[cvn-developers] Ideas for next election... (moved from 'mysociety developers list').

[paul perrin]

Hi

I was UKIP candidate for Hove in the election - I am primarily a democrat and keen on a level playing field. Having people take power/control back form political parties is a good thing and democracy club seems to be part of that - hurrah!

My main suggestion is getting volenteers in to watch the count and keep tallies of votes by ballot box. This is something the large parties have resources to do, but the information (as far as I can see) should be free.

The count goes...

1) Ballot box received from polling station.

2) Opened

3) Slips Emptied Out

4) Slips unfolded and put right way up in bundles of 25 (or 50?) - not sorted in anyway.

5) Bundles counted and checked against number of slips issued in polling station.

6) Bundles split and put into piles by candidate (Dodgy votes extracted).

7) Dodgy votes reviewed/challenged/counted

8) Candidates piles put in to bundles of 25

9) Candidates bundles counted...

10) Total announced...

At step 4 party observers can see the slips and who the vote was for and it is known which polling station it was from. So they keep a tally of how many votes for each candidate by polling district (of at least a sample of the votes). There can be 6 or more boxes being done (at different tables) at the same time - this means big parties with lots of observers get a very good idea of every parties support by area whereas small parties dont... (Just constituency totals at the final count)

So how about (trusted, reliable etc) democracy club volenteers being invited to counts to capture this info an make it available to all candidates and (if legal) publish it on the web later?

If I had known all this I would have got more people in (I hate to have lost that info about where campaigning was successful and where not... don't think the other parties are likely to share their info...), but if party people do it, it won't be shared... so trusted independent volenteers would seem to be a good solution.

Paul

[paul perrin]

(sent this from a different email address, so my have bounced - trying again from this one)

Paul /)/+)

[Seb Bacon]

I would love to see this happen. However, I'd be concerned it's just
too much to bite off.

It sounds like we'd need something like 6 volunteers at each count,
i.e. 3900 volunteers.

Given we get something in the order of 10% response rates to tasks
which you can do from your computer, I would think we'd get about 1%
being interested in doing something like this, so we'd need a
volunteer base of something in the order of 390,000 to reach that
committed 1%. I'm something of an activist myself and even then I
think I'd only be 50/50 on feeling able to commit to something like
this.

Any ideas how we'd reach the 3900 of the right, motivated people?

Seb

--
skype: seb.bacon
mobile: 07790 939224
land: 020 8123 9473

[Francis Irving]

On Tue, May 11, 2010 at 12:17:41PM +0100, paul perrin wrote:
> The count goes...
>
> 1) Ballot box received from polling station.
> 2) Opened
> 3) Slips Emptied Out
> 4) Slips unfolded and put right way up in bundles of 25 (or 50?) - not
> sorted in anyway.
> 5) Bundles counted and checked against number of slips issued in polling
> station.
> 6) Bundles split and put into piles by candidate (Dodgy votes extracted).
> 7) Dodgy votes reviewed/challenged/counted
> 8) Candidates piles put in to bundles of 25
> 9) Candidates bundles counted...
> 10) Total announced...

To add that stages 1)-5) are called "verification". And then stages
5)-10) seem to be called "the count".

> At step 4 party observers can see the slips and who the vote was for and it
> is known which polling station it was from. So they keep a tally of how many
> votes for each candidate by polling district (of at least a sample of the
> votes). There can be 6 or more boxes being done (at different tables) at the
> same time - this means big parties with lots of observers get a very good
> idea of every parties support by area whereas small parties dont... (Just
> constituency totals at the final count)
>
> So how about (trusted, reliable etc) democracy club volenteers being invited
> to counts to capture this info an make it available to all candidates and
> (if legal) publish it on the web later?
>
> If I had known all this I would have got more people in (I hate to have lost
> that info about where campaigning was successful and where not... don't
> think the other parties are likely to share their info...), but if party
> people do it, it won't be shared... so trusted independent volenteers would
> seem to be a good solution.

I love it!

If such a project was started, I'd support Democray Club offering
members tasks about it (e.g. 1. find someone who can get you in the
count ...)

You could start with a shared spreadsheet/wiki that volunteers can all
log into and enter the data.

Perhaps try it out for a byelection? There's the one to happen later
this month (due to death of a candidate during the General Election
campaign) that would be perfect.

