2003 Swindon Borough Council election explained
The 2003 Swindon Borough Council election took place on 1 May 2003 to elect members of Swindon Unitary Council in Wiltshire, England. One third of the council was up for election and the council stayed under no overall control.[1]
After the election, the composition of the council was
Voting trial
Swindon was one of 3 councils which trialed voting by television in 2003 for the first time anywhere in the world.[3] Voters in Swindon also had 8 electronic information kiosks in the town centre where they could vote,[4] telephone and internet voting.[5] These trials, which were open for voting in the week before the election,[5] followed a trial of electronic voting in the 2002 election which saw turnout increase by 3.5%.[6]
Overall turnout in the election was 29.82%,[7] lower than in 2002.[8] [9] However the number of electronic votes increased by 75% from 2002 to 11,055, including 349 cast by television.[8]
Notes and References
- News: Local elections . 2010-10-27 . BBC News Online.
- News: How Britain voted: English and Scottish councils . . 18–19 . 2003-05-03 .
- News: Britain: Pol idol; Television voting . . 29 . 2003-04-26 .
- News: Text, e-mail, click...just vote, please . . 4 . 2003-04-29 .
- News: SA . Mathieson . Inside IT: X marks the spot: Today's local elections mark the biggest experiment so far in e-voting . . 15 . 2003-05-01 .
- News: Simon . Parker . Society: Cross culture: The government is putting its faith in the potential of electronic voting to the test in tomorrow's local elections. But are indifference and disillusionment the real enemies of democracy? . . 2 . 2003-04-30 .
- Web site: Swindon Borough Council Election Results 1 May 2003 . 2010-10-27 . Political Science Resources . https://web.archive.org/web/20120609174709/http://www.politicsresources.net/area/uk/loc03/pages/swindon/election.pdf . 9 June 2012 . dead .
- News: Life: Inside IT: News . . 18 . 2003-05-08 .
- News: West: Voting, which way now? . 2010-10-29 . 2003-05-11 . BBC News Online.