Nearly 400 Potential Merton Voters Miss Out


But overall electorate grows more than ever

Nearly 400 potential electors in Merton will miss out on a vote in today's General Election, despite trying to register for the poll.

The problem has arisen because the new individual voter registration system has meant the identity of would-be new voters are checked against the National Insurance database.

If there is an discrepancy, people are then asked to provide proof of identify, such as their passport.

Problems have occurred throughout the UK by the last-minute rush to register and often in cases after women have got married and taken their husband's surname, so their details don't match the NI records.

When the deadline of April 28 arrived, there were issues with 378 potential voters in Merton which could not be resolved.

But the figures also revealed that the borough's parliamentary electorate has a whole had increased by 14,568 since the last figures were published in on December 1, 2014.

The parliamentary electorate for Merton is now 153,701, and more voters have been added in this calendar year than ever before. The previous record was 6,461 voters added in 2010.

The 2010 election in Wimbledon by won by Stephen Hammond for the Conservatives, who had a 49.1% share of the vote. This time he is standing against Andrew Judge (Labour), Shas Sheehan (Lib Dem), Peter Bucklitsch (UKIP) and Charles Barraball (Green).

May 7, 2015