To wonder what's stopping them tampering with the postal votes

Them bastards!

RishiFinallyDidTheRightThing · Today 13:33

My ballot paper arrived this morning and has already been completed and posted back. I'm keeping my eye on the local news but there have been no reports of exploding post boxes, thus far.

Ah now, that's because THEM have suppressed all news about it, you see.

That happened before they are put in the postbox.

The most well-known prosecution is Tower Hamlets but again the tampering with the postal votes happened before they were posted.

So the weakness is what happens between the time they are delivered to the household and when they are posted in a postbox.

Postal vote 'tampering' or theft is, indeed a thing. There have been several prosecutions over the years with people ending up in jail.

The main method, as far as the authorities are aware, is by people (men) considering that all the votes in their household belong to them. They insist on their family members applying for postal votes (generally 'help' by applying for them) and then filling them in themselves. I had a relative who worked in the area, whose job was to contact the 'voters', asking to speak to each member of the family. It was apparently common for a male voice to be heard in the background, 'helping' the women with their responses. The prosecutions required a lot of painstaking work and the workers considered (unofficially) that they were the tip of the iceberg.

@Reugny The rumours at the time - going back 20 years - were that one political party was collecting postal votes in bulk to post whilst out canvassing or at community meetings.

It was said that they then put huge piles in a post box and activist for another party observed this and set fire to it!

Well RM were correct.

There is no proof that there were postal votes in the post box and even if there were, not everyone in that part of the constituency with a postal vote would use that particular post box.

Where I live I have two post boxes within 5 minutes walk. How would anyone know if I used either of those post boxes, a different one in the local area, or one in a different area?

There was a post box set on fire in 2004 in Birmingham during the elections though the Royal Mail denied it was to "destroy postal votes that may or may not have been stored inside"

( I didn't go seeking this story out to prove a point by the way I was actively involved in Birmingham politics in 2004 and remember it well)

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2004/jun/10/elections2004.uk1

My ballot paper arrived this morning and has already been completed and posted back. I'm keeping my eye on the local news but there have been no reports of exploding post boxes, thus far.

OnePeachCrow · Today 11:31

It might be easier to burn down the place where the count is taking place.

Careful! You don't want to be giving THEM ideas...

You'd have to keep doing it as well. There is quite a big window for posting your votes, they are not all posted on the same day.

It might be easier to burn down the place where the count is taking place.

But why do you assume arsonist saboteurs are active only in your constituency? These people are EVERYWHERE.........

The same way you do when you put it in the ballot box - you just have to trust that everyone will do the right thing and handle it appropriately. And if you trust that bit of the process more, you can ask someone to hand your postal vote into a polling station (or you can where I am).

So, your job is to find flaws? And you actually pegged this as a real worry?
Wow. You couldn’t figure out for yourself, with this being your job, that post boxes being set on fire was an a concern?

You work in a role that's finds holes and flaws in systems and you have no ID?
I think you've found a massive hole and flaw in the company you work for.

This is a very bizarre thread but if you are anxious - just take your postal vote to nearest post office and hand it in over the counter
I put mine in the mail at work which gets collected by post office van

OP you do know interfering with the post during transit or to act to someone's detriment are criminal offences?

All ballot papers are individually numbered. In the polling station this number is recorded against the voter id number when the paper is issued to the voter.

So not strictly a secret poll as this enables investigation in the case of suspected fraud. Or in your scenario if a postbox went on fire.

Otherwise this 'corresponding number list' is securely stored for a number of years before being disposed of.

Having worked in election roles for many years I can assure that the system works very well and electoral fraud is rare and unsuccessful.

Like to know who they are

Why bother, you no idea which postbox has a vote in...you have to set on fire every single box for weeks on end. Lots of other post be destroyed and a postal vote may not be in the box.

Sorry, knee jerk response after too much time on TwiX! Really need to keep away from the Trump related threads…

They have really strict protocols in the UK and my poor friend spends weeks verifying the signatures before locking away the actual vote envelopes (unopened at that stage). I appreciate this system become harder and slower to manage as the population grows or the voting turnout is high, but I can’t see many more reliable and safe ways to process votes.

Is this the first time you’ve experienced a general election? You might feel it’s fraught but most people don’t feel that strongly about it to destroy the contents of a letter box