A systemic disenfranchisement of eligible voters may have occurred in today’s European Elections in the UK. EU citizens are being denied their vote all over the country.


First published in May 2019.

EU citizens in the UK have been denied their vote today when they showed up at their local polling stations because they are not marked as registered to vote.

Why? Some of them have simply not received their declaration forms by post from their Council, others have but their local authorities claim their forms have been lost, others received letters from their Councils saying ‘you don’t need to do anything more’... Some Councils have blamed the Electoral Commission for the mess, the Electoral Commission has blamed the local authorities.

It seems to be nobody’s fault.

A similar thing is also happening to British citizens living in the EU who have either never received their ballot papers to vote by post or received them too late to be able to vote.

Here is how the Electoral Commission first responded to Green MEP Molly Scott Cato regarding the situation:


It was only later in the afternoon that the Electoral Commission finally published a statement aknowledging that voters were being turned away:

Twitter / @ElectoralCommUK

The office of the European Parliament in the UK posted an election rules reminder on Twitter and another reminder that complaints should be directed to local authorities as per Electoral Commission recommendations.

Twitter / @EPinUK
Twitter / @EPinUK

Citizens’ rights activist Gina Miller also took to Twitter this morning to ask those EU citizens turned away to get in touch with her organisation Remain United so they can make an official complaint for breach of voters rights.


All this could have been avoided...

Yesterday in Parliament, the SNP MP Joanna Cherry asked Theresa May whether her government could ensure, as an emergency measure, that all EU citizens who had not been able to register with the declaration form in time be allowed to fill in the form in their local polling station today when they would show up to vote.



Here is how the Prime Minister responded:



Finally, the3million has urging all EU citizens who are being turned away today to complain to the Electoral Commission using this template letter.



Failure of democracy.

It has been over three weeks since us at PMP Magazine have reported on the highly likely situation in which EU citizens would end up being denied their vote in the European Elections. We even contacted the Electoral Commission and the Cabinet Office to ask them questions about it. There are now enough evidence to suggest that a much wider disenfranchisement than expected has happened.

“There are now enough evidence to suggest that a much wider disenfranchisement than expected has happened.”



This a complete failure from both national and local government, as well as the Electoral Commission, to ensure all eligible voters’ basic civic rights are being respected.

Had only one eligible voter been denied their vote in today’s elections, it would already be a failure of democracy. Hearing now that hundreds and probably more EU citizens in the UK and British citizens in the EU are being denied their vote, it makes it not only appalling, but shameful for all levels of government – showing their total inability to properly hold a simple democratic election.

“Had only one eligible voter been denied their vote in today’s elections, it would already be a failure of democracy. Hundreds and probably more EU citizens and British citizens being denied their vote makes it not only appalling, but shameful for all levels of government.”






The sheer incompetence of the current government has reached a level rarely seen in any democratic country. Do we now need UN election observers to come to oversee our elections and check all eligible voters are actually allowed to vote?

There will need to be an thourough investigation to understand whether what happened today was indeed due to incompetence or, as many already suggest, a blatant attempt to prevent democracy taking its course through voters suppression. After all, if it quacks like a duck...

“Do we now need UN election observers to come to oversee our elections and check all eligible voters are actually allowed to vote?”


Also, very impressive to see how the BBC has been relaying the news about EU citizens being denied their vote in the European Elections: zero article online – until 6.20pm!, and no mention on air – until 3.38pm!

Now, let’s just talk about Global Britain again instead...🔷






— Updates:


8.00pm

Following our reporting of today’s situation with EU citizens being denied their votes in polling stations, we have contacted the Electoral Commission and asked them some questions. Read our interview now.


4.53pm

Guy Verhofstadt MEP, President of the (liberals) and Brexit Coordinator for the European Parliament is aware of the situation and is calling for an investigation:


4.08pm

The situation in the UK is now being debated in the Dutch Parliament:


4.07pm

The office of the European Parliament in the UK has posted this updated which many might find useful when being denied to vote in polling stations:




Voters take on Twitter to express their frustration.

Here are some of the EU citizens who shared on Twitter their experience at polling stations this morning (more posts are added as we continue to monitor the situation):







Creative Commons License

(Cover: Wikimedia/Philafrenzy. / Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.)



>>> PMP Magazine articles are FREE. Do share this article widely.
>>> Please think about the environment before printing this article.
European ElectionEU CitizensElectionsElectoral CommissionCitizens' Rights