THE polling station has been saved as the bulwark of democracy. Never again, the Electoral Commission recommends, should voters be denied the option of casting their ballot secretly under the supervision of a returning officer’s staff.
The polling station was introduced by William Gladstone’s 1872 Ballot Act imposing secret ballots to spare voters from intimidation by corrupt employers and landlords. “One clear message was that many people regarded their trip to the polling station on a clearly defined polling day as an important occasion and one that underlines the importance of the right to vote,” the commission reports.
“It was therefore a frequent comment from electors in all-postal regions that they believed that their ‘democratic right’ to attend a polling station had been denied.”