Register to vote in local elections
Polling cards have been sent out and will be dropping on to doormats in the next few days
WEST Berkshire residents who want to vote in the May elections have two weeks left to register.
On Thursday, May 2, residents will go to the polls to elect district councillors to sit on West Berkshire Council and choose who they want to represent them on town and parish councils.
Polling cards have been sent out and will be dropping on to doormats in the next few days.
If you want to be able to vote, you have until Friday, April 12, to register.
This can be done online in just a few minutes.
Residents are able to vote by post if they prefer or apply for a proxy vote which allows another person to cast their vote for them.
The deadline for new postal votes and changes to existing postal vote details is Monday, April 15, and the applications to vote by proxy must be submitted by Wednesday, April 24.
Anyone wanting to stand in the elections has a deadline of 4pm on Wednesday, April 3, to send in completed nomination forms.
A list of candidates standing for election in each ward will be published online the following day.
More information about the nomination process for candidates can be found in West Berkshire Council’s Guide to Election Procedures, which can be found on its website.
There will be a number of changes in May compared to the previous local elections held in 2015.
Following a review by the Local Government Boundary Commission for England, there will be 24 wards across West Berkshire instead of the current 30 and 43 councillors instead of 52.
The review was conducted both to reduce the number of district councillors and to adjust ward boundaries so that each councillor represents a similar number of residents.
Changes to towns and villages and their populations had led to disparity between how many residents councillors had been representing.
More information about the new wards can be found on West Berkshire Council’s website.
For more information about registering to vote, visit www.gov.uk/register-to-vote
West Berkshire Council’s electoral services team is currently booking polling stations, arranging staff for polling stations and the count, as well as making sure everyone who wants to vote can do so.
