Thursday Polling again

Niall Murray in the Irish Examiner again goes on about Thursday voting. Making the point.

But the decision to hold the 1997 and 2002 polls on a Friday, when more students might be home from college, failed to stem the fall in turnout in all 10 general elections since 1973. They attracted just 63% and 66% of eligible voters respectively, compared to 68% and 69% turnouts for the previous two elections held on a Thursday (1992) and a Wednesday (1989).

Without highlighting various facts such as the register has been getting far worse since 1992, numbers of students living away from home has increased dramatically since 89/92. The number of voters under the age of 25 increased. Indeed the closeness of the election and the weather on different days effects the turnout. I could point out various polls as well. Like By-elections held on Saturday in South Tipperary had an 3% increased turnout over by-elections on a Thursday. Which is inline with international evidence. Or indeed the European elections in 1994 on a Thursday’s (9th June) turnout 43.5%, turnout 1999 Friday 50.2%.  Anyway the indo used the word temporal gerrymandering today so thats something.