Commentary on Sections Part 2: Registration of electors Section 11 Alterations of registers: pending elections
72.Subsections (1) and (2) amend section 13B of the 1983 Act, which concerns alterations to the electoral registers during a period when an election is pending. These subsections will move the deadline for applying for registration closer to the day of poll. A person will be entitled to vote in an election if their registration has taken effect by the fifth day before polling day. Registration cannot take effect until the registration officer has determined entitlement and issued a notice amending the register. The five day period for public objections, currently provided for in secondary legislation, will mean that the final date for applying to be registered will be eleven days prior to polling day.
73.Subsection (3) amends section 13B further to deal with circumstances where the registration officer has determined that an amendment to his registers is needed to add or remove a person’s entry in the register, or to give effect to a court ruling, or to correct a clerical error. If the section 13B timescales for those amendments taking effect would be later than the fifth day before the poll, then the amendments to section 13B(2) have the effect of bringing forward the date those amendments take effect, to what is called in section 13B, “the appropriate publication date”, i.e. the sixth or the fifth day before the poll.
74.Subsection (4) inserts (3A) to (3E) into section 13B of the 1983 Act. Whereas the amendment made by the substituted section 13B(2) limits effective amendments to those made no later than the fifth day before the poll, there are two circumstances in which amendments can be made and take effect up to and including a prescribed time of day on polling day itself. Currently, such alterations may only be made up to the fifth day before the day of poll.
75.These circumstances, covered by the inserted section 13B(3A) and (3C), are where there has been a court ruling, or a clerical error has been corrected. The inserted section 13B(3B) deals with the court ruling; the inserted section 13B(3D) deals with the clerical errors. These subsections direct the registration officer to issue the required notice that amends the register and specifies that the notice takes effect as from the beginning of the day on which it was issued.
76.Subsection (4) inserts a new subsection 13B(3E). Clerical errors can only be corrected during pending elections if the elector has drawn them to the attention of the registration officer in the prescribed time and manner.