Call to re-examine council votes

The number of rejected ballots was higher than in past council elections

Some ballot papers in last year's local elections should be re-examined to see if voters misunderstood the voting system, a Holyrood committee has said.

It said research should establish how many papers were marked with a cross, rather than the new 1-2-3 system used for the first time in council polls.

More than 38,000 - or 2% - of votes in the local elections were rejected, much higher than previous council polls.

The local government committee did not question the validity of any results.

It described the proportion of rejected ballots as "unacceptably high" and said the Electoral Commission should be called in to carry out the research.

However, the committee did not recommend that all ballot papers should be re-examined.

Wrongly cast

The verdict came in a report on last year's election fiasco, in which thousands of votes were wrongly cast in both the Holyrood and local council elections.

It endorsed a decision by parliament calling for Holyrood to have more control over future Scottish elections - and for council and Holyrood elections to be held on different dates.

Last year's local government elections were held for the first time under the STV method of proportional representation, which required each voter to choose three or four councillors for a ward, ranking them in 1-2-3 order of preference.

While the number of rejected ballots was much lower than the number of rejected Holyrood voting papers, it was still much higher than in previous local government elections.

The rejection rate ranged from 1.11% in East Dunbartonshire to 2.77% in West Dunbartonshire.

'Sticking plaster approach'

The MSPs said the lower rejection rate in the local elections may have been due to voters believing they only had one vote, and marking their ballot papers with a cross or the number 1.

This would have been counted as a valid vote - but some voters may not have realised they could vote for more than one candidate, said the report.

In line with last year's Gould report on the poll fiasco, the latest report called for the creation of a chief returning officer for Scotland, and for ballot papers to be easy to complete.

The Scottish Government agreed with the report's central conclusions and backed calls for further devolution of responsibility for elections.

A spokesman described current arrangements as a "sticking plaster approach".

"We call on the UK Government to take the necessary steps to implement this fundamental recommendation and announce their intention to do so as soon as possible," he said.