Electoral fraud in 2019

The UK has low levels of proven electoral fraud.

There remains no evidence of large-scale electoral fraud in 2019.

Overview

595 cases of alleged electoral fraud were investigated by the police. Of these, four led to a conviction and two individuals were given a police caution.

This table shows the number of cases of alleged fraud the police reported to us, for each election held in 2019.

ElectionNumber of cases
Local elections362
UK Parliamentary general election164
European Parliamentary election21
Non-election specific (for example, electoral registration)21
Local by-election12
UK Parliamentary by-election7
Mayoral election6
Combined authority mayoral election1
Police and Crime Commissioner by-election1

Description of tableau information

OutcomeNumber of casesPercentage of total
No further action38264%
Locally resolved20033.6%
Court proceedings initiated30.5%
Caution20.2%
Conviction40.5%
Other40.3%

More than half of all cases resulted in the police taking no further action. This means that the cases were not investigated further by the police because there was no evidence (or there wasn’t enough evidence), or no offence was found.

Number of cases, and the types of offences, investigated in 2019

Description of tableau data

The pie chart shows the number of cases, and types of offences that were investigated in 2019

CategoryNumber of casesPercentage of total
Campaigning32054%
Voting14224%
Nomination7112%
Registration5810%
Administration41%

Accessible information

Use this table to search for data from specific police forces, by category of offence or outcome.

Please contact us if you require the allegations data by police force in an accessible format.

Types of electoral fraud reported since 2010

Description of the tableau

Last updated: 31 March 2021
Next review: 31 March 2022