EA Bulletin: 359 Scotland

Guidance Update

Over the summer we have been reviewing our core guidance for Electoral Registration Officers, Returning Officers and Candidates and Agents and making planned updates such as the removal of outstanding caveats relating to recent legislative changes that were in place before the May 24 polls.  

Thank you for your feedback on our guidance as part of our post-poll surveys. We welcome your comments on the provision and content of our guidance, to ensure it continues to be useful and accessible.  We are continuing our work to update the guidance and associated resources in advance of May 2025 polls and to capture lessons learned from the May 24 polls and the July 24 UKPGE, including those highlighted in your feedback. Updates on our planned work on each of the areas of guidance are provided below

One theme from in the feedback relates to how to ensure the Commission’s website is as easy to use as possible.  We are considering these comments and exploring how we can make improvements with our digital team, and we will share more information on this work as soon as we can.

ERO guidance and resources update

We have published our resource providing the rolling registration dates for 2025. This includes timetables for updates to both the full and the open register.

In advance of the end of the annual canvass, we have updated our list of people entitled to be supplied with the electoral register resource. Our core guidance on publication of the revised register following the annual canvass can be found here.
 

RO guidance and resources update

We are currently updating our core guidance and resources for Returning Officers, including the election timetable, to support preparations for the May polls. The updates are minor amendments that have been identified as part of the feedback from the polls. and we will be publishing these in early November.  

We will be publishing updated Polling Station Handbooks in February 2025, in line with our usual timeframes in advance of scheduled polls and will be providing hard copies to you in advance of the polls as usual.  The order form will be circulated in December, with the deadline for orders to be placed early in the new year.  

Candidates and Agents Guidance

We will also be publishing our updated guidance and resources for candidates and agents at the beginning of December. Again, these updates are minor amendments that have been identified as part of the feedback from the polls.

We will keep you updated on progress of all of our guidance updates through the Bulletin as usual, but in the meantime, if you have any queries, or need any further support, please contact your local Commission team.
 

The 2024 ERO Canvass Survey is now live

EROs will have recently received our annual canvass survey, by email, from your regional or national Electoral Commission contacts. 

As in previous years, we are looking for your feedback to inform how we might better engage and support EROs and their teams. The last 12 months have been challenging and we appreciate this may have impacted on your capacity to plan for the canvass, but we hope you can make time to take stock, reflect on your experiences, and share with us, how you are tackling the 2024 Canvass.    

This year, we also wanted to start to gain a broader understanding of how EROs are addressing the needs of under-represented groups in Canvass 2024.  This is a more complex issue than we could do justice in our survey, but, with your help, we are keen to start building a picture of how this important work is proceeding.

The survey closes for responses on 4 October.