UK Elections marred by vote problems

[T_i_B]

Source: BBC

Scotland's parliamentary elections have been hit by major problems with many counts suspended and an unprecedented number of spoilt ballots recorded.

There are fears the national figure for spoilt ballots could exceed 100,000.

Seven counts have been suspended across Scotland because of major problems with the new electronic system.

A statement from the Scotland Office said DRS, the company responsible for the counting machines, must investigate the delays.



Read more: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/6622379.stm

[dipsydoodle]

1. Odd that

I hadn't realised we used anything electronic at all here in the UK - thought we were still using fingers etc to count and tally. Having said that I've noticed this too on the Beeb site :
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/coventry_warwickshire/6622561.stm

[T_i_B]

2. They tried it in Scotland

Hopefully they won't try it again for the sake of the Scots.

[muriel_volestrangler]

4. STV voting without electronic counting is long and tedious

Because when excess votes are redistributed, you have to apportion the 'next preference' votes in the proportion of all of the votes a successful candidate received(*). So if the quota is, say, 200, and a candidate receives 249 votes, then 49 votes must be redistributed according to the next preference (if any) of all 249 voters. This means you get fractional votes. Not only does the maths become complicated, if you recount a ballot by hand, you're not looking for 'preference 3', say - you're looking for 'preference after the one that this ballot has for Candidate X'.

In theory, optical scanning out to be a well-practised routine. But then again, this is government IT procurement ... :eyes:

*: Or you do a random sampling of the successful candidates votes for the excess amount, redistribute those ballots, and hope your selection was properly representative. Probably with crossed fingers ...

[dave_p]

3. Mixed system

It looks like the voting was manual but the scanning was electronic. It's an old method that should work reasonably, and there's a paper trail.

In this instance people are complaining that there were two electoral systems in two simultaneous elections - one requiring an "X" for one candidate only and the other "1", "2" etc in order of preference. The wrong character means a spoilt ballot in that particular vote.

I've no sympathy. If voters are too dumb to read the instructions first, to hell with their votes. It's not rocket science.

Some polling stations were wrongly advising voters to fold the papers in the traditional way, messing up the scanning. That's the authorities' fault.