‘Speak English in polling stations to cut electoral fraud’ Foreign languages can be used to coerce voters, says Pickles
ONLY English should be spoken in polling stations to prevent cheating in elections, according to a Government review into election fraud.
The author, Conservative former minister Sir Eric Pickles, said allowing the use of foreign languages at elections meant voters could be coerced or influenced to vote a certain way without other people knowing what was happening.
And he said: “These are not ‘community languages’ – they are foreign languages.”
He has published a report which highlights Birmingham as one of four parts of the country where a court has found that significant electoral fraud took place.
An electoral court ruled there had been widespread fraud in Birmingham’s 2004 council elections and the judge, Richard Mawrey, condemned “electoral fraud that would disgrace a banana republic”.
Sir Eric, the former Local Government Secretary, said in the report : “The use of English (and Welsh, where appropriate) in polling stations should be required at all times, including any assistance given to electors by electoral staff.”
He claimed: “The languages spoken in polling stations (and other places such as the count) has recently become an issue with concerns that promoting the use of non-English languages could disguise coercion or influence within the polling station.”
Criticising the Electoral Commission, the official elections watchdog, he said: “This has not been helped by the Electoral Commission facilitating what it calls ‘community languages’.
“Such an approach undermines integration and leaves the door open to fraud. These are not ‘community languages’ – they are foreign languages.”
Sir Eric suggested testing a system of asking people to provide identification when they turn up at a polling station to vote.
At the moment, voters simply need to give their name and address. Although many voters bring the polling card which has been delivered to their home, this is not actually required.
He also said political parties should be barred from collecting completed postal voting forms from voters – and claimed that abuse of postal voting in ethnic minority communities had been ignored because of political correctness. He said: “Evidence was presented of pressure being put on vulnerable members of some ethnic minority communities, particularly women and young people, to vote according to the will of the elders, especially in communities of Pakistani and Bangladeshi background.
“There were concerns that influence and intimidation within households may not be reported, and that state institutions had turned a blind eye to such behaviour because of ‘politically correct’ over-sensitivities about ethnicity and religion.”
Sir Eric was commissioned to write the report by David Cameron in the wake of a High Court hearing last year when Lutfur Rahman, the former mayor of Tower Hamlets in east London, was found guilty of corrupt and illegal practices and forced to step down.
The other areas highlighted in the report where voting fraud has been found are Slough, and the Oldham East and Saddleworth Parliamentary constituency.
Promoting the use of nonEnglish languages could disguise coercion or influence within the polling station Sir Eric Pickles