Chief Reporter: Anna Macnaughton

A hundred voters were turned away in Sheffield Hallam constituency last night after waiting in the rain for hours.

Ranmoor Parish centre had only four staff present, and could not cope with the numbers of people who turned up to vote.
Just before ten o’clock deputy returning officer Lee Adams crammed the remainder of the queue into the polling station, but at two minutes past it was announced that voting had finished.

Angry voters refused to leave, and chanted “we want to vote.”

The presiding officer and the police attempted to calm people down, and they eventually all left at 11.15pm.
Talking to angry voters Presiding Officer Andy Globe said: “I’d be prepared to stay open until two or three o’clock but I can’t, it’s against the law.”
The presiding officer split voters into two queues; and Sheffield University Union President Paul Tobin said: “There are two different queues for students and residents. Its an affront to democracy and treats students as second class citizens.”
Dr Joanne Beahan queued for an hour. She said: “The excuse that they had an unprecendented number of people isn’t adequate.
“And also there were separate queues for students and residents – student have an equal right to vote.”
Many students gave up and left after waiting for a long time, and on the pavement on the approach to the polling station were torn polling cards.
Student Chris Potter was the last person to vote. He waited an hour and a half, and said: “It was so badly organised – there were two rooms in the back that they could have used.”
A Broomhill polling station under a mile away had no one waiting outside. Paul Tobin went to Ponds Forge to complain and challenge the vote, but was turned away.

One polling station was used to serve an entire student accommodation complex for hundreds of students which resulted in long queues all evening.

Reports of problems at other polling stations

Many students are furious after spending two to three hours waiting to vote and eventually having to go home without voting. There are reports of problems at other polling stations including in Woodseats, Eccesall Road and Penistone.

The Ranmore Parish Centre which is acting as polling station had a staff of just four.

‘Not allowing’ ballot boxes to leave

Dan, one of those in the queue, said that that there are still a lot of people at the polling station refusing to leave until they get a vote. There are reports some potential voters are not allowing the ballot boxes to leave the polling station.

John Mothersole, Chief Executive of Sheffield City Council, said:

“We got this wrong and I would like to apologise.

“We were faced with a difficult situation with the numbers of people, and a large amount of students turning up to vote without polling cards. This made the administration process of ensuring the correct person was given a ballot paper much longer.

“The only remedy, which we could not take, was to extend the voting times.”

Later he spoke to Sky News and added:

“I wish I could have kept the doors open, I wish we’d anticipated this, I wish we’d not had the queue.

“We will learn from it, we thought we’d got it right.”

Legal advice

Deputy returning officer at the polling station at St Johns Church, Ranmoor, Lee Adams, said she took legal advice from the Electoral Commission on whether or not to close the ballot boxes.

A spokesman for the Electoral Commission said: “We give returning officers guidance on the law. The law says ballot papers can be issued up until 10pm. Voters can have time to complete their ballot papers, but it’s not possible to issue ballot papers after 10pm.”

The Electoral Commission has said they will undertake a “thorough review” of what has happened, following reports of problems in other areas of the country.

The National Union of Students (NUS) released a statement saying:

The National Union of Students (NUS) has tonight condemned election officials after students were turned away from Ranmoor polling station in the Sheffield Hallam constituency as they attempted to vote.

Many students had queued attempting to vote, but were denied the opportunity. It is reported that the backlog was the result of a decision to segregate student voters from other members of the electorate, the latter having been fast-tracked to receive voting cards.

Wes Streeting, NUS National President said:

“Where students and other voters have been disenfranchised, local authorities should hang their heads in shame. It is outrageous that citizens should be denied their basic right to vote and we demand inquiry into how this situation occurred.”

“We are alarmed by reports from Sheffield Hallam that students were placed in a separate, slower queue. Students’ unions have worked tirelessly to reverse the trend of low voter turnout amongst students and other young people. What message does this send to first time voters whose votes will not be counted?”

Holly Taylor, Education Officer at the Union of Students, said: ‘This is absolutely disgraceful…are students second class citizens?” Students have created a Facebook group, now with over 500 members,  to protest against the events at the polling station.

Latest reports claim that police have been sent to the scene to disperse disgruntled non-voters, some of who are reportedly refusing to let the ballot box leave the building.