Polling Station
Polling Station

I’m sure it won’t have escaped your attention that thousands of EU citizens who are resident in the UK were unable to vote on May 23rd. I asked people to get in touch with my office if they had been affected and so far I have been contacted by 16 people. I know there are many more out there.

Most of the problems were caused by the fact that local authorities had very short notice of the UK’s participation in the elections from the Government. This meant that councils had hardly any time to make EU citizens aware of the process and voters had less time than usual to return their UC1 forms, declaring whether they wanted to vote here or in their home country. Before the elections the Government ignored Labour’s call to extend the deadline.

When I (and many other colleagues) raised this in the Commons, the Minister refused to apologise or admit any wrongdoing on the part of the Government. He seemed oblivious to the fact that so many people had been denied their basic democratic right. Completely unacceptable.

 

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