On 12
December 2019 whilst watching BBC Election 2019 and reeling from the shock of
the exit poll predicting an 80 seat majority, imagine my horror when it was
announced that for the first time in my 62 years I had a CONSERVATIVE MP.
Blyth valley
was established as a constituency in 1950 as Blyth, renamed in 1983, has always
been labour, was the third seat to declare the result in 2019 and was the first
conservative seat at that election.
After a few
days I decided to investigate this dubious result. Where to start? Much on
twitter about rigged postal votes, folks left off electoral register but how?
I recalled
Naga Munchetty was reporting from the Blyth valley count for BBC and looked to
the video again and again. I took screenshots with subtitles on and made a full
transcript of the first 75 minutes of the broadcast.
A few things
had the hairs on the back of my neck standing up. Naga mentioned
- · A new count Manager being employed by Blyth Valley for this count.
- · Blyth valley being in a race to be first to declare the result.
- · It took only 38 Seconds for the first ballot box to arrive at the count.
- · Blyth Valley was using new computer software.
- · There were very low numbers of postal votes.
- · There were high numbers of people turning up at the polling stations necessitating extra staff being employed at the count.
- · A total of 28 ballot boxes arriving at the count.
I sent a
freedom of information request to Northumberland County Council for information
re Blyth Valley + 3 other constituencies they are responsible for. These are
Wansbeck (Lab), Berwick (Con) and Hexham (Con). I asked for the other 3 for
comparison.
The reply
from Northumberland County council ignored most of my questions but did give
postal vote numbers for the 4 constituencies. I have sent further FOI request
and asked the information commissioner to look at responses from NCC.
With regard
to the new count manager, the race to be first to declare, 38 seconds for the
delivery of the first ballot box and new computer software, without any
information I am unable to comment. I am not hopeful that I will ever get this
information but more on that later.
With regard
to the number of ballot boxes Naga said 28 in total however the notice of
situation of polling stations published on NCC website and dated 10 December
2019, states Blyth Valley used 31 polling stations so surely 31 ballots boxes
should have been received at count?
The only
information I have to date re Naga’s reporting and from NCC response relates to
the number of postal votes and the number of people turning up at polling
stations.
I put that
information into a spreadsheet, along with the same information for the 2005,
2010, 2015 and 2017 General elections, again for comparison. (See Appendix 1)
Yes postal
votes that were included in the count in 2019 (15599) were lower than those
included in the count in 2017 (16336) a difference of 735 but the total valid
votes counted was also lower in 2019 than it was in 2017.
The number of
postal votes not returned as a % of the total postal votes issued increased in
2019 to 2890 (15.60%). In 2017 this was 2587 (13.40%). A difference of 303.
So Naga was
right about lower postal votes but “very Low” is questionable.
She was wrong
about higher numbers at polling stations. The total number of votes counted in
2019 was 40859 and after deducting postal votes this means 25260 people voted
at a polling station. In 2017 the total number of votes counted was 42560 and
after deducting postal votes this means 26154 people voted at a polling
station. So in 2019 there were 894 less voters at polling stations than in
2017.
Confused I
started to look into the electorate and population to see if this might have a
bearing.
A
freedom of information response from Northumberland county council, dated 23
December 2019 stated the electorate for Blyth valley at the 12 December 2019
General election was 64429.
This
figure of 64429 was confirmed in
commons briefing paper CBP-8749, dated 28 January 2020 which used data from
this spread sheet HoC-2019GE-results-by-constituency.
The
notice of situation of polling stations new version, dated 10 December 2019 (https://www.northumberland.gov.uk/NorthumberlandCountyCouncil/media/Councillors-and-Democracy/Notice%20of%20Elections/General%20Election%202019/notice-of-situation-of-polling-stations-new-version-10122019_1.pdf) showed the
electorate was 66228.
Why
is there a difference of 1799? And
why are there differences for other years – see table below and appendix 1.
