Guidance for Returning Officers administering a Senedd election

An elector may find that they are unable to go to the polling station after the deadline for arranging an ordinary proxy has passed (i.e. 5pm, 6 working days before the poll). An elector may appoint an emergency proxy to vote on their behalf in certain circumstances:1  

• in the case of a disability (whether a medical condition, illness or otherwise) arising after the deadline for ordinary proxy applications 
• if they are a mental health patient detained under civil powers (i.e. those who are not detained offenders)
• if their occupation, service or employment means that they cannot go to the polling station in person and they became aware of this fact after the deadline for ordinary proxy applications

Electors can apply for an emergency proxy after the deadline for normal proxy applications have passed up until 5pm on polling day. If you are not also the Electoral Registration Officer (ERO), you should agree a method for communicating any additions to the list of proxies that result from the granting of emergency proxy applications.

Whenever an emergency proxy has been appointed, every effort should be made to contact the appropriate polling station staff to inform them of this, including by phone, particularly as there is no requirement in law for the proxy to provide any documentation in order to be permitted to vote.

Wherever possible, however, the ERO should provide the proxy of any voter whose emergency proxy application has been accepted a letter authorising them to act as a proxy, which should include details of the person on whose behalf they are voting. The ERO should advise the proxy to take that authorisation letter with them when they go to vote and to hand it to the polling station staff. If such a letter is provided at the polling station, polling station staff should mark it to show that the proxy has been issued with ballot papers and the marked letter should be retained with the list of proxies. 

The ERO should also, where possible, provide a supplementary list of proxies which can be issued to the relevant polling station and added to the list originally supplied.

The agreed method for communicating additions to the list of proxies on polling day should be covered at the training session for polling station staff. For more information see our guidance on staffing and training.  

You could ask polling station inspectors to liaise with the electoral registration office regarding emergency proxy applications granted on polling day and should advise them of procedures to be followed.

For more information see our guidance for EROs on emergency proxies.