Turnout at elections is often used as a measure of public engagement in politics and in some cases this might be true. Turnout at elections for the Welsh Parliament struggles to reach 45%. UK General election turnouts fluctuate but in recent years have fallen below the 70% that used to be the norm.

A criticism of direct democracy is that despite claims of greater participation in political processes it does not solve the problem of voter apathy with voter turnouts for referendums sometimes being low. This is a misunderstanding of how the system works. Where a well balanced system of direct democracy is used as it is in Switzerland the measure of success is not turnout, it's the health, wealth and happiness of the people.

The most important role of the I & R system is restraint, keeping the political parties accountable. When politicians know that if they do something that the moderate majority don't want people have the power to stop them, or that people can do things for themselves if politicians don't do what is needed then something important is injected into the political system, a large dose of common sense and the restraint that comes with that.

The problem is that if the I & R system is removed then that restraint is removed and politicians go back to the usual government/opposition party political division.

In our current government/opposition format opposition parties can do little to influence government but if there was a system of direct democracy in Wales opposition parties could bypass government and put their ideas directly to the people of Wales. The outcome would be a more responsive and inclusive government as politicians of all parties realised there was no point in party politics. This could lead to the end of the government/opposition divide and a much wider coalition in government.

Direct democracy is not cost free. Referendums cost money but it appears that economic stability is a product of a well run Initiative and Referedum system and this stability creates wealth. From the voters point of view there is the cost of time and effort in voting on regular referendum days but in Switzerland voters seem to believe it's a price well worth paying. The Swiss people are free to abolish their system of direct democracy using their referendum system but they don't.

In the past on some Swiss referendum days turnout has been as low as 35% but these are usually on occasions where the issues have been seen as being relatively unimportant. Where issues are more important turnout increases. On September 27th last year there were five subjects to be voted on and turnout was much higher, just under 60% and that's a lot more than the 45% typical in elections for the Senedd. In 2020 the Swiss voted in nine federal referendums. Each referendum required the collection of 100,000 real signatures from registered voters. Collecting those 900,000 signatures took a lot of work from a lot of people and that's not apathy, that's engagement.

In an ideal situation politicians would work together for the good of the country all of the time. That's not what we get but the restraining influence of the moderate majority of people exercised through a good I & R system should get us closer to that.