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Britain’s new voter ID laws caused friction in the voting system leading to queues and delays, according to voters who spoke to Byline Times’ VoteWatch project.
Last week was the first general election in which all voters needed ID to vote. According to the Conservative Government which implemented the rules earlier this year, voter ID laws were a “reasonable approach to combat the inexcusable potential for voter fraud that existed in our electoral system”.
But critics, such as John Pullinger, chair of the Electoral Commission, noted that the laws would disenfranchise people including already marginalised groups like unemployed and disabled people. In 2023, there was just one conviction for so-called personation fraud, which mandatory ID is meant to prevent, according to the commission.
Democracy groups are urging Keir Starmer to scrap voter ID in the Labour Prime Minister’s first King’s Speech setting out the Government’s plans next Wednesday.
Mark Kieran, CEO of democracy campaign group Open Britain, said Voter ID laws “have proven to be a barrier to democratic participation, particularly for young and marginalised voters” and added that with “such a disproportionate election result, the new Government has a responsibility to either scrap these draconian restrictions entirely or significantly reform them to ensure our democracy is truly accessible to all.”
Labour has pledged to expand the list of acceptable IDs which can be used while voting, but the party is unlikely to scrap the policy. Ministers are able to extend the list of accepted IDs through so-called secondary legislation, without needing a full bill.
Kevin Keith, a leading open government campaigner, claimed the UK had “just had the lowest turnout at a general election since universal suffrage,” with only 52% of the population voting despite “the best efforts of campaigners to engage young people and marginalised groups”.
There is a fundamental truth with regard to public policy and indeed any aspect of life: if you want people to do the right things you have to make it easy. Not impose barriers. The Government had to look at Voter ID
Kevin Keith
Problems at the Polling Stations
Several voters reported problems voting or faced delays due to the new rules in the general election.
Mike Meldrum, who voted in Oxford West and Abingdon with his wife, told Byline Times that ahead of him there were three people in their early twenties. Two had polling cards and driving licences, but one had not brought a polling card.
“They spent maybe five minutes with a supervisor coming over as well, looking for his name on the paper and they couldn’t find him. So he was left there, with his driving licence, having received a polling card…so what they did was say ‘Go home find your polling card we’re open till ten o’clock’. How demoralising is that?
“Put yourself in those shoes, you’ve effectively been dismissed because they’ve had trouble finding your address on a sheaf of paper that they already had trouble finding other people on. By that time there were a good eight people behind us in the queue looking over and tutting and so on. They had gone to the trouble of coming with their driving licence and been turned away. This is absolutely appalling.”
Christopher Jeffries voted in Bristol Central and told Byline Times that “the main problem” was the time it took to check IDs: “I voted in the morning and I was surprised by how many people turned out. It was partly because of that and partly because of the new ID laws, it did take significantly more time than in previous years”.
Under Strain
Jonathan Carr-West, Chief Executive, Local Government Information Unit (LGIU) told Byline Times that Voter ID “added pressure” to an electoral service “already under significant strain”.
He said LGIU’s 2023 survey of Election Administrators had already revealed a lack of qualified staff to work at elections which “presented a very real risk to the effective administration for a general election, as well as the long-term resilience of the profession”.
Voter ID requirements, Carr-West explained, “exacerbated the struggle to recruit staff and brought additional financial burden for local authorities”.
Byline Times previously reported during the local elections how women who use both their maiden and married names for different things often ran into trouble when voting. Clare Boyes, who voted in Montgomeryshire and Glyndwr, encountered this issue.
She used her married name for admin when she retired, and her passport was also in her married name, but was on the electoral roll under her maiden name.
Because Boyes didn’t have a photo ID she applied for a postal vote. Because the postal vote papers arrived as she went away for a week she ended up taking them to the polling station “which was quite amusing really because they seemed to be in complete disarray, they’ve always seemed really organised in the past”.
“They had two desks full of different forms, but they didn’t know which was the right form for me so it took them quite a time to work out which was the right form,” Boyes explained, adding that it “probably took about twenty minutes by which time a queue had built up. It wasn’t a great experience really”.
Carr-West from the Local Government Information Unit said: “The specific impact of Voter ID cannot be quantified because it is compounded by other significant changes to the electoral process and in voter habits. Electoral Administrators were prepared for the General Election but this is only because staff go far above what should be expected, working many hours for free.”
‘Never Like This Before’
Boyes thinks otherwise: “They didn’t seem very well prepared. I’d never noticed them having anything before except for the list they cross you off, but now it was two tables full of forms.”
Elaine Taylor spent election day as a teller for Labour in West Worthing. She told Byline Times she met a mother, with two young children on polling day, “who was not very well off”. The woman did not have a passport, and because she didn’t have a car, she didn’t have a driver’s licence. She was also too young for an over 60s bus pass. “She had no idea she could apply for a free voter ID.”
Similarly, Heather Bell told Byline Times that when attempting to vote in Central Brighton she was unable to get to the front of a very slow-moving queue. She added it has “never been like this before”.
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Taylor said that when driving around Worthing queues outside polling stations “gave the impression of very high turnout, when actually there wasn’t”. She added that, “I think this is the UK following the Republicans in the US in making voting harder unnecessarily.”
Jonathan Carr West of the LGIU added: “Ultimately, successful elections in the UK are currently only achieved through enormous goodwill. To maintain faith in elections and democracy, the public needs to be certain that elections are secure, inclusive, well-organised and that the results represent our genuine preferences. A functioning system is required to achieve this.”
Additional reporting by Josiah Mortimer.