cause for the low turnout. According to him, the attention to the war probably gave many voters the feeling that the elections for a new city council were less important this time.

Local

Of the people who did go to the polls, a third voted locally. Of the Opinion Panel of EenVandaag, 48 percent of the local voters indicated that they feel that local parties are specifically there to tackle problems in their own municipality. This concerned subjects such as practical, local matters such as the construction of windmills or the preservation of regional language or culture. The practical attitude of a local party was 30 percent preferable to a national party that, according to the panelists, should color “within ideological lines”. A third say they voted locally in protest against national politics. 15 percent of local voters say they chose someone they know.

On Thursday, various parliamentary groups also largely blamed the historically low turnout among national politicians. Derk Boswijk, campaign manager of the CDA, stated that “we did not show our best side last year” and his party, the PvdA, the SGP and the Party for the Animals believe that politicians should look at themselves. “The low turnout is an assignment for all politicians to act with integrity and to live up to the trust placed in us,” said PvdA MP Khadija Arib.