Much interesting stuff in both articles with some amazing comments from the two Chief Executives!
http://www.westernmorningnews.co.uk/repeatedly-brazenly/story-23154231-detail/story.html
“In written evidence to the committee, Mr Williams wrote: “How much should one spend chasing those who won’t vote?”
And just how much should be spent on those who DO want to vote, Mr Williams?
Our CEO, Mark Williams (shared with South Somerset) appears to have a split personality when it comes to voter registration.
In the large rural area of South Somerset, where door to door canvassing has always been done he sides with the Parliamentary Committee on Voter Registration which says that this is a mandatory step and it is breaking the law not to do it. A Committee member noted that the canvassing produced some 11,000- 12,000 extra names on the register in South Somerset.
In the large rural area of East Devon, where door to door canvassing has not been done since at least 2011, he sides with – er, well, himself and the ERO of Mid Devon – who say they are NOT breaking the law when they fail to do the canvassing. He says that this does not result in losing any voters as they are picked up “by other means” and that the other means are “more amiable” than going out to individuals on cold dark nights and trying to bribe them to register by saying that if you don’t you might not get a credit card. He did not address the concerns of EDA which says at least 6,000 voters were missing from the register at the last Euro election.
Here is a press release from the Electoral Commission, that says you MUST conduct house to house canvassing:
Here is the relevant part of the legislation. In South Somerset, Mr Williams follows it to the letter, in East Devon he chooses to believe that it gives him the right to be “flexible”.
“Duties of the Electoral Registration Officer
Steps to be taken by the Electoral Registration Officer
1.1 Under Section 9 of the Representation of the People Act 1983 (RPA 1983) an Electoral Registration Officer has a duty to maintain registers of UK Parliamentary and local government electors containing the name, qualifying address and electoral number of those persons appearing to them to be entitled to be registered in it.
1.2 This duty on the Electoral Registration Officer to maintain the register includes, but is not limited to, the requirement to conduct an annual canvass in accordance with Section 10 of the RPA 1983 for the purpose of ascertaining any persons who are entitled to be registered. This annual canvass is conducted with reference to the relevant date of 15 October, the relevant date being the date on which a person must be resident at the address they are applying to be registered at.”
From http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1983/2/section/10/enacted
section 10 of the RotPA says:
“the registration officer shall—
(a) have a house to house or other sufficient inquiry made as to the persons entitled to be registered (excluding persons entitled to be registered in pursuance of a service declaration);”
In East Devon, Mr Williams relies on the last sentence to justify NOT canvassing, in South Somerset he relies on the information preceding it above to justify canvassing.
So, it seems Mr Williams has one rule for the Liberal Democrat controlled South Somerset District Council and one rule for the Conservative controlled East Devon District Council.
Will he explain the reasons for this difference at tomorrow’s Cabinet meeting?
This is a personal summary of major points from an EDA correspondent, based on the audio transcript above.
In his evidence to the Select Committee, Mark Williams said:
He had decided not to do house-to-house canvassing, even though it was a performance standard of the Electoral Commission. When asked if he believed himself to be in breach of the law he said, ” No”.
The two EROs were asked if they had made clear to their officers that they were repeatedly breaching the law by not doing house to house canvassing – neither answered the question.
He thought there were more “amenable ways” of registering voters than having people on their doorsteps on dark nights and mentioned telephone and internet registration. Earlier, both he and the ERO of Mid-Devon noted that one of the reasons people had not registered was low internet use!
He called people who did not respond to written requests to register as “Refusniks” although he had earlier said that sometimes lack of response was because people had died or moved into nursing homes.
Mr Williams said that if people had presented themselves for the Euro elections earlier this year and had not been registered, they were dealt with by officers at polling stations phoning his office when they would be told that they were on the “old register” and given advice to allow them to vote with the reason “clerical error”.
One of the committee noted that, in South Somerset, door to door canvassing had resulted in between 11,000 and 12,000 extra voters being registered. He gave a number of 3,231 homes not having been canvassed after non-registration in East Devon in 2013.
Both EROs were asked,” What price democracy?” £40,000 (the mid-Devon estimate of how much house to house canvassing cost) seemed a very small part of the overall budget. Each ERO said that their way of doing things was better than canvassing (and presumably cost almost nothing). The committee member wondered why, if this was the case, their method had not met with wider enthusiasm from other EROs!
