Labour and Liberal Democrat councillors in Stockport have criticised government plans to change electoral registration could see up to a million people fall off the register.
The abrupt proposed changes would usher in individual electoral registration, replacing the previous system of registering to vote by household, and were due to be implemented in December 2016.
However, the government have issued an order to bring the date forward by one year, leaving Stockport with almost 4000 unconfirmed voters, who the council say could become disenfranchised from the democratic system.
Councillor Colin Foster, Labour spokesperson for young people and voter registration, said: “The government shouldn’t be moving the goalposts like they have done.
“Whatever the rationale for the changes, the implementation of them has been shambolic and will lead to people who have been able to vote in the past now not being registered.
“These rushed changes also ignore the wider problems of not being on the electoral register, which include making it harder to get a credit card or a mobile phone contract and increasing the possibility of an £80 fine.”
Labour and Liberal Democrat councillors will bring forward a motion next week asking Stockport Council to ‘take every practicable step … to ensure that as many local residents are registered to vote as possible’.
Councillor Iain Roberts, Deputy Leader of the Council and Liberal Democrat Group said: “People who are legally entitled to vote should be able to do so in a democratic society; that should be a principle which is fundamental.
“Councils across the country were given an implementation date for these changes and that has now cynically been changed at very short notice.”
The council meeting will take place on October 29.
