Besides referendums, explain ways democracy in the UK could be improved and what are the arguments against them?

A variety of ideas have been put forward to improve democracy in the UK, however two key suggestions have become prominent in public debate. The first idea, championed by the Labour party, is to lower the voting eligibility age to 16. The principle idea behind this is to increase the spectrum of the public’s views visible at the ballots, making the electoral result more reflective of the nation as a whole. Opposition to a lowered voting age, namely the Conservative Party, argue the policy is only held by Labour due to differences between intergenerational voting patterns, whereby younger voters are more likely to vote for Labour, while older voters are more likely to vote for the Conservative party. This would mean that lowering the voting age would tend to increase Labour’s share of the vote.   A second key idea for improving democracy is to introduce mandatory voter participation. This idea is based on the Australian model, which sees a fine implemented to anyone who does not hand in a ballot paper, although voters can spoil their paper if they do not wish to cast a vote in favour of any candidate. The aim of the policy suggestion is that the more people that vote the more accurate the image of the nation’s views will be; turnout in Australia has not dropped below 91 per cent since the policy’s introduction. However critics of the idea say that forcing people to vote is in its self anti democratic, and opposed to the principals of a liberal society. Furthermore many people do not vote because in the first-past-the-post system they often feel their vote does not hold value, primarily if they live in a safe seat where casting their vote would be unlikely to have an impact. A final criticism is that often people do vote because it is hard for them to get there, and so introducing fines may be more likely to penalise the elderly, less mobile or economically deprived.