A correspondent has sent an extract from a letter from an MP (Chris Ruane, a member of Political and Constitutional Reform Select Committee, see post below of 7 July 2014) after he contacted him on the subject of EDDC’s missing 6,000 voters. It makes interesting reading:
“Thank you very much for your e-mail, and your very thorough research.
The example of East Devon is one that I highlight in my work, and also includes West Devon and Mid Devon. On the ERO’s attachment, I have listed all the ERO’s who have failed the compulsory Performance Standard Three to conduct door to door visits, as you mentioned, and you will see that East Devon has failed it three times. …
… On the issue of registration, with the changes to Individual Electoral Registration now in force, keeping tabs on the ERO is more crucial. Last year, every local authority did a test run (confirmation dry run) of comparing their electoral register with the Department for Work and Pensions database. Because to register to vote under IER, you need a National Insurance number, those on the register now have to be checked that they are exactly who they are. So the DWP matching was a way to do this. Local authorities were also advised to do a similar match with databases they have (such as council tax records). Only a quarter did this in the dry run. I have attached the list of those who did to this local data matching, and East Devon is not on there. This was their opportunity to test the system before it went live, as it has done now.
On the issue of an FOI request, this may seem odd, but the ERO does not fall under FOI legislation. I found this out whilst doing my own research, and those ERO’s I knew who weren’t complying, responded to say that they didn’t have to answer. I have raised this with the committee. If you get the same response, please do let me know [the correspondent has confirmed that he did get the same response from EDDC].
Recently I asked a question at Deputy Prime Minister’s Questions, and Greg Clark is now looking into those councils who fail in their duties.
Please let me know how you get on with East Devon.”
An attachment provided by Mr Ruane shows that East Devon has not undertaken the required doorstep canvassing since 2011, and that East Devon did not take part in the very important IT systems dry run for the Individual Electoral Registration process.
East Devon Watch 
In the interests of transparency, I am happy to disclose that the above letter was to me. I believe that it raises important issues about the conduct of the EDDC Electoral Returning Officer (ERO), Mark Williams who is also the EDDC Chief Executive.
I think that we need to ask ourselves whether the EDDC ERO has been knowingly negligent in the performance of his duties as ERO and/or that he has demonstrated a disregard for democracy which is inappropriate in an ERO much less a Chief Executive who should be setting an example?
So let’s take a look at the evidence:
1. There has been a net decrease of 6,000 voters – though if you take into account the increase of homes in Cranbrook, the missing voters are probably nearer 6,800 – including during the period of the recent European Elections. This presumably means that these people were disenfranchised, and were not able to vote in the European elections. Obviously we, the public, don’t know who these citizens are, or what their demographic is, so we are not in a position to judge whether their votes could have made a significant difference to the outcome.
2. From the document I was provided by Mr Ruane MP, I understand that the EDDC ERO has been deficient in providing the doorstep canvassing that the Electoral Commission require him to undertake not just this year, but for the past three years. Surely, having failed to undertake this required activity for the first of these years, it is reasonable for us to have expected the ERO to have “pulled his socks up” and made sure that it didn’t happen again the following year. So for it to happen for three consecutive years seems somewhat unacceptable to me.
Even more to the point, how many of the missing voters would not have lost their vote if the ERO had undertaken the doorstep canvassing as he was required to do?
I note from EDDC’s recent PR web page at http://www.eastdevon.gov.uk/communications_and_consultation.htm?newsid=1148 that the ERO has apparently now decided to take some positive action and do telephone canvassing, but this is clearly far too late for those who were unable to vote, and seems to have been prompted more by bad publicity (from the EDA) and perhaps by the parliamentary select committee that Mr Ruane is part of than by a concern for democracy.
3. In this same web page, the EDDC EOR claims that the drop in voters is a consequence of data cleansing in advance of the new process of Individual Electoral Registration (IER), and that it is not a consequence of his lack of activity or diligence.
But if this were the case, then we should expect to have seen the same 6%-7% drop in voter numbers across other local council areas. A selection of Freedom of Information requests to other local councils that surround EDDC has shown that this has not happened elsewhere, and therefore cannot be reasonably blamed on the new IER process as the EDDC ERO has tried to do.
