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| Britain |
| Jail for Labour councillor who stole postal votes |
| 2005-04-09 |
| A Labour councillor who stole postal votes in a local council election was jailed for three years and seven months yesterday. Judge Peter Openshaw, who described the system as being "wide open to fraud", said: "The defendant has literally stolen votes." Muhammed Hussain, 61, had arranged the collection of blank ballot papers posted to homes in the ward he was contesting in Blackburn, Lancs, Preston Crown Court was told. Campaigners went from house to house asking voters to hand over papers, saying: "Don't worry we'll take care of them." Hussain pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to conspiring to defraud the returning officer. He defeated the sitting Tory candidate in Bastwell ward in the May 2002 local elections by a 685 majority. Police investigated the unusually high number of postal votes. On Monday, six Labour councillors (named Shafaq Ahmed, Shah Jahan, Ayaz Khan, Mohammed Islam, Muhammed Afzal and Mohammed Kazi) were found guilty of electoral fraud in two Birmingham wards. Commenting on which, a High Court Judge "criticised the government's insistence that the current postal voting system was working. 'Anybody who has sat through the case I have just tried and listened to evidence of electoral fraud that would disgrace a banana republic would find this statement surprising'". The two cases which came to trial are generally considered to be just the tip of the iceberg of postal voting irregularities which happened last year, the vast majority, if not all of which, apparently benefitting Labour. The same flawed system will be operating nation-wide next month for the General Election. I won't be voting for Labour on May 5th. That is, I don't intend to - unless one of Blair's minions steals my vote. |
| Posted by:Bulldog |