Postal votes fail to deliver
Plus our final campaign check-in, our election night coverage, news in brief, and more
Voters across Medway who registered for a postal vote have not received their ballot papers on time. But who is responsible for the mistake? Medway Council and Royal Mail each seem to be blaming each other. More importantly, what does this mean for voters? Further down, we have one final check-in with each party campaign ahead of the election, details of how our election night coverage will work, our news in brief section, and more.
Postal votes fail to deliver
Some postal voters in Medway face being disenfranchised because they haven’t received their ballot papers ahead of Thursday’s General Election.
Late last week, rumours started circulating that a number of postal voters in Medway hadn’t received their papers. These seem to be predominantly within the Gillingham and Rainham constituency.
It is unclear how many voters have been impacted, but anecdotal evidence and conversations in local Facebook groups suggest significant numbers of voters haven’t received papers.
As a result, postal voters without a ballot now need to follow an awkward process of contacting Medway Council and collecting a replacement ballot, which they must return to a polling station or Gun Wharf on Thursday. While these mitigations are welcome, it does mean that those who chose a postal vote because they will be away, face mobility issues, or lack the relevant photo ID to vote in a polling station now face being disenfranchised.
Over the weekend, Medway Council Leader Vince Maple published an open letter to Royal Mail raising questions about what has happened, and so began a game of blame shifting.
Medway Council told us that all postal votes in Medway were sent as scheduled via first class. For most postal votes within the UK, the sent date would have been 20 June.
Royal Mail told us that they have engaged with Medway Council on the issue and that all offices in the area are now free of ballot packs. Their spokesperson went on to tell us:
“We have a specialist elections team that plans every aspect of the elections delivery programmes and works closely with local authorities to ensure everything runs as smoothly as possible. We have investigated concerns and can confirm all votes that enter our network are being delivered."
So if Medway Council sent the votes as scheduled, and Royal Mail delivered them as they received them, what has led to so many voters in Medway not receiving their packs or receiving them too late to ensure they can be returned in time?
It’s hard to pinpoint exactly what has gone wrong in this situation, and the situation is not unique to Medway, with postal voters across the country failing to receive their ballots in time.
Since postal votes were opened to all voters, they have become a significant part of the electoral process. In Medway, over 40,000 voters have opted to receive one. While it remains unclear how widespread the current disruption is within Medway, it does raise inevitable concerns about how reliable postal votes can expected to be in coming elections.
If you are a postal voter and haven’t received your ballot paper, you can contact Medway Council on 01634 332030 to request a replacement, which can be picked up from their Gun Wharf headquarters in Chatham.
If you cannot get to Gun Wharf, you can authorise someone else to collect your replacement postal vote pack on your behalf. They must bring a signed letter from you giving them permission and show photo ID to confirm their identity.
It is now unlikely that any postal votes returned via the post will arrive in time to be counted. You can return your postal vote to any polling station in your constituency on polling day or to Gun Wharf. When doing this, you will be required to fill out a form, but it will allow your vote to be counted.
You can find more information on the process via Medway Council’s website.
Our coverage on election night
We will be at the election count at Medway Park on Thursday night, getting the results for each of Medway’s three constituencies as they come in.
Long-time veterans of Medway elections will know to find us over on our Twitter account, where we’ll be tweeting brief updates throughout the night. We’ll also post updates in our Substack Chat for our paid supporters, so feel free to join us there.
For those who don’t want to spend all night sitting up, we’ll publish an election results special report for paid supporters as soon as we have a final result. It’s hard to predict when this will be, but we expect it somewhere around 6am. Ideally, you’ll be able to browse the results at your leisure with your breakfast. Our usual Friday edition will still be available for all readers later in the day, including further analysis of the results.
It feels a bit harsh to whack this behind the paywall, but a lot of time and effort goes into this kind of election coverage. Unfortunately, it’s only sustainable if enough readers choose to become paid supporters.
To try and mitigate this, we are currently offering a 30-day free trial to any paid subscription level for all new subscribers or those choosing to upgrade. So, if you’d like to receive our election results report on Friday morning, please consider taking the offer. If you want our results and analysis and choose to unsubscribe after that, you can absolutely do that. But we hope you’ll consider supporting a new way of producing independent journalism for Medway and stick around a bit longer.
One last check-in
With the General Election just two days away, we’ve got just about enough time for one check-in to see how the candidates spent the campaign's final weekend.
The Conservative campaign in Chatham and Aylesford rumbled on, and while it hasn’t exactly been high energy stuff, it’s been competent enough. Nathan Gamester has been out fairly regularly with decent-sized teams, recording videos while walking around estates and, most importantly, erecting some very large boards featuring his face.
Over in Gillingham and Rainham, Rehman Chishti has been posting the address of one of his voters online, attending church picnics, and getting at least one reasonable sized team out, even if other days have been characterised by him wandering around the constituency with one or two others delivering leaflets.
