Statement regarding petition for an elected mayor

A petition presented to Bath & North East Somerset council concerning a ballot for a directly Elected Mayor has failed a scrutiny test.

A Statemebt issued by the council  today is below.


Bath & North East Somerset Council has confirmed today (11th June 2015) that the petition it has received for an elected mayor for Bath and North East Somerset has been unsuccessful due to a shortage of valid entries.

The Council has notified the organiser of the petition today that the total number of valid petitioners has not met the statutory number set out by the Local Government Act 2000.

In assessing and verifying the petition of 13th May 2015, the Council followed the strict guidance set out by the regulations. These require the Council to check each entry individually against the current register of electors. As a result of this detailed checking the Council established that there were 5,039 entries which matched the electoral register and 2,241 entries which did not. The total number of valid entries required to validate the petition was 6,437. A number of the entries had been amended and the expectation is that, if a petition is resubmitted, these will be corrected.

In order to be a valid entry each person must be on the local register of electors. Everyone signing the petition is required to provide their first name, surname and address and the date on which he or she signs the petition.

Almost half of the invalid entries were from people who were not on the electoral register or had not given their full address. The remaining entries included a mix of either duplicate entries; incorrect names or addresses; initials rather than full names or they were not sufficiently legible to enable identification.

The organisers of the petition can amalgamate the number of valid entries with any subsequent petitions submitted to the authority. The petition dated 13th May will be retained for inspection by the public from Electoral Services at the Guildhall, High Street, Bath, during normal office hours until 11th July 2015.