NI election ‘mistakes’ spark investigation call

The Ulster Unionist leader was commenting after the Electoral Office NI (EONI) “apologised unreservedly” for mistakes due to human error in the run up to the December 2019 general election.

The deadline to forward proof of eligibility to vote paperwork was given to a number of people as November 26, rather than the correct date of December 4. This misinformation led to an unknown number of eligible voters being left off the voting register.

On the BBC Radio Nolan Show on Tuesday, it was claimed the EONI had described the mistake as a “typo”.

One woman, who said she lost her vote as a result of the misinformation, told the radio programme she rejected the explanation outright.

“How can you believe that?” she said.

“That is impossible. A typo is one or possibly two characters or numbers, but not an entire date in its entire format. The date and month is both wrong. It’s impossible, I just don’t believe that.”

Mr Aiken said it appeared that EONI was “marking its own homework” unsupervised and has now “decided that there aren’t any issues to be followed up”.

He said the Audit Office must now step in to look at the “processes and procedures used in the conduct of recent elections,” and “to consider if the closure of a number of electoral offices has had an impact on the delivery of services”.

He added: “Serious allegations have been made about the conduct of elections, and the way in which they have been dealt with so far has done little to allay people`s concerns about how the Electoral Office has dealt with these allegations.”

The chief electoral officer Virginia McVea has said EONI “strongly refuted” the allegations, and added: “In response to previous enquiries from this programme, we advised that the Electoral Office had carried out a thorough investigation into allegations that were made and we are satisfied that many of the issues raised were inaccurate and unfounded.

“However, we have made it clear that given we dealt with hundreds of thousands of documents during this election in a very short period of time, mistakes are inevitable due to human error. We apologise to the people affected unreservedly.”

Ms McVea added: “It is important that we point out that the application processes in relation to the electoral register are much more complex and stringent in Northern Ireland than they are in the rest of the UK.

“I can provide assurance that we will continue to review our processes, acknowledge any errors that are made and do everything we can to further improve what is already a very robust and fit for purpose service that ensures the fairness of elections in Northern Ireland.”

The Northern Ireland Audit Office told the News Letter that, as elections in NI are not a devolved matter, the National Audit Office in London was the appropriate body to comment on whether an investigation will be launched.

They have not yet responded to a request for comment.

• The Electoral Commission NI has a statutory duty to report on the administration of UK Parliamentary elections – gathering evidence from a wide range of sources, including the public, candidates and administrators.

However, a spokeswoman said: “We do not have any investigatory or sanctioning powers in relation to Returning Officers. The Chief Electoral Officer for NI is an independent statutory office holder appointed by the Secretary of State for NI. They are required to report annually...on the discharge of their functions. We will publish our post-poll report in due course.”