Online voting guides for European elections launched today

People who do not know which of the 20 parties they should vote for in the European elections can now once again fill in the online voting guides from Stemwijzer and Kieskompas. Both voting aides were launched on Wednesday. The Stemwijzer launch event in The Hague drew most of the party leaders who will take part in the European Parliament election campaign in the Netherlands over the coming weeks.

ProDemos developed the Stemwijzer. The vote helper was filled in around 3.2 million times in a month during the last Dutch parliamentary elections. Five years ago, during the last European elections, around 1.7 million people answered the questions in the Stemwijzer. Around 200,000 of those people did so just three hours before the polling stations closed.

The Stemwijzer asks users 30 questions about issues, including the distribution of asylum seekers, taxes for large corporations, the situation in the Middle East, nuclear energy, and the enlargement of the European Union. After answering the questions, the person sees which party is aligned with most of their answers.

Currently, there is little enthusiasm in the Netherlands for the European election. Around 300,000 Dutch voters filled in the Kieskompas during the last European elections five years ago, which is a very small number compared to the three million people who filled it in during the Dutch parliamentary elections in November. Kieskompas Director Willem Blanken said he is hoping that around 1.5 million people will fill in the Kieskompas for the European elections, which will be held on June 6.

Blanken said he considers Dutch voters to be very moderate. “Actually, the ChristenUnie should be the largest party in the Netherlands. The party has a social component and speaks a lot about humanity. They are moderate and careful, also when it comes to Europe. Everybody likes those elements. Most people are somewhere in the middle,” Blanken added.

Like in the Stemwijzer, the Kieskompas gives people 30 questions on issues like nitrogen emissions, immigration, the number of countries in the European Union, a joint European military, and social policies. “People lose their attention span after 30 questions,” said Blanken. The answers are then compared to the beliefs of the political parties.

The questions are decided after extensive research. The Kieskompas team refined their list as part of a study involving around 10,000 people before the launch. There is a thought process behind determining the questions. Blanken said, “If all parties think the same, then there is no point in the question. You need to be able to differentiate the parties.”

The subjects should also give a good image of the public debate. Left- and right-wing parties should be given the same amount of attention.

Yet Kieskompas has a question that Blanken did not want included this year. It concerns whether the Netherlands should leave the European Union like the United Kingdom did. Blanken said, “Only the Forum voor Democratie agrees with this. The other parties don’t. The PVV has left its position on the topic. Actually, we just think that it is a bad question. We decided to keep the question in any way because Nexit still gets discussed in the public debates.”

The question is supplemented with another question, which is whether being a member of the European Union has been predominantly bad for the Netherlands. “Forum voor Democratie also fully agrees with this, but a few other parties are neutral about it. That is where you can see the sentiment regarding Europe the best.”