Year
|
Population estimate Mid year aged 18+ from ONS
|
Electorate A (from Electoral commission data)
|
Turnout (number of valid votes counted as % of electorate A)
|
Total number of valid votes counted
|
Electorate B (from notice of situation of polling stations)
|
Turnout (number of valid votes counted as % of electorate B)
|
Difference in Electorate (A – B)
|
|||||
Blyth Valley
|
*2019
|
67490
|
64,429
|
63.42%
|
40,859
|
66228
|
61.69%
|
-1799
|
||||
Blyth Valley
|
2017
|
67240
|
63,428
|
66.99%
|
42,490
|
61264
|
69.36%
|
2164
|
||||
Blyth Valley
|
2015
|
65907
|
61,247
|
62.80%
|
38,461
|
63957
|
60.14%
|
-2710
|
||||
Blyth Valley
|
2010
|
65021
|
62,900
|
61.31%
|
38,566
|
60252
|
64.01%
|
2648
|
||||
Blyth Valley
|
2005
|
63793
|
63,628
|
57.15%
|
36,366
|
Not available see FOI response
7489
|
||||||
* mid 2018 population data used here as this is latest
available
|
||||||||||||
Once
again a FOI request to NCC was refused when I enquired about this, and once
again I have asked the Information Commissioner to investigate for me.
The
abiding theme in all of this is a total lack of transparency.
Further
reading and research has shown me just how little scrutiny there is of the
whole election process, what little redress there is if electoral fraud is
found and how much of our personal data is accessible by so many people.
In
order to better understand how electoral fraud might occur I looked at the
electoral commission guidance for Electoral Officers, sent FOI to cabinet
office, DWP and of course NCC.
I
managed to scrape together enough information to draw up this flowchart of the
Individual Electoral Registration process.
I
was not in the least surprised to see how the cabinet office (Demonic Cummings)
has full access to all of our private data, our entry on the electoral register
and even the printing company that handles most of the electoral printing
requirements including postal vote packs.
Not
hard to see how armed with all of this data a person can be tracked on social
media and having been run through VICS very accurately predicted which way they
will vote.
Not
a lot of personnel involved and certainly nothing that would show up as
glaringly obvious in data, which is what I found in Blyth Valley.
I
also discovered that a lot of local authorities, NCC included, do not record
the number of people who complain about being prevented from voting.
In
my opinion the only way that these numbers can be obtained is by an audit of
those voters who said they were voting but did not.
The Constituency Labour Parties HAVE lists of who said they were voting and did not. It would not be a difficult task to contact these people and find out why.
The Constituency Labour Parties HAVE lists of who said they were voting and did not. It would not be a difficult task to contact these people and find out why.
If
it could be shown that significant numbers of people were removed from the
electoral register and or did not receive their postal votes then an official
investigation could be called for.
This
would be an abuse of a person’s human rights and could go to European Court of
Human rights.
See
the writings of Kim Sanders-Fisher about this potential human rights abuse on
this excellent site https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/forums/topic/elections-aftermath-was-our-2019-vote-the-eu-referendum-rigged-toryrig2019
I
have tried in vain to get Blyth Valley CLP to carry out an audit of non-voters
and have asked several contacts but none of their CLPs are interested in doing
this either.
Labour
at a national level does not even bother to respond to requests!
I
have taken this as far as I can and I am shelving this project.
Shame
because for everyone on twitter etc. I see whingeing about this lackadaisical
government, no one seems to care that WE
DO NOT HAVE TO ACCEPT IT!
