General Election 2015: Should I really care?

The UK will hold a General Election on 7th May 2015 and the campaigns have begun in earnest. For me, it will be my second opportunity to vote and my first chance to vote in a General Election, having already voted in the local and European elections of 2014. My first vote was something I was really looking forward to, and I actually enjoyed it, so much so that I wanted to do it again, but, as I understand it, an election is not like a water slide, there are no second chances. 

WARNING: AN ELECTION IS NOT A WATER SLIDE

By the arrival of the polling day last year, it had seemed like a age since I turned 18, it was actually over a year and a half, though this was exaggerated and exasperated by the fact that I have been watching election nights keenly since I the age of 15 at least. I have felt myself to be both opinionated and informed enough since way back then (perhaps the lowering of the voting age may be a topic for a future blog post) and thus actually putting pen to ballot paper was a moment for which I had waited far too long. 

So I voted, for whom exactly? I will not reveal to you on the whispering, gossiping forum that is the internet. And yet, that election which would traditionally be seen as a less important, a precursor to the big one that is the General Election, may well have been more significant than the one on the horizon, for me anyway. It was the first election to the newly re-drawn Fermanagh and Omagh district council, and the European elections also threw up some potentially interesting dynamics with the candidacies of Anna Lo for Alliance and Jim Allister for the TUV, not to mention the interesting possibilities of further inroads for Sinn Féin on both sides of the border.

As for 2015, what's in it for me Even if the vote provides a minor thrill in Fermanagh-South Tyrone as it did in 2010 with just 4 votes proving the decisive margin for Michelle Gildernew, it will still be a tribal election resulting in one-upmanship whatever the outcome. The choice will be between the abstentionist incumbent from Sinn Féin, someone from the SDLP (Maybe Frank Mitchell, if their criteria from 2010 is anything to go by), a DUP and a UUP candidate (possibly just one ironically entitled 'unity' prospect from the two parties) and others who frankly won't make it near the post in this race; from the TUV, Alliance, a Socialist perhaps and maybe even a UKIPper. Im not a Unionist by the way, I will say that much, so that rather limits my options on any day. Also, UKIP lack any kind of significant presence in the North so are unlikely to feature prominently at all and even if they do choose to run, they'll more than likely damage the Unionist vote rather than the nationalist. So that means we miss out on any of the craic going on in Britain with UKIP and Al Murray and them (non-Republican) Greens and all that there. 

While I will of course exercise my right to vote, I do wonder if, in this election at least, there is any real point at all. My vote will not impact the next government to rule over Fermanagh from London.
(Unless an NI party should hold the balance of power: since Sinn Féin don't take their seats and the Unionist parties cuddle up to the Conservatives anyway, that would realistically leave the SDLP as the only potential party to be courted by a coalition partner or partners) I can not vote Labour or Lib Dem if I wanted since they don't contest the election directly though I could arguably vote conservative via the Ulster Unionists. Thus, in this General Election, it seems the broad strokes of representation are so general that they will manage to miss little old me in my home on the Lough Erne island of Inishmore, and perhaps, that is fitting.

I live in Dublin for at least 4 days every week, coming home to be fed and to hurl so, you may soundly suggest, I don't even live there, why would I want to care about the election in the UK? Well I do, partly because I am interested in its outcome generally, and partly because it may well affect my life, in fact it will. If the UK leaves the EU for example, what would it mean for me as someone who travels from the North to the Republic on a weekly basis for my education? Or if a Conservative government with its own majority was to allow fracking to go ahead in Fermanagh, what would that mean for me and my family living and farming in the county? Or simply as a young person looking for employment once I leave college during the next government's term, will my vote let me choose between austerity and investment? Arguably not. The validity and gravity of my concerns will, as I see it, be decided the forthcoming election, so it seems I will have a vote, but a vote without a say.