Following the revelations that the Wolverhampton South West result showed more ballot papers being counted than had been issued and that the official marked register for part of the constituency had gone missing both Wolverhampton Council and the Electoral Commission have been investigating.
The investigations have not only failed to locate the missing electoral register but also found that part of the marked register also went missing in a second Parliamentary constituency, Wolverhampton North East.
Meanwhile, the investigation into the ballot paper number discrepancy has revealed a bizarre decision taken during the verification stage of the general election. One batch of ballot papers was counted twice for verification purposes, with a difference of 20 votes between the two counts, a greater difference than would usually be accepted. It was therefore then counted a third time, coming up with a total 287 greater than the second count. At this point, it was decided not to count again and the third number – far different from the previous two numbers – was then recorded as the ‘correct’ figure.
Moreover, even had either the first or second number been used, the mismatch between the figures for ballot papers issued and votes counted would not have been fully accounted for. There was a 66 vote discrepancy between the declared totals. If the 163 rejected ballot papers are also taken into account, this made for a total discrepancy of 229. If the second of the verification tallies was correct, this becomes a discrepancy of 58 more votes having been issued than were counted. In other words, a problem of too many votes having been counted becomes a problem of too few.
No explanation has been provided as to what happened to these 58 in the statement from Wolverhampton Council’s Chief Executive outlining the result of his inquiries.
Altogether, the loss of parts of the marked register from two Parliamentary constituencies, the strange decision to take as correct a figure during the verification that was clearly different from the other two without any further checking, the declaration of a result whose numbers did not tally and the inconclusive investigation which has simply shifted the question over the mismatch leaves significant doubts over the quality of electoral administration in Wolverhampton.
It is not yet whether or not the Returning Officer is claiming his full fee for administering the election.
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4 Comments
This is all very fishy.
But what does this have to do with Julia Goldsworthy? (She is tagged in the post.)
Given the apparent maladministration here – and similar missing registers in Glenrothes after the by-election – at what point does the actual integrity of the election in the constituency get called into account?
Your readers may be interested to read the full statement issued last week by Simon Warren, chief executive of Wolverhampton City Council:
Statement following the investigation into additional votes and missing registers at the 2010 Parliamentary Election Count
Released: Thursday 11th November, 2010
In August 2010, Wolverhampton City Council Chief Executive Simon Warren ordered an investigation into an anomaly that occurred at the counting of the votes for the Wolverhampton South West Parliamentary constituency. Concluding that investigation, Simon made the following statement:
“On the matter of the additional votes, the Acting Returning Officer, Deputy Acting Returning Officer and relevant candidates and agents were made aware of the discrepancy at the time of the count itself and all agreed that the difference between the verified and counted votes would not make any difference to the overall result and due to the time – 5.00am – and the length of time the count had already taken, the result was declared.
“The subsequent investigation has revealed that there was more than one set of figures on one table where three recounts had taken place. The figures sent to the Chief Counting Supervisor for totalling up the results were from the third recount which differed greatly from the first two recounts which only had a discrepancy of 20 between them, well within the normal margins of error accepted by candidates and agents. The difference between the second and third counts was 287. The table was recommended not to recount again following consultation between the Acting Returning Officer and the candidates and agents, and it appears that the third set of figures were sent to the top table where in fact the first or second should have been used as these only had a difference of 20. If the second set were used there would have been 287 fewer votes recorded.
“It must be remembered that this occurred at 5.00 am on the day after the count and the counting supervisors felt under great pressure to get the result announced. It is understandable therefore that this type of error could occur.
“We clearly have lessons to learn from this. One of the first things we will be doing is introducing more intensive training for supervisors. We are considering other improvements.
“I’d now like to focus on the unrelated matter of the missing registers. There were, in fact, two missing registers for polling stations Park 8 and Oxley 1.
“The presiding officers are requested to put all of the envelopes containing documentation, registers, unused ballot papers, corresponding number lists, stationery etc in a black sack and return them to the count when bringing in their ballot boxes. (The exceptions are the ballot paper account envelope and the postal vote envelopes which are handed in separately.) On this occasion they were also instructed to bring back any rubbish in clear plastic sacks. These would contain polling cards etc and were confidentially disposed of by the Civic Hall staff during the evening as the verification was underway.
“The black sacks containing the returned stationery were kept in the Civic Hall during the duration of the count . The Civic Hall was sealed at the end of the count until it was re-opened for the Local election count on Friday. The stationery parcels and the ballot papers were kept in the locked counting room.
“During the Local count the following morning the sacks of envelopes and stationery were opened and the register envelopes taken out. After intensive searching it was discovered that the two registers were missing.
“Subsequently, a second team of people were deployed to make a second search and this also did not reveal the missing registers.
“It is assumed therefore that they were mistakenly put into the rubbish bags by the presiding officers, brought to the counting venue along with the other items requested and were confidentially discarded with the rest of the rubbish on the evening of the count.
“We have lessons to learn on this point too. There was intensive training given to the presiding officers prior to the election which included details on what to put in the sacks at the close of poll. The relevant presiding officers have also been spoken to and are convinced that they put the registers in the correct sacks.
“Future training will underline the importance of packing the relevant envelopes at the close of poll. As an added precaution, envelopes containing the registers will be handed in separately at the count venue along with the ballot paper and postal vote envelopes. Presiding officers will also be advised to leave any rubbish at the polling station.
“In conclusion, there is no evidence of any fraudulent activity in connection with any of these occurrences which could all be attributed to human error.
“There is also no connection with the South West constituency count anomaly and the missing registers. It is an unfortunate coincidence that one of the missing registers is from Park ward in the South West constituency.”
ENDS
I suggest that this makes a good case for abandoning counts on Thursday evening. The excuse about it being 5am as a reason for not recounting doesn’t stand up to scrutiny – the process could have been stopped if everyone was too tired to continue and resumed later on Friday. There are precedents for this in local elections to my certain knowledge.
Isn’t it time we grew out of ‘ the excitement of election night’ in favour of getting it right? Under AV counts will take longer which justs adds to the case