Postal ballots fraught with risk, say printers
William Mitting, PrintWeek, 24 April 2008
Security printers have slammed the government's procurement process for the printing of postal voting ballots, calling for a stricter standard of accreditations in the tender.
Angus Walker, business development director at Adare, said that even with the additional safeguards of signature and date of birth checks, which have been introduced for next week's local elections, the postal voting system remains "fraught with risk" of fraud.
He said: "For too long the production of voting packs has been viewed as a commodity product. It needs to be seen in the same highly sensitive, time critical light as legal documents."
He added the procurement process is "without regulation or consistent standards".
These sentiments were echoed by Kevin Illingworth, co-founder of K2, who said many organisations printing the ballots were "not fit for purpose".
"Anyone printing these ballots should have ISO 9001, and really should also have ISO 27001 and APACS accreditations for security. Yet these are not requirements to win the contract," he said.
He added the government had tightened up postal voting with the introduction of signature identification and K2 was striving to improve the security of postal voting with innovations such as digital watermarks.
The Ministry of Justice defended the system. A spokesperson said: "The government has taken significant steps to tighten up the security of the electoral process."
Postal vote timeline
- 2008 printers claim procurement process is 'without regulation'
- 2005 judge voids Birmingham vote
- 2004 chaos in Birmingham amid accusations of fraud
- 2000 extended to pref-erence service for all voters
