Faced with fewer people voting, growing disenchantment with government, not to mention the need for more votes, the PvdA is doing its best to bring politics back to the people, according to blog This Amsterdam.

It’s time for drastic action. The PvdA has been hit by falling popularity and so it has decided to allow non-members to have a vote on who will be the face of the party in four local council areas: Amsterdam, Zoetermeer, Utrecht and Groningen.

‘It’s a lovely idea. People will become involved in politics,’ says the party’s chairman Hans Spekman. (Spekman, that’s the old-school Labourite who oh so pointedly does not shave or wear a tie to show he is a man of the people.)

They’ve even taken to calling these pre-vote votes primaries, like America, to show how very democratic they are.

The plan still has to be approved by the party’s powers that be, but doubtless will get the nod.

Perhaps at the same time, the PvdA can look at its support for the new government, which plans to stop new arrivals – including EU citizens – from voting in local elections until they have lived here for seven rather than five years.

Somebody say ‘no taxation without representation?’ What price democracy Mr Spekman?