Big picture lesson about election sites: Try them out in local,
European and by elections first! The Straight Choice did this, and
were in a much stronger position than if they hadn't.

Another example - would have been good to do the voter survey for a
byelection first. Then we'd have had chances to change its wording,
how refusal to answer is handled, and so on.

Francis

[Tim Green]

My reaction is similar - it'd be great if we could do it, but we don't
have enough of the right type of volunteer, and also that the people
most capable of organising it are least likely to want to make the data
open - I can't see it being very easy/possible to organise collaboration
between local parties on it.

-t

[paul perrin]

You don't need 100% coverage from day one and they only need to see (say) 200 votes from each box...

With nothing else to worry about (checking on dirty tricks, reviewing spoilt ballot papers, speaking to the press (or at least trying to!)) then I think two people could do a worthwhile job - as each box comes tally the first 200 and move on to the next - one challenge is seeing where and when new boxes come in... so making sure you know which polling station you are counting for and don't miss any...

Paul /)/+)

On 11 May 2010 12:43, Seb Bacon <seb....@gmail.com> wrote:

I would love to see this happen.  However, I'd be concerned it's just
too much to bite off.

It sounds like we'd need something like 6 volunteers at each count,
i.e. 3900 volunteers.

Given we get something in the order of 10% response rates to tasks
which you can do from your computer, I would think we'd get about 1%
being interested in doing something like this, so we'd need a
volunteer base of something in the order of 390,000 to reach that
committed 1%.  I'm something of an activist myself and even then I
think I'd only be 50/50 on feeling able to commit to something like
this.

Any ideas how we'd reach the 3900 of the right, motivated people?

Seb

[David Woods]

Would it be too much to ask that a change be made to regulations to ensure
that the counters themselves record this data so results can be analysed
properly? It shouldn't add too much more effort to the count. Something to
at least approach the Electoral Commission with?

I agree it's a great idea, but unlikely to get enough volunteers to do it
properly. Having attended one count to do exactly that, it's a pretty
tedious job that goes right through the night.

It's well worth trying in the by election though, and selected seats.

[Seb Bacon]

Well, I do like Francis' suggestion of trialling it on a by-election,
at least -- then we'll definitely get an idea of the scale of the
task.

Anyone fancy a trip to Thirsk & Malton on 27 May?!

Seb

On 11 May 2010 13:30, paul perrin <pperr...@googlemail.com> wrote:
> You don't need 100% coverage from day one and they only need to see (say)
> 200 votes from each box...
> With nothing else to worry about (checking on dirty tricks, reviewing spoilt
> ballot papers, speaking to the press (or at least trying to!)) then I think
> two people could do a worthwhile job - as each box comes tally the first 200
> and move on to the next - one challenge is seeing where and when new boxes
> come in... so making sure you know which polling station you are counting
> for and don't miss any...
> Paul /)/+)
> On 11 May 2010 12:43, Seb Bacon <seb....@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> I would love to see this happen.  However, I'd be concerned it's just
>> too much to bite off.
>>
>> It sounds like we'd need something like 6 volunteers at each count,
>> i.e. 3900 volunteers.
>>
>> Given we get something in the order of 10% response rates to tasks
>> which you can do from your computer, I would think we'd get about 1%
>> being interested in doing something like this, so we'd need a
>> volunteer base of something in the order of 390,000 to reach that
>> committed 1%.  I'm something of an activist myself and even then I
>> think I'd only be 50/50 on feeling able to commit to something like
>> this.
>>
>> Any ideas how we'd reach the 3900 of the right, motivated people?
>>
>> Seb
>>

[Francis Irving]

And if somebody is prepared to definitely go there and organise it, we
can send a mailout to just Democracy Club volunteers in that area,
asking for volunteers to help them.

That goes in general actually! If you've got a Democracy Club like
thing you're doing that is specific to a local area, do post to this
list asking for a local mailout about it.

Francis

[paul perrin]

Hi

Each candidate is entitled to 6-10 people to observe the count (depends on various factors that I don't remember!) who need to be named in advance for passes to be issued - I don't know if there is any other way to get a pass.

So you may need to butter up a candidate who hasn't already got a full list of party workers.

Paul /)/+)

On 11 May 2010 15:39, Francis Irving <fra...@mysociety.org> wrote:

And if somebody is prepared to definitely go there and organise it, we
can send a mailout to just Democracy Club volunteers in that area,
asking for volunteers to help them.

