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Postal votes started to come into Tower Hamlets Town Hall this week as voting gets underway for the elections taking place on Thursday, 22nd May. Stringent security checks are being carried out, with every postal voting statement scanned to ensure that the signature and date of birth match the signature and date of birth on the original application form in council records.
All postal votes – whether they are posted in advance to the Town Hall or brought to a polling station on election day on 22nd May – will be treated in the same way and be thoroughly checked by council staff. If any of the personal identifiers do not match then the vote is rejected.
There have been just under 30,000 postal votes issued for these elections. The postal votes opening sessions started on Monday, 12th May, and on Tuesday 13th alone 3,500 postal votes were received. The process of checking will continue right up until election night, but counting of votes will not take place until Friday, 23rd May.
John Williams, Returning Officer for Tower Hamlets, said: “We want to encourage people to use their democratic right to vote. Postal votes are a legitimate way of ensuring those who cannot get to polling stations can have their voice and choice heard. But we are also determined to tackle fraud robustly, which is why we have been working closely with the police and the Electoral Commission to maintain the integrity of the elections.”
Mr Williams also urged voters to take great care when filling in their forms. He pointed out that some people will write in the date they posted their postal vote in the box where they should be writing their date of birth. Voters also need to pay attention to how they record their date of birth, making sure they put the date where they are asked for the date, and the month where they are asked for the month. If they get these the wrong way round, their vote will be invalid. Because a surprisingly high number of voters get these simple points wrong, the number of votes declared “spoiled” when the result is issued may be quite high, but it doesn’t mean that there is largescale attempted fraud.
The elections in Tower Hamlets will be the most complex to date but will have the strongest system to prevent fraud in London – and one of the most robust in the country. A Local Protocol to establish trust in the system was launched by Tower Hamlets in partnership with the main stakeholders involved in the election, including the local and metropolitan police.
The Local Protocol makes clear that the Metropolitan Police, local police and Tower Hamlets Council take electoral fraud extremely seriously and will investigate all allegations of irregularities robustly, promptly and fully.
Among the tough safeguards being taken to ensure everyone can be confident of free and fair elections are the following.
•Police will be based at some polling stations on election day and a mobile police team will respond as necessary.
•Police will prevent large groups of supporters congregating around polling stations and obstructing voters.
•There will be a limit on numbers of activists who can gather outside.A direct dedicated email address for agents and candidates to report concerns.
•Allegations made to the Returning Officer will be investigated fully and responded to within 24 hours. If the Returning Officer passes an allegation to the police, they will respond within 48 hours.
•Extra training has been given to polling officers around challenging voters they may have suspicions about.
•At the beginning of March letters were sent to every property in the borough confirming who we currently have registered at the property.
•All late registration and absent vote applications will be verified against other council records.
•Election officers have increased the number of visits they make to check properties.
•Party campaigners will be discouraged from handling postal votes and asked not to assist with the completion of ballot papers.
