Hello and welcome to The Rundown, a podcast from Politics Home.

I'm your host, Alan Tolhurst.

After last week's somewhat downbeat look at how the voters are feeling about the country as we head towards a election,

we thought perhaps we could offer a more positive look at politics and why we should fight against apathy.

So who better to have on the episode than Joe Phillips and David Seymour?

We've just published a new book, Why Vote, How to Make Your Voice Heard in a World of Broken Politics,

alongside my colleague, Paul Home reporter, Caitlin Doherty, who I don't think anyone could describe as apathetic about politics.

So Joe and David, you're both experienced journalists who worked around politics for many years. What is the argument for why people

should get out and vote when Rishi Sunak finally calls an election this year? Because apathy

is dangerous. It's absolutely dangerous. It is the biggest threat to democracy. And I know that sounds

ridiculous and overdramatic, but it's true. What we're trying to say in the book is that people

over 65, the turnout amongst that age group in 2019 was about 77%. For people under 30, it's about

55%. So do we really want a country and a future that is decided by

people? And this is not about young and old, but actually if you want to have a stake in the future,

there's no point in sitting home moaning about it. And it really doesn't take any effort. You don't

have to be an expert. you don't have to be

political geeks like us, you just have to get your bum off your seat, or do a postal vote.

But take part, it's your right, and I would argue it's your duty.

And what you can be absolutely sure of is that you may think, possibly do think, and it may actually be true that if

you vote, it may not achieve very much, but what you can be absolutely certain of is that if you

don't vote, you're not voting and you're just letting the government be formed by other people.

Yeah. It's the one weapon that most people have is to actually go out and cast that vote,

...