Many EU citizens will be unable to vote in UK, campaigners warn

Campaigners for non-British or Irish EU citizens have made a formal complaint to the Electoral Commission amid fears many of them will be unable to vote in the UK in this Thursday’s elections for the European parliament. Nicolas Hatton, the co-founder of the3million, has accused the regulator of providing insufficient guidance, leading to inconsistent advice from local authority electoral officers. “The3million has multiple examples of local authorities mishandling the application process,” he said in a three-page letter. Catherine West, the Labour MP for Hornsey and Wood Green, has raised concerns about the issue in a separate letter to Sir John Holmes, the chair of the Electoral Commission. West fears that as many as 75% of non-British/Irish EU citizens living in the UK who registered to vote in the local elections three weeks ago could be turned away on Thursday because they have not filled in a second form necessary for them to vote in the European elections.