APPENDIX
Region
|
Year
|
Electorate
|
Turnout (number of
valid votes counted as % of electorate)
|
Total number of
valid votes counted
|
Total number of
ballots at count
|
Total number of
ballot papers rejected at the count
|
Total number of
ballot papers rejected at the count as % of valid votes counted
|
Total number of
postal ballot papers issued
|
Number of covering
envelopes received by the RO or at a polling station before the close of poll
|
Number of covering
envelopes NOT received by the RO or at a polling station before the
close of poll
|
Number of covering
envelopes NOT received by the RO or at a polling station before the
close of poll as % of total number of postal ballot papers issued
|
Number of ballot
papers returned by postal voters which were included in the count of ballot
papers
|
Number of ballot
papers returned by postal voters which were included in the count of ballot
papers
as % of Total number of valid votes counted |
Number of ballot
papers returned by postal voters which were NOT included in the count
of ballot papers
|
Number of ballot
papers returned by postal voters which were NOT included in the count
of ballot papers
as % Number of covering envelopes received by the RO or at a polling station before the close of poll |
Won by Party
|
Won by Number of
ballots
|
Won by % Share of
total ballots at count
|
Population estimate
Mid year aged 18+ from ONS ***
|
Electorate (from
notice of situation of polling stations)
|
Turnout (number of
valid votes counted as % of electorate from notice of situation of polling
stations)
|
Difference in
Electorate (Results versus notice of situation of polling stations)
|
|||||||||
Blyth
|
2019
|
64,429
|
63.42%
|
40,859
|
40,953
|
94
|
0.23%
|
18,527
|
15,956
|
2,890
|
15.60%
|
15,599
|
38.18%
|
357
|
2.24%
|
CON
|
712
|
42.68%
|
67490
|
66228
|
61.69%
|
-1799
|
|||||||||
Blyth
|
2017
|
63,428
|
66.99%
|
42,490
|
42,560
|
70
|
0.16%
|
19,275
|
16,688
|
2,587
|
13.42%
|
16,336
|
38.45%
|
352
|
2.11%
|
LAB
|
7915
|
55.94%
|
67240
|
61264
|
69.36%
|
2164
|
|||||||||
Blyth
|
2015
|
61,247
|
62.80%
|
38,461
|
38,502
|
41
|
0.11%
|
17,848
|
15,790
|
2,058
|
11.53%
|
15,198
|
39.52%
|
592
|
3.75%
|
LAB
|
9467
|
46.31%
|
65907
|
63957
|
60.14%
|
-2710
|
|||||||||
Blyth
|
2010
|
62,900
|
61.31%
|
38,566
|
38,615
|
49
|
0.13%
|
21,875
|
18,479
|
3,396
|
15.52%
|
17,748
|
46.02%
|
731
|
3.96%
|
LAB
|
10744
|
44.48%
|
65021
|
60252
|
64.01%
|
2648
|
|||||||||
Blyth
|
2005
|
63,628
|
57.15%
|
36,366
|
35,773
|
593
|
1.63%
|
14,409
|
10,409
|
4,000
|
27.76%
|
10,131
|
27.86%
|
278
|
2.67%
|
LAB
|
14677
|
54.95%
|
63793
|
Not available see FOI response 7489
|
|||||||||||
Berwick
|
2019
|
59,939
|
70.25%
|
42,109
|
42,287
|
178
|
0.42%
|
10,661
|
9,419
|
1,242
|
11.65%
|
9,237
|
21.94%
|
182
|
1.93%
|
CON
|
14835
|
56.90%
|
62583
|
59562
|
70.70%
|
377
|
|||||||||
Berwick
|
2017
|
59,148
|
71.37%
|
42,212
|
42,291
|
79
|
0.19%
|
10,497
|
9,306
|
1,191
|
11.35%
|
9,111
|
21.58%
|
195
|
2.10%
|
CON
|
11781
|
52.50%
|
Not Available
|
||||||||||||
Berwick
|
2015
|
56,969
|
70.96%
|
40,423
|
40,501
|
78
|
0.19%
|
8,910