Mr Williams said that he worked well with the “local” branch of the Electoral Commission, which seemed to understand his approach better than the national office. His was a “purposive” approach and resulted in less bureaucracy. Door to door canvassing was a “weak” element of the process and it was no use telling people that they would not get a credit card if they did not register [however, as he hasn’t done door to door canvassing since 2010 one wonders how he can make this claim].
He said it was much like when the Audit Commission had said how things should be done and he had ignored them and the outcomes had been better because sometimes we can do it better with alternative ways.
Mark Williams had no idea how many East Devon people were registered to vote overseas.
Mark Williams said that he preferred to do his electoral registration by “goal setting” rather than “prescriptively” – i.e. his way and not the Electoral Commission way, his way was more flexible.
He was asked if there were any concerns. He said no. Not until very recently and only one person had addressed a recent [July 2014!] council on the matter.
He was asked how many people he had “knocked off” the register – he said none although he said that “a blog” had mentioned 6,000.
The two EROs were asked how their work could be improved. The Mid Devon ERO said that voting should be made obligatory and that if people did not vote they should be fined and the money should go to the local authority. [So, effectively spend no money on getting people to vote but take money from them if they don’t!]
EROs were asked what would be helpful for the next election. Mr Williams said that people should get more interested in politics, and do lobbying (yes, he did say that!) and he said that people would not vote if the councillors who put themselves up for election were not inspiring!
He said that the process should be smooth and convenient and that remedies such as “clerical error” and “breach of regulations” should be available on the day to enable those not registered to vote..
The Mid Devon ERO said that more devolution of responsibilities to local level where councillors had more accountability for local functions instead of a lot of central direction would help.
There seems to be confusion about whether EDDC has recruited all the canvassers it needs to follow up the missing 6,000 voters. On the one hand CEO Mark Williams told the Parliamentary Select Committee on Voter Engagement at its session this evening that all canvassers had now been recruited, whereas EDA understands that on Tuesday 7th October Jill Humphrys of East Devon District Council put out an appeal to every town and parish clerk in East Devon which read as follows:
Subject: Personal Canvassers – Earn £8.50 per hour – UNCLASSIFIED:
Hi
We are looking for Personal Canvassers to go door knocking between 28 October and 28 November 2014.
Personal Canvassers will be sent out to areas with pre-printed forms and a canvasser worksheet. The aim is to get a form completed on the doorstep, if the first visit is unsuccessful you will leave a calling card and put the form through the letter box. If you spot anything else that could be of use to us such as a new property or different address than we have pre printed, you will make a note on the supplied worksheet.
You will be asked to collect both Household Enquiry Forms and Invitation To Register forms. We will send you an email each Monday and Thursday to let you know of any returns and to prevent any wasted visits! Training and first issue of forms will be on the afternoon of Monday 27 October. We are paying £8.00 per hour (hours to be recorded on a timesheet), 45p per mile and 50p per form that you return to the office and that is determined as a completed application or provides sufficient information to enable us to remove someone.
Please do not hesitate to contact me if you require any further information (01395 517550).
Kind regards. Jill
MW said Doorstep Canvassing was not a legal requirement until this year. Chris Ruane appeared to then accuse him of breaking the law. MW and the Mid-Devon guy both said that they took the decision on the basis of alternatives being as good or better, but MW half side-stepped whether this was lawful or not.
MW said temporary canvassers were all now fully recruited, and were being paid on an hourly basis but he was not pressed to prove this.
MW said his role was to facilitate electors being able to vote even if they ask for the vote on polling day – using “clerical error” procedures to enable it.
[this does not sound to be a very sensible strategy as it is unlikely that local officials will all know how to do this or will be exceptionally busy on the day]
Chris Ruane definitely put MW under pressure at key points. He asked about how they maintain the property database but MW gave a simplistic answer and there wasn’t time to follow it up.
MW was sounding very flustered at times. But time was too tight to give him the real detailed grilling needed.
Seems Scottish devolution is more important …!
The transcript will appear as soon as we can get it.
Not sure our seaside towns would agree!
http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2014/10/forget-seaside-its-rural-vote-stupid
….. 207 days to the next election on 7 May 2015
There are now very, very few “safe seats” if any.
There must be some current MPs who thought they had “safe seats” that would see them to their dotage (and even further) beginning to wonder if they will be having to go to the job centre next May.
Watch out for more silly stunts from them as they try to convince us that they are different to the rest whilst behaving the same way!
THIS is why:
A majority of 617. UKIP could have won if just another 1,000 or so voters had been registered.
Is this what our council is afraid of?
Well, we can aee how their CEO is attempting to wriggle out of his responsibilities. Will ours choose the same route? Will the Parliamentary Select Committee buy it?
