Voter Turnout Figures for Haringey by Ward

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Permalink Reply by Harringay 4eva on May 7, 2022 at 20:39

The polling station for West Green had moved this time. When we got to the usual polling station (Wisdom primary school on west green road/Phillip lane) there was a group of people there who also hadn’t noticed the location had changed. When we went online Haringey website said there were now 2 polling stations in West Green. Most of us didn’t have our polling cards so then had to go home to find out which polling station to go to. Ours turned out to be at the Milton road community centre, near the junction with Green Lanes. It turned out to be quite a ordeal. Obviously we should have checked our polling cards before we left the house but it does make me wonder how many people were deterred by this. The map on the polling card didn’t make it immediately obvious where the Milton road community centre was.

I knew in advance that on this occasion there weren’t any Green or independent candidates, so just the usual 3 choices. Outside the polling station there was another small group. Nobody there had had a visit from any potential candidates & they were talking amongst themselves about who to vote for & why. Everyone said they hadn’t had a flyer through the door either. There were no representatives from any of the parties outside the polling station. 

I’m sure these are the sort of things which led to the 21% turnout in West Green.

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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on May 11, 2022 at 20:15

Another factor which led to the low initially reported Voter Turnout figures was a mess-up spotted by local campaigner Paul Burnham (and others) who alerted Mr Andy Donald the Chief Executive, and Election Returning Officer.
        For people not on various social media groups, here's what I received on Granddad's traditional email. Read bottom-up, of course. ~

___________________________________________

From: Paul Burnham
To: Andy Donald
Cc: Fiona Alderman; Cllr Peray Ahmet; "Cllr Luke Cawley-Harrison
Sent: Tuesday, 10 May, 2022
Subject: Official complaint re. discrepancies in published election results

Good afternoon Mr Donald

Thank you for updating the percentage turnout for West Green Ward on the Council's election results webpage.

I would be grateful if you could also publish the numerical turnout for West Green Ward, this remains unamended with the incorrect figure of 2,974.

Kind regards

Paul Burnham

------ Original Message ------
From: Paul Burnham
To: Andy.Donald
Cc: [as above]
Sent: Tuesday, 10 May, 2022 At 23:57
Subject: [As above]

Dear Mr Donald

Thank you for your early and helpful response to my complaint.

I have noted that six of the seven affected Wards are now shown with higher turnouts on the Council's election results webpage.

However I was disappointed to see that the turnout has not yet been adjusted for West Green Ward. I would be grateful if the postal votes could be added there as well.

Thank you for contacting Wikipedia. However there will be many other sites (among them being London Councils) which have referenced the original borough turnout figure of 31.76%.

The revised figure of 34.44% is a significant difference (2.68% higher), with 4,098 additional votes posted up so far. It is also a good news story, and therefore I suggest that the Council does a full press release with the new data, to ensure that the facts have as much currency as possible, driving out the faulty information which has been published in error.

I would be grateful for your response to these suggestions.

My digest of the turnout figures is attached as a jpeg.

Kind regards

Paul Burnham

------ Original Message ------
From: Andy.Donald
To: Paul Burnham
Cc: [As above]
Sent: Monday, 9 May, 2022 At 17:49
Subject: [As above]

Dear Mr Burnham

Thank you for your email.

