Hundreds of polling cards not delivered

4:05pm Wednesday 30th April 2008

Comments (20)   Have your say »

CRUCIAL wards in Thursday's elections could be decided without the ballots of thousands of voters.

Polling cards containing polling station addresses and people's registration details have not been delivered.

Council chiefs do not know the full scale of the problem and are desperately trying to get the message out that people can still vote even without their polling cards.

You can just turn up at the polling station.

But senior councillors, fearing a low turnout could affect who wins some of the town's tightest seats, have expressed their dismay and are calling for an investigation.

"No-one that I have spoken to in my ward has received them yet," said the council's deputy leader, Clr Keith Bland (CON-Culcheth, Glazebury and Croft).

"We've had 60 calls from people asking: When do I get my polling card and can I still vote?' "People should have received them weeks ago. It's not very satisfactory at all.

"Once the election is over there needs to be an investigation into who the culprit is."

Opposition group leader, Terry O'Neill (LAB-Burtonwood and Winwick) said he had urged the council's returning officer, Diana Terris, to send emergency advice letters to affected areas.

The council realised there was a problem on Monday when a flurry of e-mails from alarmed councillors saying large swathes of their wards had not received polling cards were received at the Town Hall.

The electoral services department, already snowed under processing postal votes, was tasked with finding out the cause and extent of the problem.

At the time the Guardian went to press the council was unable to say if it had managed to.

"We're investigating but it's too early to say," a spokesman said.

"There is no pattern to tell if any particular ward has been affected more than others."

"Our concern now is to make people aware they can still vote without their cards."

In the past, council employees were paid overtime to hand deliver polling cards to every registered voter in the weeks before an election.

More recently the council has paid Royal Mail to deliver them.

In Penketh, where last year only 81 votes seperated Labour from the Tories, at least 300 households have not received them.

It is understood that parts of Birchwood, Poulton North and Hatton, Stretton and Walton - where there won't be another election until 2012 - have also been affected.

nick.lakeman@guardiangrp.co.uk