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Stephen Teap calls for electoral register reform after polling card sent for his late wife

Cervical Check campaigner Stephen Teap is calling for reform of the register of electors after a ...
Stephen McNeice
Stephen McNeice

08.08 4 Feb 2020


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Stephen Teap calls for elector...

Stephen Teap calls for electoral register reform after polling card sent for his late wife

Stephen McNeice
Stephen McNeice

08.08 4 Feb 2020


Share this article


Cervical Check campaigner Stephen Teap is calling for reform of the register of electors after a general election polling card arrived for his late wife.

Irene Teap died almost three years ago.

Mr Teap says the arrival of the card highlights a lack of care and he's calling for a root-and-branch review.

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Speaking on Newstalk Breakfast today, he explained this is not the first this has happened.

He said: "At this stage, we've received [one] for the Eighth Amendment referendum, the presidential election, the local election, and now this.

"When I got it yesterday I just threw it up on Twitter - more tongue in cheek, but [also] angry at the stupidity of the situation over two and a half years on.

"What surprised me the most was the responses I got from the people: it wasn't just Irene's voting cards that turned up, but it seems to be an ongoing thing for many people."

Mr Teap said that the situation does raise concerns about potential electoral fraud, as well as the accuracy of turnout numbers reported after an election.

However, he also pointed to the "insensitive nature" of the situation - saying people who recently lost a loved one may receive a polling card a few weeks or months after the death.

He observed: "You go in the births, deaths and marriages office and you register a birth and it issues a PPS number. You go into the same office and you register a death.

"I just can't understand how there isn't some joined-up thinking in relation to this, just to remove people [from the register].

"Let it be reviewed, link it to the PPS number... but clearly something needs to be done, if anything just to tackle the insensitive nature of it."

Plans to modernise electoral registration put forward before the election was called in January proposed using PPS numbers to verify voters' identities.

It has previously been suggested that the electoral register could be overstated by hundreds of thousands of people.

Main image: File photo of Stephen Teap. Photo: Leah Farrell/RollingNews.ie

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