This issue was brought to our attention over the weekend. We counted using three zones, each consisting of 7 wards. It appears that the information published on our website did not contain the correct turnout figures (i.e. total number of ballot papers) for one of these counting zones. This counting zone team incorrectly sent the verification data to our web team, after inputting the postal voting ballot paper data – but before pressing save.
This meant that for one of our counting zones, the web-team was only provided with the turnout from our polling stations, and not the total turnout for that ward (which should have included both polling station and postal voting turnout).
        All ballot papers (from polling stations and postal voting) were correctly included within the count figures and in the verification figure published on the statutory notice of result.
Our website has been updated, and I have requested the web team work with Wikipedia to correct their pages.
        In answer to your specific queries:
1. I have set out the discrepancy above – the web team had been provided with the correct count results but turnout data that did not include postal voting ballot papers
2. A notice of result is being issued to all election agents and candidates. This includes the correct verification figure / turnout
3. I can confirm that all unused ballot papers were verified overnight on Thursday 5 – Friday 6 May. These were kept sealed and separate throughout the count and are now sealed in secure storage
4. Each of the 21 wards’ ballot papers began with the same ballot paper number (5000001 for polling station ballot papers, 3000001 for postal voting ballot papers). Each ward is also allocated a three-letter ward code. Each ballot paper also contains a Unique Identifying Mark (UIM) which is the ballot paper number and the three-letter ward code combined – this ensures there is no ballot paper within the borough containing the same UIM.
5. As mentioned above, the reason for the discrepancy on our website was due to the postal voting ballot paper turnout figures not being included in the turnout published on our website for one of our count zones. This error has now been corrected and we are looking into this to ensure this does not happen at future elections.
I apologise for the confusion this caused and I hope this reassures you as the accuracy of the Haringey count.

Best wishes
Andy
Andy Donald
Chief Executive
Haringey Council

------ Original Message ------
From: Paul Burnham
Sent: 07 May 2022 22:15
To: Andy Donald
Cc: [As above]

Dear Mr Donald

I am writing to you in your capacity as Returning Officer for the borough elections on 5 May.
In five of the Wards, the published total vote for the candidates exceeded the published the published turnout figure as follows:

• In St Ann’s, candidates received 4,201 votes in total in a two member ward, which means there must have been at least 2,101 valid ballot papers; and presumably more, because not all voters use all of their available votes. But the published result says that only 1,720 voted there.
• In Stroud Green, candidates received 10,922 votes in total in a three member ward, which means there must have been at least 3,641 valid ballot papers; and presumably more, because not all voters use all of their available votes. But the published result says that only 3,065 voted there.
• In Tottenham Central, candidates received 7,841 votes in total in a three member ward, which means there must have been at least 2,614 valid ballot papers. But the published result says that only 2,010 voted there, with.
• In Tottenham Hale, candidates received 5,318 votes in total in a three member ward, which means there must have been at least 1,773 valid ballot papers. But the published result says that only 1,407 voted there.
• In White Hart Lane, candidates received 7,637 votes in total in a three member ward, which means there must have been at least 2,546 valid ballot papers. But the published result says that only 2,011 voted there.

It seems evident that you have failed in your duties in relation to the conduct, reporting, probity and integrity of these elections.
       You should have accurately reported both the numbers of votes secured by each candidate, and the total number of votes cast and the turnout, in these five wards, but that has not been the case.
        Wikipedia has already faithfully posted up your election returns, showing that the lead candidate in Tottenham Central Ward received 99.7% of the vote (see the attached image). I personally do not believe that to be true, but how can we be sure?
I would be grateful if you could:
(1) Explain the discrepancies listed above.
(2) Inform all the candidates for the above five Wards of the discrepancies in the published results.
(3) Verify that the unused ballot papers from the polling stations remained in the sealed boxes returned from the polling stations.
(4) Verify that no ballot papers shared duplicate numbers.
(5) Did the borough perhaps exclude postal votes from the turnout figures – and if so, why?
I am copying this letter to Fiona Alderman. the Monitoring Officer, and to Cllrs Ahmet and Cawley-Harrison.

Kind regards

Paul Burnham

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Permalink Reply by James Ingram on May 13, 2022 at 2:39

How will new/ old council leader Peray + her fellow #Haringey councillors work to address the v low turnout across the borough, esp. in the most deprived wards?

How will Haringey Labour grow civic participation?

https://twitter.com/James_Ingram_1/status/1522823716815749120?t=V4b...

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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on May 13, 2022 at 9:38

Hi James Ingram, You're obviously right to be astonished at the voter turnout figures. And I share your puzzlement.
        In every single Haringey ward more than 20% of Haringey's registered voters went to the trouble of filling in a postal vote and taking it to a letter box. Even stranger, many of them went to a "polling station".

Maybe there should be a research project to look into this strange behaviour?
        Addressing the problem? Well we know the addresses of voters. Though not all. Some have second homes in other cities or countries.
        Civic Participation? Hmm. There's an interesting idea. What do you have in mnd?

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