That goes in general actually! If you've got a Democracy Club like
thing you're doing that is specific to a local area, do post to this
list asking for a local mailout about it.

Francis

On Tue, May 11, 2010 at 01:34:23PM +0100, Seb Bacon wrote:
> Well, I do like Francis' suggestion of trialling it on a by-election,
> at least -- then we'll definitely get an idea of the scale of the
> task.
>
> Anyone fancy a trip to Thirsk & Malton on 27 May?!
>
> Seb
>

[Philip Potter]

Or register a DC candidate? Shame it costs £500 :)

[Mark Goodge]

On 11/05/2010 15:51, paul perrin wrote:
> Hi
>
> Each candidate is entitled to 6-10 people to observe the count (depends
> on various factors that I don't remember!) who need to be named in
> advance for passes to be issued - I don't know if there is any other way
> to get a pass.

The media get passes. I'm not sure what the process is for obtaining them.

But, having attended a count myself (with a media pass!), I have to say
that the entire process is very frantic and chaotic and with a lot of
people milling around - as well as the candidates and their observers,
you also have lots of people involved in the count as well as various
media representatives. So, for practical reasons, they may not want to
add to that unless necessary.

Mark
--
The election aftermath in Abba lyrics:
http://mark.goodge.co.uk/?p=488

[Francis Irving]

In Liverpool last week, at least, they didn't need to be named in
advance. A candidate got me into the count just using pass cards, none
of which had any name on them.

Can you register as a 3rd party monitoring programme? Like the Open
Rights Group monitored electronic voting a couple of years ago. I
can't find a link about it, but bet someone can...

Francis

[paul perrin]

In Brighton the media were in the gallery - no where near the actual ballot papers.

If I were 'sponsoring' DC observers as a candidate, they would be 'my' observers for the duration and the most important people there second to noone - doing what all observers should be doing, ensuring the reliability of the count. Barging through if necessary to see what you need to see.

The ballot box process is a bit long winded, but ensures the candidates can (if they have the bodies) track the entire process never losing sight of the box/ballots unless sealed (checking the seals when they are made and before they are broken). The postal votes process make a complete farce of this - an argument for improving the postal system, not damaging the standard polling process. But that is a different matter - for a different forum...

Paul /)/+)

[paul perrin]

Even if you could, then morally I think you'd then have to defer to candidates observers (they have a lot on the line)... better to have a candidate as patron for the night ? Do their observing and tally for them in return for publishing the data...

Thats the way I was thinking of it - but there may be other/better ways.

Paul /)/+)

['Dragon' Dave McKee]

Well, legal is clearly the first issue: if it's not legal to share
that information then I'd be intrigued as to whether the other parties
are allowed to do what they are doing!

Trusted reliable independent volunteers? Quite frankly, there's no way
of even beginning to hope to guarantee this, short of having double
checking; and within a constituency it would be trivial to have all
volunteers be biased.

If you wanted trustworthiness, I'd suggest video, although I highly
doubt that would be acceptable to the returning officer.

There's also no realistic way of trying to verify each party's data,
if they did give it; inaccuracies in the sampling method could easily
be the cause of any mismatch.

Lastly, there's a need for a list of where counts are taking place - I
couldn't find where City of Durham's was.

All that said: good luck!

[Mark Goodge]

On 11/05/2010 16:22, paul perrin wrote:
> In Brighton the media were in the gallery - no where near the actual
> ballot papers.

Whether the media are permitted in the main count area itself is up to
the returning officer. The list of people with a statutory right to
attend the count is set out in the Representation of the People Act 1983
and the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000, and the
attendance of anyone else is at the returning officer's discretion. The
returning officer is also required to consult the candidates' agents
before granting admission to anyone other than those with a statutory
right. He isn't bound to take their opinion into account, but in
practice it's unlikely that anyone would be allowed to attend if all the
agents were opposed.

It's customary for the media to attend, although whether they're allowed
onto the counting floor or kept in a separate area tends to depend a lot
on local circumstances.

I think what I'm saying is that, although your idea is a good one in
principle, it's going to be unworkable in practice without either a rule
change, or at least a general agreement, to allow third-party
organisations to be represented at the count. Trying to arrange access
on a count-by-count basis is likely to lead to significantly different
results in different places.

