What news have I on the ‘missing votes’ in Queen’s Park? Well, I know that all the candidates have been written to by Shahrar Ali who has appraised them of his calculations and his investigations with Brent Council. I imagine that the next steps will be to petition the Returning Officer through the High Court as the Officer does not have the power to choose to recount the ballot. More info as and when I’ve digested the papers from the Law Courts…

In the mean time I’m holding a bucket for £2 coins to be dropped in: a legal challenge isn’t cheap! I’m encouraging donations for the fund. Click on the Donate! button. (pst…it’s on the left, over there…)

The suggestion that a number of votes went uncounted at the local election is based on what was witnessed by Shahrar Ali on the night. There is no way that Shahrar could have seen all the ballot papers in for the Queen’s Park ward, but he did witness the first sort and count of the block votes and also the count of the ’splits’ and the paper with unallocated votes.

Here is a picture of Shahrar Ali (Green Party), Kwasi Kwarteng (Conservative) and William Motley (a Liberal Democrat candidate elected Councillor) at the count.

Why is the witeness testimony important? Well, in explaining the annominaly, Shahrar uses the difference between the likely statistically frequency of ballot papers coming up with unallocated votes and what was witnessed during the count. I’ll let him explain….

“In a nutshell, the problem is this: If you came across ten ballot papers in a row (in the largest, mixed pile) in which voters were consistently using only two votes that might be passed off as a freak occurrence. Yet for the count to be true, you would have had to have come across ONE THOUSAND THREE HUNDRED AND EIGHT ballot papers in a row in which, on average, no body was using their third vote (or, on average, every other voter was using only one vote). Such a scenario would be dismissed as absurd and contrary to fact. Indeed, beyond any reasonable doubt SUCH AN ABSURDITY WAS NOT OBSERVED at the count in question.”

Did those of you who stood up to be counted on May 4th get counted?

I’ve spent today researching the process for the counting of ballots and gathering information on the election result in Brent as I believe that there is cause for concern over the result returned in Queen’s Park ward. My concern centres on the counting of ballot papers with unallocated votes. let me explain…

You each had three votes on your ballot paper. Some of you voted for three candidates from the same party (a block vote), some of you for candidates from two or more parties (a split vote). Some people voted for two candidates: in Queen’s Park there were two Green Party candidates, voting only for them would have been a block Green vote but would have left one vote unallocated. If you voted for Rocky Fernandez only, you would have not allocated two of your votes.

In Queen’s Park, 3642 voters turned out giving a total of 10,929 potential votes. The results show 9,320 votes were cast, leaving 1,606 unallocated votes. Interesting…if these votes had been cast would Queen’s Park still be Yellow? The gap between Neil Nerva (1,059) and Michael Motley (1,102) is only 43 votes…I want to know more about these 1,606 unallocated votes. Does that number seem high to you? Shahrar Ali, Green Party candidate in Queen’s Park has been analysing the results as 1,606 unallocated votes appears “inexplicably large” to him.

The discrepancy is inexplicable on three grounds: (1) in comparison to adjacent wards, Kensal Green (387) and Kilburn (827); (2) in comparison to Queens Park in 2002 (513 on 25% turnout); and (3), more fatally, an approximation of the ratio of unspent votes to used votes that must have shown on ballot papers in the “mixed” pile (where cross-party voting took place) for the overall count TO BE TRUE. Unfortunately, that ratio is CONTRARY TO WHAT WAS OBSERVED. Therefore, the VALIDITY of the count is put into SERIOUS QUESTION.

Here’s his analysis of the numbers: Queen’s Park unallocated votes. Is it possible that a bundle of split / mixed ballots were not counted?

Queen’s Park, Mapesbury and Brondesbury have all turned Yellow - congratulations to the Cllrs in these wards. You’ve been trusted with them - look after them. Make sure that you continue with the effort that it took to win the ward as you work the ward.

You may have read a letter in the Kilburn Times from a residents in Queen’s Park questioning the sanity of planning regulations that prevent people from moving towards renewable energy. I bumped into Rupet Degas from the Brent and Harrow Green Party in Queen’s Park yesterday and he nearly split our sides laughing at the lack of joined up thinking. This morning he forwarded me a reply he wrote that has, as yet, not been published by the paper.

“It saddens me to hear yet another story of Brent Council’s ludicrous policy regarding solar panels (’Council policy has gone mad’, letter, Times, 12th April). For the Labour led council to declaim support for renewable energy and then deny planning permission to those who want solar panels on their houses is at best hypocritical, at worst utterly irresponsible and environmentally destructive. Solar panels don’t look much different from your average dormer window, so my guess as to why the council doesn’t want them up probably has something to do with bottom-line profit or some such nonsense. The fact remains that the sooner more people go to the initial expense of installing solar panels, the sooner prices will come down and everyone will have them. I’d buy shares now if I were you before the Labour boys finally wake up and want a piece of the action. Joking apart, self sufficiency should be strongly encouraged and advocated by the council, but without any Greens at the table to get things moving, what hope is there? Look on the bright side though - at least you can watch Rupert Murdoch’s propaganda channels without the fear of Brent Council asking you to remove your satellite dish! Funny that.”

Rupert Degas
Green Candidate for Queens Park
Brent and Harrow Green Party
PO Box 42434
London NW10 3XT
rupert@qsound.uk.com