Candidates for the Egremont South Town Council by-election

Three candidates have come forward for the vacant seat on Egremont Town council, so there IS going to be a contested election on 24th April. Here are the candidate details:


































It will probably not surprise readers of this blog to learn that I will be supporting Jeff Hailes, who has lived in the aera for many years and is involved with a number of local activities and causes including the Rugby club and Credit Union. Jeff was an excellent Borough Councillor for St Bees.

There will, very surprisingly, not be polling cards sent out for this election. As per my previous post and link, The Cumbria Chronic has published a piece on the decision of Egremont Town Council not to send out these cards, which you can read by clicking on the link immediately below:

SHHH! ELECTION TAKING PLACE… – The Cumbria Chronic

Most of the time Egremont Town council works together pretty well in a constructive and not-particularly partisan or party-political manner. The vote last week about the forthcoming by-election was, I still think, very surprising and quite different to how the council has normally worked since I joined it.

Normally polling cards are sent out when there is an election to make sure everyone who is entitled to vote knows that there is an election, when, where and how to vote etc.

But we are told this is not automatic and when there is a Town Council by election, the council gets to decide whether or not to send out polling cards.

So good luck finding out about the election if you're not on Facebook and don't get called on by one of the candidates, because Egremont Town Council voted, on the chair's casting vote after a 3:3 tie, not to fork out the £1,400 cost of printing and sending out polling cards.

The argument put by those who voted not to send out polling cards was to save money, and that the electorate could be informed by other means such as Facebook.

I was one of the three councillors who voted that polling cards should go out, because not all electors are online and without an official notice of the election through the door some voters are bound to miss out, either because they miss the election entirely or find out too late to get voter ID or a postal vote should they need either. 

(Remember, you now need ID to vote in any public election. The council can provide a voter ID card if you don't have anything else suitable but this takes time to organise so there is a deadline.) 

Watch this space for further news about the by-election.

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