Guidance for Police Area Returning Officers administering a Police and Crime Commissioner election in England and Wales

Once a person becomes a candidate at a PCC election as defined in the paragraphs below, they can request a copy of the full register and absent voters’ lists covering the police area they are standing in. Registers can only be supplied if the candidate has made a written request.1

The earliest a person can officially become a candidate is on the last day for the publication of notice of election (i.e. on the 25th working day before the poll).2 They will officially become a candidate on this day if on or before this date they have already declared that they are a candidate at the election (or another person has declared that they are a candidate).

If after this date they or others declare that they will be a candidate at the election, they will become a candidate on the date such a declaration is made, or on the date that they submit their nomination papers, whichever is the earlier.

While the legal responsibility for receiving requests and supplying registers to candidates’ rests with the Electoral Registration Officer (ERO) for each voting area, you should start discussions with EROs at an early stage to determine how best to ensure that all candidates can be supplied with registers in such a way that they have timely and easy access to them, and decide how this will be communicated.

For example, you could decide to supply the registers centrally on behalf of the EROs as part of the nomination pack. The benefit of this approach is that it could operate so that candidates would only need to complete one request form covering all voting areas and receive their registers from a single place, instead of having to approach each ERO separately with individual requests.

If you are considering supplying the registers centrally, you will have to discuss and agree with the EROs how the various registers could be brought together for subsequent supply and consider how this would work for both printed and data copies. The registers must be supplied in data form unless a printed copy has been specifically requested.3 You will need to ensure that whatever arrangements you put in place are clearly communicated to the candidates and their agents to enable them to use the registers to campaign and obtain the necessary subscribers. 

Requesting the register outside of the election period

Political parties and elected representatives are also entitled to request a copy of the electoral register outside of the election period.

You can find more information in our guidance for EROs on free supply of the full register for England and Wales.