Memorandum by Tameside Metropolitan Borough
Council (PVF 08)
GENERAL
1. Owing to the lateness of the legislation
the printer failed to meet the deadline for Royal Mail to deliver
all postal vote packs to the electorate in Tameside by Friday
28 May 2004. As a consequence the Council determined to have the
postal vote packs delivered by Council employees over the bank
holiday weekend.
2. The problem was exacerbated by the later
deadline of 17 May for the appointment of proxies and notifying
the Returning Officer of any different address they wished to
have their postal vote packs delivered to.
3. The selection of the North West Region
as a postal pilot area in itself was not a problem. However, having
Royal Mail dictate a very prescriptive and complex technical specification
compounded the printer problems referred to in (1) and (2) above.
4. One report to Greater Manchester Police
about allegations of fraud over a candidate handling ballot papers
against the advice in the local protocol.
PRINTING AND
DISTRIBUTION
5. Given the timescales involved and technical
specification there were printer capacity problems as experienced
by my authority.
6. No requirement to reprint any ballot
papers.
7. Royal Mail worked in close partnership
with the Council and no problems were experienced with regards
the return of postal votes. However, due to no fault of their
own Royal Mail was unable to meet the delivery deadlines agreed
with them.
8. All ballot papers were hand delivered
by Council employees, with the exception of remote locations and
properties where Council employees were unable to gain access
to such properties.
9. The Council replaced a total of 208 postal
vote packs, with 200 of these being electors who claimed to have
not received their original postal vote packs.
VOTING PRACTICALITIES
AND RETURNS
10. (a) Over 400 declarations of identity
were returned to electors due to their being incomplete witness
declarations.
(c)
Call Centre received numerous calls from electors
who were unclear of how to vote by post. The instruction sheet
was too complicated and could have been simplified by having a
short pictoral instruction sheet my Council has used in recent
elections.
11. (a) 212 postal vote packs (0.33%) returned
too late to be counted.
(b)
1,123 (1.75%) of ballot papers were rejected.
12. Did increase voter turnout from 24.45
in local elections in 2003 to 38.43% in June and from 17% in last
European Parliamentary elections to 38.0% this time.
13. Not held postal pilot schemes before
this year.
COST AND
RESOURCES
14. (a) Substantial drain on Council employees
over the period 1-10 June for receipt and opening of postal votes
and central support services of the Council. Over 80 staff used
for the receipt, bar coding and opening of postal votes each day
from 1 May 2004.
(b)
Yes, substantial by core elections team. In
excess of 500 hours over the election timetable. Costs not yet
quantified.
15. Final costs still to be determined but
estimated to be in excess of £440,000.
16. Not applicable. Tameside Council also
had all out local elections on 10 June 2004.
Head of Democratic Services for Returning Officer
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