Tower Hamlets local elections: Clampdown to stop vote fraud in scandal-hit borough

Security: a fraud prevention system has been introduced at Tower Hamlets town hall
Alex Lentati
WEST END FINAL

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A scandal-hit London borough has had to implement some of the most intense anti-fraud measures in the country before the local elections.

Tower Hamlets is the only council in the capital, and just one of three in the UK, fully using the Government’s anti-fraud postal vote pilot. It follows previous complaints that the postal ballot system has been used to “farm” votes.

The Standard was shown the “intense scrutiny” each postal ballot must go through to ensure they are genuine. Just over 31,000 postal votes were sent out in Tower Hamlets, with a warning that they should only be filled out by the addressee.

Behind a guarded door in the town hall, each form is scanned through a computer where 100 points on the signature are checked against their postal application, as well as date of birth. Discrepancies flagged are investigated by a team with “forensic science training”.

A sample of voters are phoned to check they received their form, while others are questioned about whether they filled it in themselves.

Hunting for discrepancies: Rob Curtis, head of electoral services at Tower Hamlets
Alex Lentati

Rob Curtis, head of electoral services, said: “Anything flagged up by the computer is checked by a human eye, which can more easily detect human errors. Any ballot that doesn’t meet the checks will be considered spoilt.”

Council chief executive and returning officer William Tuckley added: “Every ballot is intensely scrutinised, but we err on the side of inclusion. You can’t put a price on democracy and we want people to feel we are running a fair election.” More than 1,000 homes with five or more people registered to vote have been checked by council officers. Anti-fraud police officers equipped with body cameras will be deployed at every polling station on election day.

Mr Tuckley said: “As well as our postal vote measures we have worked hard to ensure polling stations are secure and no one is going to feel intimidated.”

This month, the Standard revealed 39 new allegations in Tower Hamlets of corruption in the run-up to next month’s elections, including complaints of bribery, forgery and ballot tampering.

Yesterday, the Standard reported that police are investigating allegations of postal vote fraud in Hammersmith and Fulham. It is understood a number of people reported suspicions that they had been tricked into applying for a postal vote. The council said there were no concerns over the validity of votes.

Mr Tuckley became Tower Hamlets chief executive in 2015, shortly after independent mayor Lutfur Rahman was ousted by an election court for “corrupt and illegal” practices and banned from office for five years.

Mr Tuckley said: “In 2014, the count went wrong to a serious degree. We are determined not to have a repeat of that.”

This year, Labour mayor John Biggs is up against councillor Rabina Khan of the People’s Alliance, and councillor Ohid Ahmed, of Aspire, a party founded by Mr Rahman.

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