Mr Ruane also provided a list of councils who took part in the dry run of new IT systems to support the new process , and EDDC was not one of them. IER apparently requires every voter to be identified individually by their National Insurance number, and IT systems need new interfaces to be able to verify these details. The Electoral Commission provided detailed guidance to EROs about their involvement in the run up to the change over to IER, and the IT dry run was a critical opportunity for EDDC to make sure that they would be able to support the IER when it arrived. So we need to ask several questions:
a. What were the reasons for EDDC not taking part in the IT dry run?
b. Would involvement in the dry run have enabled the EDDC ERO to ensure that the data cleansing didn’t stop over 6,000-7,000 people from being able to vote in the European elections?
c. What other preparations for IER (as recommended by the Electoral Commission) did EDDC not bother with, and would any of these have helped keep these voters registered?
Taking all of the above into account, the extended period of failure to perform his duties as ERO properly and the apparent lack of proactivity in planning for the change over to IER, has the EDDC been negligent, or demonstrated a disregard for democracy?
4. Since the EDDC ERO is also the EDDC Chief Executive, it certainly looks like he has been accountable for his performance as ERO only to himself as CEO, and (as far as we know) as CEO he has not been critical of his performance as ERO. Clearly, this lack of segregation of duties has left the role of ERO unaccountable within EDDC.
I guess we can all form our own judgements, but it seems to me that his performance as ERO has been demonstrably poor, and that his lack of proactivity has not demonstrated the regard and support for democracy that we would expect to see both from an ERO (who is part of the Electoral Registration process) and from a CEO who needs to be setting an example to all of the officers working for him.
I, therefore call upon Mark Williams, the EDDC Electoral Returning Officer, to resign his post as Chief Executive of EDDC (which includes the responsibilities of ERO) on the basis that his position has become untenable.
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transparencyforeastdevon in another blog http://eastdevonalliance.org/2014/07/17/proof-that-our-mps-knew-about-eddcs-electoral-roll-fiasco/ has pointed to a document from the same select committee on the parliamentary web site: http://www.parliament.uk/documents/commons-vote-office/June%202014/11%20June/6.SPEAKERS-Committee-Electroal-Commission.pdf
Leaving aside that someone can’t spell “electoral” in the document name 🙂 , this document says:
“The Commission’s detailed analysis of the registration data has identified that in addition to the 5 EROs (for Mid Devon, Taunton Deane, Torridge, West Devon and West Somerset) who reported that they did not meet performance standard 3 – the house-to-house enquiry standard – in 2013, there are a further 17 EROs who did not ensure that during 2013 all non-responding properties were canvassed in person. ”
The document I received from Chris Ruane MP entitled “ERO’s who failed doorstep canvass” shows 22 councils for 2013 including East Devon, so it would appear that the ERO for East Devon omitted to tell the Electoral Commission that he had not undertaken doorstep canvassing.
Accurate and truthful reporting is to be expected from every public servant, including EROs, but particularly from someone at CEO position who should be demonstrating his integrity to the staff and officers who work for him.
Again, I call upon Mark Williams, the EDDC Electoral Returning Officer, to resign his post as Chief Executive of EDDC (which includes the responsibilities of ERO) on the basis that his position has become untenable.
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I have found a page on the Electoral Commission website where you can see the performance of EROs for each area against the performance standards set by the commission:
http://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/find-information-by-subject/performance-standards/performance-in-running-elections-and-referendums/view-performance-of-local-authorities
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Its official – EDDC have effectively admitted that the poor performance of the East Devon ERO, Mark Williams, during the past 3 years was a direct cause of the drop on voter numbers.
“Doorstep canvassing” is a process by which Electoral Registration officials (working for the ERO) visit homes who do not have registered voters in order to see if they need assistance with registering to vote.
We know from the Electoral Commission Website and from the documents provided by Chris Ruane, MP that Mark Williams has failed to undertake doorstep canvassing for the period 2011 to 2013.
Now EDDC has stated in a News page on its web site ( http://www.eastdevon.gov.uk/communications_and_consultation.htm?newsid=1148 ) that:
“Acting on Cabinet Office guidance, and in preparation for IER, we removed all ‘carry overs’ – that is to say every property where we had not received a completed electoral registration form for the previous two years.”
So, the lack of doorstep canvassing for 3 years resulted in properties not sending in registration forms, and the lack of registration forms was the reason that people were deregistered by the ERO.