As a commentator said – Devon is hardly the Sahara where canvassers have to chase tribespeople on camels to persuade them to register to vote!
And sparsely populated regions of Scotland seemed to manage registration too!
Wonder if the Parliamentary Select Committee will agree with him on Monday?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-27466042
Voter engagement in Mid Devon – not worth the money it seems. Wonder if he told councillors of his views and what they thought then and think now?
And if Mid Devon had done its homework too?
Well, here is what did happen in East Devon:
Click to access eu-elections-lro-declaration.pdf
Here is what happened in Mid Devon:
http://www.middevon.gov.uk/CHttpHandler.ashx?id=23530&p=0
Here is the result for the South West region
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_West_England_(European_Parliament_constituency)
Interesting – another few thousand votes could have tipped balances.
I have written this evening to the Chairman of the O&S Committee, Cllr Tim Wood, and copied to his deputy, Cllr Graham Troman. My letter reads:
Dear Councillor Wood
I am a council tax payer living in East Devon, and my full details are below. I write to you in your role as Chairman of the EDDC Overview and Scrutiny Committee.
I would be grateful if you could answer the following questions urgently, as they relate to an event of unusual local concern on Monday in Westminster as well as to Full Council next Wednesday, when I and others will ask about your Chief Executive’s dismissal of sincere concerns put to him in July’s public question time by Mr Paul Freeman. I was in attendance, and can confirm that the minutes are correct, and that Mr Williams did tell Mr Freeman to get his facts right …
You will be aware that Mr Williams’ appearance before the Select Committee has only just become public knowledge, and that EDDC has given such an interesting occasion on the national stage no publicity at all. I and many others have to be grateful for the vigilance of other local people for any knowledge of this, and even the four district councillors I have asked about it had not been told.
Please advise:
1. If/when the Overview and Scrutiny Committee was appraised of the missing voters and lack of canvassing in the East Devon District.
2. If/when the Overview and Scrutiny Committee was made aware of the Returning Officer’s appearance before the Parliamentary Select Committee on voter engagement
3. If/when this matter will come before the Overview and Scrutiny Committee for discussion.
4. If it is not the intention of the Committee to bring this matter forward, please confirm this.
Yours faithfully,
Paul Arnott
cc Vice Chairman O&S Committee, Cllr G Troman.
d
Click to access EPE-LGE-Part-A-Returning-Officer-role-and-responsibilities.pdf
2.8 While you can appoint one or more persons to discharge any or all of your functions, you cannot delegate your personal responsibility for delivering the election. Further information on the appointment of deputies can be found in Part B – Planning and organisation.
2.9 You are also subject to breach of official duty provisions. This means that if you or your appointed deputies are, without reasonable cause, guilty of any act or omission in breach of official duty you (and/or they) are liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding £5,000.
Or will it get kicked into the (now very long) grass the same way the investigation into the East Devon Business Forum was?
EDA exclusively broke the story of the district’s 6,000 missing voters in July this year and on the fiasco that followed (where very-belated attempt to recruit 10 house-to-house canvassers resulted in only 2 taking up the offer)
According to
http://www.theyworkforyou.com/calendar/?d=2014-10-13#cal41011
and here:
http://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/political-and-constitutional-reform-committee/news/voter-engagement-13th-evidence-session/
EDDC CEO Mark Williams (also the district’s official Returning Officer)has been called to give evidence on
13 October 2014
to the
Parliamentary Select Committee on Political and Constitutional Reform
who are investigating “Voter engagement in the UK”.
Extract from site here:
Political and Constitutional Reform:
Voter engagement in the UK 5:15 pm
Witnesses: Mark Williams, Chief Executive and Electoral Registration Officer for East Devon District Council and Kevin Finan, Chief Executive, Mid Devon District Council; Roger Casale, Chair, New Europeans and Samia Badani, New Europeans
This committee appears regularly on the UK Parliament Channel on TV and Chris Ruane Mp, who has taken a keen i terest in our district, does not pull any punches. And, since he has been extensively briefed about the situation in East Devon, we do not anticipate that Mr Williams will receive an easy ride.
If it is not televised, a transcript of his performance and that of the CEO of Mid-Devon (also heavily criticised by the Electoral Commission) will be available a few days later.
Watch this space yet again!
