Birmingham City Council has revealed that staff witnessed attempts to breach the secret ballot at 50 polling stations during May’s local elections, with incidents including voters using hand signals and switching languages to circumvent the law. Lord Hayward, who introduced the 2023 legislation criminalising such conduct, has urged the Electoral Commission to investigate – warning Birmingham is unlikely to be the only council affected. The Mail has the story:
The elections watchdog has been urged to investigate after the country’s biggest town hall admitted the full scale of illegal ‘family voting’.
Birmingham City Council revealed staff witnessed attempts to breach the secret ballot at 50 polling stations in May’s local elections.
A list of incidents obtained by the the Mail showed presiding officers repeatedly had to tell voters it is against the law to enter a booth with someone else and tell them which candidate to pick – and received abuse in return.
In the city’s Jewellery Quarter, voters “became aggressive” with an officer after being told not to talk to each other in polling booths.
A man in Balsall Heath was said to be “trying continuously” to “influence voters” – and when stopped he accused officials of fraud.
The presiding officer said he had been “so stressed and under pressure” from the man, while another family “was rude”. In another part of the inner-city area, a man was witnessed trying to “influence voting“ through “Islamic gestures, blinking eyes, hand signals”.
A woman nearby “was aggressive” when told not to talk or show her vote.
Elsewhere a father was seen holding “all the poll cards” for his relatives and “was advising each one on how to vote”. The presiding officer in Garretts Green told them to go into separate booths but conceded: “It was clear that votes were being influenced.”
In Handsworth, at the centre of a row over segregation last year, voters were said to “just switch language” when told to “stop collaborating”.
The presiding officer wrote in a report: “Conferring, did not listen when asked to stop… changed language when advised to vote independently.”
And in Hall Green South, one woman “tried several times to talk to husband, showing him who to vote [sic]”. She then tried to “point where to vote”, forcing the presiding officer to “place my arm out to stop her”.
In Quinton, a woman went into the booth with her daughter and told staff “she wanted to make sure” she “voted correctly”.
One presiding officer said that when he told husbands and wives that talking in booths was a criminal offence, most men were apologetic and it was “mainly the women who took umbrage”.
This newspaper obtained the full list under freedom of information after the council initially provided only a brief summary.
On Friday, Tory peer and leading pollster Lord Hayward, who introduced the 2023 law that makes it an offence to attempt to influence voting in polling booths, said: “I hope the Electoral Commission will acknowledge that attempts at breaching the secret ballot clearly remain a problem and needs to be investigated.
“I do not believe this is the only council where this was a problem and hope the Commission will identify where else this arose and whether the polling station officers were as active as they were in Birmingham.”
It comes after a row over family voting at the Gorton and Denton by-election this year. Observers saw “extremely high” levels but Greater Manchester Police said it had found “no evidence”.
Democracy Volunteers observers said they saw 291 potential breaches of the secret ballot in the UK at the May elections.
The Electoral Commission said: “We provide guidance and support… to help protect the integrity of elections, and work with police to ensure allegations of electoral abuse and intimidation are treated seriously.
“We are gathering evidence on the… May 2026 elections and will publish our findings in the coming weeks.”
Worth reading in full.
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How about following the Islamic tradition of segregating the sexes on arrival?
Corrupt Pakistani heritage people. Deport. Remigrate. Repatriate. Urgently. Including those born here because they are all unintegrated and trying to turn us into an Arab, muhammadan, retard nation.
If nothing is done we are headed for a no prisoners civil war. History provides everyone who looks with a mirror to the likely future.
Import the third world, get the third world
The penalty for breaching the secret ballot should be removal from the voters roll for 10 years, that is at least 2 General Elections.
Is that Zalenski at the counting table?!
Surprise!
The Labour Government will only force action to prevent “family voting” when it really starts to operate against the interests of the Labour Party.
And that’s not the case yet, apart from in a handful of Constituencies.
The Jew-hating West Midlands police have investigated fully and decided their muslim friends have no case to answer.
I’d have thought voter coercion would ve completely unnecessary in the sorts of cultures hinted at in this article. Anyone with a modicum of intelligence would know to vote for the parties who serve them, i.e. the furthest left ones. When they see they can do no wrong and enjoy preferential treatment under certain ideologies it’s kind of a no-brainer.
Just another form of jihad, suits Labour, Tories turned a blind eye for 14 years.
And Birmingham city council is (in a crowded field) about the most incompetent in the country and the city absolutely resembles a third world shithole in every respect.
Enoch Powell was SO right.
Yes and the leader of the Conservative Party and of oh her Majesty’s Loyal Opposition of the time sacked him for being “racialist” (sic).
After voter ID check move people from the same or neighbouring addresses into different queues for the polling booths on opposite sides of the polling place.
Queue ‘A’ please, queue ‘B’ please, wait please.
They’ve already been told how to vote
What will they do when they have the results? sweet Fanny Adams
They just can’t bring themselves to confirm the “ethnicity” of these voters can they, other than the nicely vague reference to “Islamic gestures”.
It’s been easier up to now – ‘put a cross next to the one with a rose’… less simple now
Nothing will be done about family voting, and those who have been paying attention will know why.
Indeed. Nothing was ever done to fix postal voting. Even though the Electoral Commission compared its use to that of a Banana republic
Family Voting?
You mean Muslim voting.
Where wife #4 is told to do the same as wife #1 and follow the orders of the barely literate inbred Husband.
Police found no evidence of physical threats to Reform members until after Ann Widdecombe’s assassination. Reform have been on the receiving end of abuse for raising these issues.
If you bring the third world to Britain and insist they are better people than the Brits what do you expect.
assassinationmurder.JFK was murdered. The IRA attempted to murder Thatcher. The word assassinate has overtones of legitimate targeting.
Was Osama bin Laden murdered or executed by the Obama administration? Debate.
I’m not sure if Bin Laden was rubbed out by anyone, if I’m perfectly honest.
So the possible answers include ‘Murdered’, ‘Executed’ and ‘No’.
I’m kind of uncertain what this has to do with Muhammadan electoral corruption?