Stop e-voting trials, government told

The Electoral Commission has called for the government to hold fire on further e-voting trials until security and process issues have been resolved.

The election watchdog made the recommendations as part of its official review of the electronic voting pilots held during the local elections in May.

Thirteen local authorities - including Sheffield, Shrewsbury, Stratford-on-Avon and Warwick - ran trials for electronic voting, vote counting and voting in advance.

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Despite learning lessons from the trials, the Commission feels there is little benefit in running any more until a government plan for changing the way pilots are conducted is worked out.

Peter Wardle, chief executive of the Electoral Commission, said further trials will not be beneficial "in the absence of any clear direction, or likelihood of new insights".

The evaluation also raised the issue of public confidence in the security of e-voting, as well as accessibility and technical difficulties. Other recommendations include the implementation of individual voter registration before electronic voting can take place.

In some locations where e-vote counting was tested, it was abandoned in favour of a standard manual count due to difficulties using the technology.

The Commission suggests a minimum of six months planning is required to implement electronic counting effectively.