Finally, Kelly Tolhurst’s campaign in Rochester and Strood seems to have reached peak ‘save Kelly’ proportions. She’s been campaigning to build a new hospital at Lodge Hill, a site too scientifically important to build houses but apparently fine for a hospital. Old favourites like saving Chatham Docks have also appeared, as has a slightly odd endorsement from Johnstone’s on Rochester High Street. The week's biggest event came as former Home Secretary and very popular figure Priti Patel joined Tolhurst for campaigning on St. Mary’s Island. It was also interesting to note that Patel also spent some of the day campaigning in Sittingbourne and Sheppey, without bothering to pop in to support Rehman Chishti in Gillingham and Rainham along the way.
On the Labour side, the party took out a front-page advert on the Medway Messenger because that’s apparently how you reach voters. Chatham and Aylesford candidate Tris Osborne continued his run of posting photos of him delivering leaflets but in a vague enough manner that it could just be at his own front door. If Osborne wins on Thursday, it will almost entirely be down to the national swing rather than any resources being put into the seat.
The party continued their run of having big figures campaigning in the seat, with Shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves appearing in Gillingham and Rainham to give a speech and support Naushabah Khan. This was followed up by Walthamstow MP Stella Creasy campaigning in the seat yesterday.
Over in Rochester and Strood, Lauren Edwards continued her relentless campaign with teams of activists out constantly and meeting union workers and reps from BAE Systems. Finally, Labour Deputy National Campaign Co-ordinator Ellie Reeves visited the seat yesterday and unveiled a new poster campaign featuring Rishi Sunak next to you in bed. This was premiered next to the busy A2 in Strood and somehow didn’t cause any accidents as drivers spotted the horrifying scene.
Last week, we reported that Reform had a quiet week in Medway. Chatham and Aylesford candidate Thomas Mallon got in touch to highlight that his team were out daily across the constituency and that he had been running a campaign stall in Chatham High Street, which is located within the Rochester and Strood constituency. We’re happy to correct the record.
Elsewhere, activists were out in Strood over the weekend doing whatever the hell this is before doing it in Rochester High Street as well. According to the caption, it’s a revolt against taxes and ‘trans ideology’, apparently. Because of course it is.
After we reported the misdelivery last week, the Lib Dems claimed that Royal Mail incorrectly delivered their Rochester and Strood leaflet in Chatham and Aylesford. We’ve established above that Royal Mail struggles to deliver things correctly, so it’s a plausible story. However, the correct leaflets being correctly delivered the next day raises an eyebrow or two.
Elsewhere, the party had teams out on St. Mary’s Island and the Davis Estate, the only two places they think exist in Medway. They also proved their commitment to trying to win in Medway by once again campaigning in Carshalton and Wallington.
It’s been a fairly quiet week for the Greens, but they did manage to get some leaflets out on St. Mary’s Island, which was clearly the place to be this week.
While the Workers Party has been quiet in Rochester and Strood, Chatham and Aylesford candidate Matt Valentine has been making videos with George Galloway and posting bar charts that would make the Lib Dems blush.
The SDP continued their cheerful campaign, with candidates Steve Tanner and Peter Wheeler hitting the streets with their banner to campaign in Walderslade, Twydall, and Snodland, where they managed to disgruntle some voters enough that they had screwed up leaflets left on their car windscreen. While we’re not usually in the business of posting Party Political Broadcasts here, the SDP one features no less than two characters played by Peter Wheeler. The man has range.
Independent candidate Peter Cook had his car damaged, and his bike tyre slashed this week in what he claims was a political attack. He also somehow managed to get a poster up in at least one shop, so a week of highs and lows for his campaign.
Just two more days, and it’ll all be over. Stay strong.
In brief
🏢 Former Chatham and Aylesford MP Tracey Crouch has been signed up by Hanover Communications, a ‘strategic communications consultancy’ to boost its growing sports offer. Hanover advises the NFL, UFC, England and Wales Cricket Board, British Horseracing Authority, Football Association, Premier League, Sky Sports and many more, so it seems like it will be a good fit for the former Sports Minister.
🪛 Medway Council are expanding their repair cafe initiative following a successful trial. Residents can visit the drop-in sessions in Chatham and Strood and receive expert help repairing electricals, bikes, and clothes.
📖 To Ease My Troubled Mind, a new book looking at the life of legendary Medway artist Billy Childish by music journalist Ted Kessler is released this week. The book, constructed from a year of interviews with Childish, his family, ex-girlfriends, band members past and present, friends, foes, collaborators, and even his therapist, is released on Thursday.
More Authority
For our weekend interview, we sat down with Rob Flood, who is the chair of the City of Rochester Society, a historian, and a newly minted podcaster. We chatted to him about the City of Rochester Society, Medway’s LGBT+ history, whether Rochester should have a town council, city status (inevitably), and lots more.
Footnotes
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Music that soundtracked the creation of this edition: Where’s My Utopia? by Yard Act, Straight Outta Compton by NWA, and You Are Who You Hang Out With by The Front Bottoms.
This is actually the first time since I moved (back) to Medway two years ago that I *have* received my postal ballot papers.
Very much seems to be Medway Council's issue - my wife and I applied for postal votes because we are away on holiday on polling day - my postal vote arrived shortly after 20th June, however my wife's didn't. She phoned Medway Council and was told they could not send hers out until 26th June at the earliest. Fortunately, the in-laws live nearby and forwarded them on to out holiday address, just in time to return them for the deadline. Not impressed with Medway Council’s handling of this.