And to remind you of what Mr Williams said in response to a public question about this, see:
THE MISSING 6,000 VOTERS: A PERSONAL PERSPECTIVE FROM AN EDA BLOG COMMENTATOR
http://eastdevonalliance.org/2014/07/
where the (in)famous quote: … “in any major change process it is not where you start from that counts but where you end-up” was uttered by the CEO as an explanation of why the lack house-to-house canvassing of missing voters in the previous three years led to the loss of more than 6,000 voters on the register of electors at the recent European Parliament elections.
What a GREAT time to be an Independent candidate!
Grassroots rebellion over arrogant leadership in Devon and Cornwall
By Western Morning News | Posted: October 05, 2014
By Phil Goodwin
Westcountry councils face a growing rebellion from a grassroots movement weary at being ruled by an out-of-touch and “arrogant” leadership, the Western Morning News on Sunday reports today.
Campaigns have sprung up across the region in opposition to a perceived centralisation of power which has left many voters feeling removed from the democratic process.
A revolt in Cornwall has seen parish councils form an alliance against the “emerging dictatorship” of the unitary “super council” and threaten to picket County Hall in protest.
In Mid-Devon, a petition has been launched against the cabinet-style of government, where decision-making power is confined to a handful of senior Conservative figures.
In East Devon a quasi-political pressure group has been formed to unify opposition after a series of controversial planning issues. Paul Arnott, chairman of the East Devon Alliance, said chief executives and unelected officers wield excessive influence and are answerable only to a powerful political elite.
“What we see now is a kind of corporate CEO mentality which is just not appropriate at a district council,” he added. “This not Wall Street – it is East Devon, and we are supposed to be following a localism agenda.
“The effect is setting a tone of unelected arrogance – we would like to see a return to the wise and kindly town clerk approach of days gone by.”
Labour’s Local Government Act of 2000 introduced modifications to the old committee system, including the cabinet and leader model, which is common throughout Devon and Cornwall. This allows the ruling party to populate the cabinet with its own members, regardless of the make-up of the council.
In Mid-Devon, where the Conservatives hold a 57per cent majority of the 42 seats, the Liberal Democrats and Independents have no representation and all of the senior power is concentrated in nine Tory councillors.
The same set-up can be seen at Devon County Council, where Tories hold 61per cent of the seats but all the cabinet posts, and at East Devon District Council, where a 71per cent majority holds 100per cent of the cabinet posts.
The Campaign for Democracy in Mid-Devon hopes to collect the 3,000 signatures required to force a referendum on the style of governance.
Nick Way, a Lib Dem member at the authority, supports a return to the committee system. “I think it is more democratic, particularly for a small authority like us,” he said.
“The current system is almost like a dictatorship of the majority – at the end of the day they have a majority but a change would make it easier for their back-benchers to have more of a say and influence policy.”
Harvey Siggs, a Somerset county councillor and vice chairman of South West Councils, says he understands the frustration given the cuts but disagrees with claims of a democratic deficit.
“In Somerset we spend a lot of time trying not to be remote,” he added.
“A good cabinet does its absolute best to be as transparent as possible and we still have to be accountable to the full council.
“With the pace of life and all the things that need to be dealt with, I don’t think the committee system is fit for purpose.
“All too often the disaffected people are around planning. There are winners and losers but mostly, the losers don’t complain.”
In Cornwall, representatives of 15 parish councils packed a hall in Chacewater last week in a bid to rally all 213 town and parish councils to join a revolt against Cornwall Council.
The gathering came in response to the infamous “Chacewater Letter” which branded the unitary authority an “emerging dictatorship”.
The letter, in July, criticised Cornwall Council’s lack of communication, its savings plans, planning policy, arms lengths organisations and highly paid officers.
At the highly charged meeting on Tuesday, fellow parish councillors agreed and declared change at Cornwall Council must happen.
More militant members called to draft in the local government ombudsman, for the formation of an alliance of parish councils and even for protests at the doors of County Hall.
Truro City councillor Armorel Carlyon, who chaired the meeting despite her own council not endorsing the criticism, told those gathered she could see the “democratically elected members being airbrushed out of the picture” by non-elected council officers.
Read more at http://www.westernmorningnews.co.uk/Grassroots-rebellion-arrogant-leadership-Devon/story-23044099-detail/story.html
According to the answer to request on the whatdotheyknow website:
“The current position is that 2 canvassers have been appointed but ideally the Council requires a minimum of 10 to ensure that the work can be done as effectively as possible. We are therefore re-advertising the positions from next week (week beginning 29th September) with a view to recruiting more Canvassers. Canvassing will commence from the week beginning 27th October.”
Source: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/temporary_personal_electoral_can#incoming-565304
East Devon Watch 