Accuracy of electoral registers improves following individual voter registration

The overall accuracy of electoral registers increased following the completion of the move to individual electoral registration last December, the Electoral Commission has found.

Its report on the process said that as of 1 December 2015 registers were 91% accurate and 84% complete, an increase in accuracy of four percentage points and a likely decline of just under one percentage point in completeness since the last registers under the former household system of registration, which were produced in February and March 2014.

Even so, this left between 7.6m and 8.3m eligible people not correctly registered to vote.

Individual registration was introduced to replace what was seen as an archaic system under which ‘heads of households’ registered voters, and because of fears that this was open to abuse by the inclusion of ineligible or imaginary voters.

There was considerable variation in how different groups had responded to individual registration, with the commission finding a nine percentage points fall in the registrations of 18-19 year olds, and a six points fall among those who rent from private landlords.

The drive to register voters ahead of last month’s referendum saw an overall 5% increase in registrations compared to 1 December 2015.

Commission chair Jenny Watson said: “The commission has called for individual electoral registration since 2003, and the registers are now more accurate and secure as a result of the new system.

“But there are still too many voters not correctly registered, particularly young people, and more needs to be done to correct this.”

She said automatic registration of 16 and 17 year olds when they receive National Insurance numbers should be adopted.

The commission has urged the Government to introduce a facility for voters to check whether they are already registered, which it said would reduce the administrative burden on electoral registration officers in processing duplicate applications.

It also recommended more use of automatic registrations by using government data to update registers, for example when someone moves home within the same local authority.