QED.
Again, I call upon Mark Williams, the EDDC Electoral Returning Officer, to resign his post as Chief Executive of EDDC (which includes the responsibilities of ERO) on the basis that his position has become untenable.
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Looking at the Electoral Commission web site, we find a document entitled “Electoral registration data for 2013” http://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/__data/assets/excel_doc/0003/168906/GB-2013-registration-data-master-spreadsheet-publication.xlsx we find in row 248 (East Devon) column Q that there were 3,231 “households that the ERO has not received a response from and has not been able to confirm through secondary checks” and of these that there were 0 (yes zero) “that have not been subject to personal canvass”.
In other words, the ERO reported to the Electoral Commission that he had canvassed every one of the 3,231 households for whom registration forms were missing.
So, if this is the case then how come the Electoral Commission thinks otherwise and put him on the list of Below Standard EROs for the third year running?
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Parliament was aware as early as 3 December 2013 that the electoral commission was concerned about the risk of voters being disenfranchised as can be seen in this answer from the Electoral Commission to a question raised by Chris Ruane MP (again):
“The Electoral Commission informs me that its performance standard 3 aims to ensure that electoral registration officers (EROs) make the necessary house-to-house enquiries to ensure that all eligible residents are registered, in line with their legal duty to maintain the electoral registers. It is particularly important that in preparation for the transition to individual electoral registration (IER), EROs do all they can now to ensure that their registers are as accurate and complete as possible by taking all available steps—including carrying out house to house enquiries and using available local data to identify and target potential electors and to verify and validate data held on the electoral register—before the transition to IER begins.”
” The Commission required all EROs to report on their performance prior to the start of the canvass, to confirm that arrangements were in place for the necessary house to house enquiries to be carried out, and has intervened where issues were identified and recommended improvements to be made before the completion of the canvass. In March 2014, the Commission will make a final assessment of performance for 2013, including an assessment of performance against performance standard 3, and will report on its conclusions.”
So, both the Electoral Commission and Parliament knew of the risk of significant proportions of the populations being disenfranchised in the run up to IER. More importantly, they had apparently received assurances from EROs (including Mark Williams) that they would undertake Doorstep Canvassing properly, and Mark Williams reported at the end of 2013 that he had canvassed every household that needed it, however despite both the assurances in advance and the perfect report afterwards, the Electoral Commission still named East Devon as one of the 22 councils that didn’t undertake Doorstep Canvassing properly.
See http://www.theyworkforyou.com/wrans/?id=2013-12-03c.179542.h&s=%22east+devon%22#g179542.r0 for parliamentary question and file:///D:/Paul/Documents/Local%20Politics/Electorate%20Analysis/GB-2013-registration-data-master-spreadsheet-publication.xlsx row 248 for Mark Williams report that there were 3,231 households where he had “not received a response from and has not been able to confirm through secondary checks” but that were 0 (yes – zero) households “that have not been subject to personal canvass”.
So, apparently, our ERO Mark Williams promised the Electoral Commission he would do the job properly, then reported that he had performed the job perfectly, but the Commission then still named him as one of the EROs who was below standard on canvassing.
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Paul
Why not ask a question in full EDDC Council on exactly how many households were canvassed in the past three years as a result of non-return of registration forms? Then, rather than continuing to investigate it directly yourself, you will have the answer as to whether the ERO DID organise canvasses and told the truth to the EC, or whether he put in a misleading return to the EC because of NOT organising canvasses. If you phrase the question to include the return reported by the EC and also to ask for how many canvassers were employed each year then the ERO will know that he has to tell the truth one way or the other.
Jo
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Thanks for the suggestion Jo.
I actually did this – I asked the council about it, including whether they would discipline him for his failure to perform and inaccurate reporting – and they referred it to … and I couldn’t believe this … the CEO who is also the ERO to answer the question about whether he should be disciplined.
However, of course, Mark Williams did not answer any of the questions that I had put to the Council, instead suggesting that I needed to check my facts (see above) and saying that it wasn’t where you started that mattered, but where you finished. In other words, so long as the 6,000-7,000 voters eventually get registered it doesn’t matter that they were not registered e.g. earlier this year when the European Elections were taking place. Presumably, it doesn’t matter if you missed this one, so long as you are registered when another one comes along.
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