Mark

[Francis Irving]

My impression was you could record as much as you like at the count. I
asked about taking photos, and they thought it was odd that I didn't
assume that was fine.

It's meant to be transparent, after all!

But yes, I agree it is a hard operation to organise in terms of
trust...

Francis

[paul perrin]

Thats odd, it was no cameras or phones in our count room (apart from the media over looking us!).

But I don't get some of the logic anyway - discarding ballot papers with identifying marks, whats the logic behind that?

As a candidate without massive resources I would have *appreciated* extra bods to gather this info... the only bad things that could happen would be that they riot, or misled me as to which areas my support came from...

Publishing the info is not a big deal in principle as the other parties would already have it...

Paul /)/+)

[Francis Irving]

On Tue, May 11, 2010 at 06:01:45PM +0100, paul perrin wrote:
> Thats odd, it was no cameras or phones in our count room (apart from the
> media over looking us!).
>
> But I don't get some of the logic anyway - discarding ballot papers with
> identifying marks, whats the logic behind that?

That's *very* important.

Otherwise you can pay somebody to vote for you, and check that they
did so during the count.

Francis

[paul perrin]

Some votes in my count were allowed despite having odd 'marks', because the returning officer said the marks didn't identify an individual...

i.e.

A distinctive but unusual scribble instead of a cross was allowed.

An 'initialled' change was disallowed because the initials 'identify' a person.

If the logic is as you say, both should have been disallowed.

Mind you the biggest waste of time was 'ticks' being reviewed one by one as 'doubtful' but allowed because they showed clear intention. There are no instructions saying 'use a cross', so I don't think 'ticks' should automatically have been queried...

Paul /)/+)

[Mark Goodge]

On 11/05/2010 20:15, paul perrin wrote:
> Some votes in my count were allowed despite having odd 'marks', because
> the returning officer said the marks didn't identify an individual...
> i.e.
> A distinctive but unusual scribble instead of a cross was allowed.
> An 'initialled' change was disallowed because the initials 'identify' a
> person.
>
> If the logic is as you say, both should have been disallowed.

No, because, as Francis says, the thing that is specifically disallowed
is anything that identifies the voter. Other than that, provided that
the voter's intention is clear and that intention is to cast a valid
vote, then it's counted.

> Mind you the biggest waste of time was 'ticks' being reviewed one by one
> as 'doubtful' but allowed because they showed clear intention. There are
> no instructions saying 'use a cross', so I don't think 'ticks' should
> automatically have been queried...

The instructions to the voter do say to use a cross. Anything that isn't
a simple cross does need to be reviewed.

Mark

[paul perrin]

On 11 May 2010 20:31, Mark Goodge <ma...@good-stuff.co.uk> wrote:

On 11/05/2010 20:15, paul perrin wrote:

Some votes in my count were allowed despite having odd 'marks', because
the returning officer said the marks didn't identify an individual...
i.e.
A distinctive but unusual scribble instead of a cross was allowed.
An 'initialled' change was disallowed because the initials 'identify' a
person.

If the logic is as you say, both should have been disallowed.

No, because, as Francis says, the thing that is specifically disallowed is anything that identifies the voter. Other than that, provided that the voter's intention is clear and that intention is to cast a valid vote, then it's counted.

A specific squiggle could easily identify a paid voter if the candidate had agreed it in advance - even more so than a set of initials.

 

Mind you the biggest waste of time was 'ticks' being reviewed one by one
as 'doubtful' but allowed because they showed clear intention. There are
no instructions saying 'use a cross', so I don't think 'ticks' should
automatically have been queried...

The instructions to the voter do say to use a cross. Anything that isn't a simple cross does need to be reviewed.

Definitely no instructions on my paper or in my polling station. Where did you see these instructions?

 

Mark

[Philip Potter]

On 11 May 2010 18:55, Francis Irving <fra...@mysociety.org> wrote:

> On Tue, May 11, 2010 at 06:01:45PM +0100, paul perrin wrote:
>> Thats odd, it was no cameras or phones in our count room (apart from the
>> media over looking us!).
>>
>> But I don't get some of the logic anyway - discarding ballot papers with
>> identifying marks, whats the logic behind that?
>
> That's *very* important.
>
> Otherwise you can pay somebody to vote for you, and check that they
> did so during the count.

Doesn't every ballot paper have a unique number?