|
8,116
|
794
|
8.91%
|
7,855
|
19.43%
|
261
|
3.22%
|
CON
|
4914
|
41.10%
|
|||||||||||||
Berwick
|
2010
|
56,578
|
67.94%
|
38,439
|
38,523
|
84
|
0.22%
|
7,529
|
6,580
|
949
|
12.60%
|
6,375
|
16.58%
|
205
|
3.12%
|
LIB D
|
2690
|
43.70%
|
|||||||||||||
Berwick
|
2005
|
56,722
|
63.63%
|
36,090
|
36,269
|
179
|
0.50%
|
14,409
|
4,137
|
3,452
|
23.96%
|
3,439
|
9.53%
|
698
|
16.87%
|
LIB D
|
8632
|
52.80%
|
|||||||||||||
Hexham
|
2019
|
61,324
|
75.26%
|
46,150
|
46,330
|
180
|
0.39%
|
14,441
|
12,973
|
1,468
|
10.17%
|
12,737
|
27.60%
|
236
|
1.82%
|
CON
|
10549
|
54.50%
|
63515
|
60861
|
75.83%
|
463
|
|||||||||
Hexham
|
2017
|
61,737
|
74.87%
|
46,224
|
46,303
|
79
|
0.17%
|
14,607
|
13,102
|
1,505
|
10.30%
|
12,792
|
27.67%
|
310
|
2.37%
|
CON
|
9236
|
54.10%
|
Not Available
|
||||||||||||
Hexham
|
2015
|
59,708
|
72.59%
|
43,345
|
43,427
|
82
|
0.19%
|
12,556
|
11,500
|
1,056
|
8.41%
|
11,155
|
25.74%
|
345
|
3.00%
|
CON
|
12031
|
52.70%
|
|||||||||||||
Hexham
|
2010
|
60,360
|
72.04%
|
43,483
|
43,543
|
60
|
0.14%
|
12,960
|
11,265
|
1,695
|
13.08%
|
10,919
|
25.11%
|
346
|
3.07%
|
CON
|
5788
|
43.20%
|
|||||||||||||
Hexham
|
2005
|
60,298
|
69.44%
|
41,872
|
41,513
|
359
|
0.86%
|
10,026
|
8,010
|
3,452
|
34.43%
|
7,920
|
18.91%
|
90
|
1.12%
|
CON
|
5020
|
42.40%
|
|||||||||||||
Wansbeck
|
2019
|
62,100
|
65.23%
|
40,509
|
40,628
|
119
|
0.29%
|
14,538
|
12,489
|
2,049
|
14.09%
|
12,089
|
29.84%
|
400
|
3.20%
|
LAB
|
814
|
42.30%
|
66675
|
66228
|
61.17%
|
-4128
|
|||||||||
Wansbeck
|
2017
|
62,151
|
68.31%
|
42,454
|
42,511
|
57
|
0.13%
|
14,979
|
13,128
|
1,851
|
12.36%
|
12,799
|
30.15%
|
329
|
2.51%
|
LAB
|
10435
|
57.30%
|
Not Available
|
||||||||||||
Wansbeck
|
2015
|
60,705
|
63.47%
|
38,528
|
38,596
|
68
|
0.18%
|
13,491
|
11,968
|
1,523
|
11.29%
|
11,513
|
29.88%
|
455
|
3.80%
|
LAB
|
10881
|
50.00%
|
|||||||||||||
Wansbeck
|
2010
|
61,782
|
61.95%
|
38,273
|
38,334
|
61
|
0.16%
|
15,562
|
13,194
|
2,368
|
15.22%
|
12,722
|
33.24%
|
472
|
3.58%
|
LAB
|
7031
|
45.90%
|
|||||||||||||
Wansbeck
|
2005
|
63,005
|
58.42%
|
36,809
|
37,068
|
259
|
0.70%
|
6,405
|
4,659
|
3,452
|
53.90%
|
4,633
|
12.59%
|
26
|
0.56%
|
LAB
|
10581
|
55.20%
|
|||||||||||||
** PV per
party Conservatives 7342
Labour 1710 LibDem 1224 Green 492 Rejected 79 Total 10847
|
NOTES:
The representation of the people act 2000 gave everyone the right to
vote by post starting
with the 2001 general election although take-up was low. By the 2005
general election there
was an increased take-up of postal voting.
The electorate as shown on polling station notice has been included
because of the
difference noted between this figure and the electorate declared as part
of the results. Most
of these notices are removed quite soon after an election and those
for Blyth Valley were
obtained by an FOI request to Northumberland county council archives.
|
*** These population figures include people living in UK who are not eligible to vote
and exclude people living overseas who are eligible to vote.
Mid 2018 used for 2019 (latest available data)
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||