> I have just put Frau Worsching's question to the Hull
> Returning Officer because my wife was also prevented from
> voting last Thursday. Evidently if EU citizens are included
> in the first form on which the register is based and
> indicated as such they should then receive a form UC1 which
> needs to be completed before they can gain the right to
> vote not only in local government elections but also in
> those for the European parliament. I suppose it's one more
> way to stop foreigners poking their noses in the affairs of
> this sceptr'd isle.
> ----------------------
> A.R.Deighton
> Department of German
> University of Hull
My wife was (wrongly as has now been acknowledged) prevented from
voting in the election for the Scottish Parliament. It all apparently
hinges on the interpretation of the word "national", never
straightforward in a UK context. But then it is easy enough for
British citizens to lose the franchise. It happened to me when I
did a house exchange with a couple from Bamberg. Whilst I was away a
woman called at the front door of my house, asked who lived there and
was told, in somewhat fractured English, "we do". So Rudi and Hiltrud
Maier duly appeared on the next electoral register, whilst my
daughter and I were removed from it. Had they chosen to do so, Rudi
and Hiltrud could have voted in any kind of British election they
liked.
Howard Gaskill
>
>
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