There was an interesting and somewhat concerning poll published by Sky News recently. Now this poll isn’t massive, it’s only 1295 people and it was only of Sky TV customers and was conducted via text message, so I would take it to a certain extent with a pinch of salt. It may not be fabulously representative or accurate. But, if the figures are do have some truth in them, then it may indicate that people may be considering what I believe would be a disastrous course of action.

The poll shows that a significant minority of people, 26% would boycott any European Parliament election that is held because of Theresa May’s wholly incompetent handling of Brexit. This would not in my view be a good thing. Boycotting elections rarely if ever nullifies them and by boycotting you are leaving the field clear for your opponents to have a clear run. The Sky poll shows that 43% of Britons are angry about prospect of voting in a Euro election, an election that has been brought about by the delay to Brexit owing to the incompetent way that the government has handled this process.

I would counsel those 26% who are considering boycotting the Euro elections to think very carefully before doing that. This is because if there are indeed 26% of voters who are thinking of boycotting the possible election then that is a sizeable portion of the electorate who will be voluntarily silencing themselves. When those who wish to see the government given a political bloody nose over the way that they’ve behaved over Brexit self disenfranchise themselves from the political process, the only winners are our enemies.

If angry Brexiteers don’t bother voting then you can be sure as anything that the Remaniers will. Also voting will be the Islamic postal vote farms which will benefit Labour along with those who bovinely vote Labour year upon year no matter how bad the party gets. Boycotting this poll, in which I predict the Tories will be decimated, may also benefit the slimy, Janus-faced, EU enthusiasts of the Liberal Democrats. Neither of those prospects, Britain sending loads of Labour and Lib Dem Euro-enthusiasts to Strasbourg, fill me with anything but fear for the future.

Unless we vote for the sort of alternatives to the three main parties in this Euro election, that are also going to be standing, then we as Brexiteers will end up being unrepresented and also politically outmanoeuvred. Boycotting will result in no pro-Brexit voice in the EU Parliament, nobody to throw a strategically aimed spanner in the works and nobody to build alliances with other EU Parliament members who share some or all of the views held by Brexiteers.

Boycotting a Euro election would be a self defeating action it really would. Britain has had some awful political results from people not bothering to turn out and vote. Part of the reason that London for example ended up with the truly awful Sadiq ‘Saracen’ Khan as Mayor is because the majority of potential voters didn’t bother turning out. In the last London Mayoral election only 46% of London’s potential voters bothered to get out and vote. These majority of Londoners could have voted for an alternative to Labour’s Khan, but instead they stayed at home. Unfortunately those inclined to vote for Labour did not stay home, they got out and voted and that’s why London is currently suffering the adverse effects of being governed by a slimy self publicist like Khan.

Boycotting the possible Euro Parliament elections is a self defeating activity. It will mean the government wins, that the Labour Party wins, that the Remainers win and they will do all they can in the Euro Parliament to frustrate Britain’s exit from the EU. It would be far far better for those of us who are angry at the delay to Brexit and who are concerned about having to vote in an election that we shouldn’t have to have voted in, to make our voices heard and vote for either one of the Eurosceptic parties or, at a pinch, for a Conservative who has a record for being pro-Brexit. Staying home on election day will not just achieve nothing, it could end up being extremely damaging all round. We must not let the ‘Apathy Party’ land us with representatives who will not represent us.