Help for disabled voters

Our polling stations are made accessible and as many as possible are wheelchair accessible, with temporary ramps used where needed.  The ramped access may be different to the main door, but this will be sign posted.

If it is difficult to access the polling station, the Presiding Officer will offer help to the voter getting into the station, or might bring a ballot paper out to that person to ensure they can fill it in.

There will be a low level polling booth suitable for use with a wheelchair in polling stations.

Large print posters of the ballot papers are available to view in every polling station, these are used as a reference. Electors will still need to cast their vote on a standard ballot paper, as it is required by law.

A special aid called a 'tactile device' is available to help blind or visually impaired voters to vote without assistance.  The tactile voting device has a sticky backing, which attaches on top of your ballot paper. It has numbered lift up flaps (the numbers are raised and in braille) directly over the boxes where you mark your vote.  You can find out more at the RNIB website here

If you have a disability that prevents you from completing a ballot paper on your own, you may take a companion to the polling station to help you to vote. Your companion must be a close relative (father, mother, brother, sister, spouse, civil partner; son or daughter if they are aged eighteen years or over). Before helping you, your companion must complete a simple companion declaration form at the polling station to indicate that they have recorded the vote truly and faithfully. Please ask the Presiding Officer at your polling station about this.

You can ask the Presiding Officer to help you, they are legally bound by the Requirement for Secrecy and your vote will remain secret. If you know which candidate you wish to vote for, you must instruct the Presiding Officer, in the privacy of the polling booth, to mark the ballot paper(s) on your behalf.

If you do not wish to attend the polling station to cast your vote you can apply for an absent vote.  For more information click here