Guidance for Returning Officers administering a Scottish Parliament election

An election agent may appoint a sub-agent to act on their behalf in any part in of the constituency or region for which they are acting.1

A sub-agent can do anything that the election agent is entitled to do within the area to which they are appointed. However, sub-agents may only attend postal voting opening sessions and the calculation of the regional result where these are taking place within the area in which they have been appointed to act and they are acting in place of the election agent.

The election agent should ensure that the sub-agent is aware of the election and spending rules. Anything done by the sub-agent will be treated as if it had been done by the election agent.

By the second working day before the poll the election agent must declare in writing to the CRO or RRO as appropriate the name and address of any sub-agent and the part of the area in which they may act.2

Every sub-agent must have an office address. The office address must be included in the declaration notifying the relevant RO of the appointment of a sub-agent.3 The office must be a physical address to which any legal notices can be delivered – PO boxes or similar mailboxes cannot be used.

A request may be included in the declaration of sub-agent that their home address is not published on the notice of sub-agents and a correspondence address is published instead.4

A sub-agent’s office address could be the local party office, an office set up for the election or their home address.

If the sub-agent is using their home address as their office address and has made a request for a correspondence address to be published on any public notice instead of their home address, only the correspondence address should be published.

You should include forms for the notification of appointment of sub-agents in your nomination packs.

You can find nominations packs in the agents section of our resource page.

The election agent can revoke the appointment of a sub-agent at any time. If a sub-agent dies or has their appointment revoked the election agent may appoint a new-sub agent by declaring in writing the name, address, office address and area of appointment of the new sub-agent to the CRO or RRO (as appropriate).

Once the name, and office address and area of appointment of a sub-agent have been declared, the CRO or RRO (as appropriate) must give public notice of these details.5 In the case of the regional election, if you are also the RRO, you must give notice to CROs in your region setting out the sub-agents’ details as soon as possible. As CRO, you should publish any such notice locally.6