The count at the Scottish elections was delayed by
problems with a new
electronic vote counting system last
week.
On Friday 4 May, seven counts were suspended and thousands of
ballot papers were recorded as spoiled after the new system from
software supplier DRS
struggled to cope with the most complex
election in Scottish history.
In a statement, DRS said that the automated counting system
experienced problems with the “consolidation” of the votes.
The Scottish elections were made more complex because three
different voting systems were used to count votes for the joint
council and Scottish Parliament elections.
The £4.3m IT system counts votes by scanning ballot papers. For
the Scottish elections, it started by counting first-past-the-post
constituency votes for the Scottish Parliament. Secondly, it
registered votes for the regional list and finally, it registered
the order of preference for the single-transferable vote.
Deputy Scottish Secretary David Cairns said in April, “People
should have confidence to know that if things do go
catastrophically wrong, we will still have the bits of paper and
could do a manual recount if needed.”
The Electoral Commission has announced a
statutory review into the conduct of the election.
The Scotland Office offered its support to
the statutory review.
How DRS won the Scottish elections contract
>>
How the Scottish elections plunged into crisis
>>
E-voting: the people's choice >>
Comment on this article:
computer.weekly@rbi.co.uk