Appeals will often raise issues relating to whether the polling place that has been designated meets the ‘reasonable requirements’ of electors in the constituency, or a particular group of those electors, for example electors residing in a particular part of the constituency. In deciding whether electors’ ‘reasonable requirements’ have been met in the designation of a polling place, the Commission will not seek to identify the best polling place in the polling district.
Instead, the Commission will look at whether the designated polling place meets electors’ reasonable requirements in respect of the issues that have been raised in the appeal, for example relating to the:
location of the polling place
size of the polling place
availability of the polling place
accessibility of the polling place
Electors’ reasonable requirements will depend on local circumstances, for example they may be different in a predominantly urban polling district, compared with a polling district that is mainly rural.