Upholding Human Rights: A Call to Action to Promote the Vote

Photo ID will now be required to vote in some elections across the UK.

In this blog, Elaine James, Rob Mitchell and Clare Reeves from Bradford District Council explain what changes are taking place in each nation and how social workers can ensure people understand their right to register and are supported to participate.

As social workers, human rights are central to everything we do.  Upholding people’s citizenship, their right to feel like they belong and that they have a voice that others hear and respect is rights based social work.  That’s why we have decided that supporting people to register from 16+ and participate in elections is important to how we practice.  Having a voice in elections, knowing that you have the right to register and to vote is the biggest decision you can participate in.  Taking action to ensure people with disabilities understand their right to register and participate, and that they are supported to be able do so, has become central to our practice in our Local Authority.

We know that people with disabilities are less likely to vote in local and national elections. There is growing evidence that people with a learning disability often don’t know about their right to vote, and there is still a misperception that adults who lack ‘capacity’ cannot vote. Section 73 of the Electoral Administration Act (2006) abolished mental incapacity as grounds to prevent someone from being able to participate in elections. Bradford believe that the ability to cast your vote is central to rights based practice, and the support offered by social workers through this campaign is key to making explicit the connections for people between voting and the right to make other decisions about their lives, being able to choose how to spend the day and being able to decide where you want to live and who to live with.

In an attempt to tackle what we see as structural discrimination, we first stood in solidary with local User Led Organisations campaigning to ‘Promote the Vote’ in 2017.  With the help of Professor Chris Hatton from Manchester Metropolitan University we are finding with each campaign that when social workers talk to people about their right to register and vote, they are significantly more likely to do so.  This encouraged us to step up and campaign more widely during the general elections in 2019 and in 2021.  We are now preparing for the local government election in 2023. 

Our campaign work on Promote the Vote starts in earnest each February in the run up to voter registration campaigns from our local elections teams.  We make contact with social care providers, in particular supported living homes, and ask them if:

  • they have a policy on voting
  • staff receive training on voting rights
  • they include support for people to vote in their support plans.

With each year, we are finding that the providers are getting better at knowing voting is important and planning to support people to register and to cast their vote at the polling station.

During March and April, we visit supported living settings to discuss with staff and residents their right to vote, registering to vote, ways to vote.   Where it would enable someone to participate and vote in person on polling day, we make one off adjustments to support plans so that people can be supported to do so.  Each supported living setting is given a pack of resources to help staff in supporting residents. These include a series of easy read guides to local elections, the role of local councilors, registering to vote and postal voting. These guides were developed by a local community group (Bradford Talking Media) and a local group of learning disabled adults. Alongside the guides, each person is helped by a social worker to fill in a Voting Passport. This document sets out the type of support needed if voting in person which they can take to the polling station so that polling clerks are aware of these support needs. All polling staff in Bradford receive training on the Voting Passport alongside information on reasonable adjustments.

After the election, we follow up to check, did people actually vote.  We have learned a huge amount about what factors support and enable participation in voting.  We have also learned that when support staff erroneously believe that there is a mental capacity test (there isn’t) and that people lack mental capacity (without any lawful process being followed to make any such assumption) they are less likely to make the adjustments needed to support people to participate and vote.

This year we have a new impetus to our campaigning work.  In this year’s elections on the 4th May 2023 voters will for the first time be required to produce photo ID at polling stations in England for local elections. The following will apply in each nation:

  • In England, photo ID will be required in local elections, police & crime commissioner elections, UK parliamentary by-elections and recall elections from 4th May.
  • In Scotland, photo ID will be required in UK parliamentary by-elections and recall elections from 4th May. It will not be required at Scottish Parliament elections or local council elections.
  • In Wales, photo ID will be required in UK parliamentary by-elections, police & crime commissioner elections and recall elections from 4th May. It will not be required at Senedd elections or local council elections.
  • In Northern Ireland, voters have been required to show photo ID at elections since 2003. The new requirement does not change this.

In addition to the above, from October 2023, voter ID will be required across the UK for UK-wide General Elections- this will apply in all nations. More information is available on the Electoral Commission website here.

We are really worried that people with social care needs, in particular adults with learning disabilities, are the least likely people in society to have the types of ID required.  In 2023 we are calling social workers to action to prevent mass disenfranchisement of the people we support by getting involved in your local area in Promote the Vote and supporting people to get their ID so they can’t be denied their rights.  To apply for a Voter Authority Certificate, which is a newly introduced form of ID brought in under the voter ID legislation, people can be supported to apply if:

Top 5 Actions BASW Members can take now:

  1. Speak to your Principal Social Worker or Head of Service about taking action to Promote the Vote in your local area.
  2. Pull together a list of local support providers and care homes who you can visit and encourage to get involved.
  3. Organise a briefing or information session for other social workers to spread the word and mobilise others into action - this could be with the support of your local BASW branch.
  4. Make contact with local user led organisations and find out if they are running a local campaign about voter registration and voter ID that you can get involved with and support.
  5. Include support to register, ensure voter ID is in place and any reasonable adjustment needed on the day to enable to the person to visit a polling station and vote in the person’s needs assessment and support plan.