Register to Vote in Basingstoke

Before you can vote in UK elections or referendums, you need to register to vote. To register to vote, you must be a UK or Irish citizen, a qualifying Commonwealth citizen living in the UK, or a qualifying foreign citizen in Wales or Scotland. In England you must be 16 to register to vote although you can’t vote until you are 18, unless the law changes.

How do I register if I am not already registered?

Go to www.gov.uk/register-to-vote Fill in your name, address, date of birth, and a few other details.  Look out for a confirmation to say you’re registered. Registering to vote is free and takes about 5 minutes.

If you are not sure if you are already registered you need to contact the electoral services team at Basingstoke and Deane Borough Council to find out.

If you are registered to vote, you will be on the electoral register. Every year, Basingstoke and Deane Borough Council contacts all properties in the borough to check who is eligible to register to vote and ensure our Electoral Register is up to date. They are required by law, to contact every household to obtain and confirm the names of residents, this year they will do this by email rather than post if they have an email address. Please respond to this. Find out more using this Annual Canvass link.

Ways of Voting

Depending on your circumstances and where you are registered, there are three ways to cast your vote. They are:

• In person –  This means going to the polling station to vote on polling day. You will be sent a polling card in advance.
• By post – This means your council will send you a posting voting pack so you can complete your ballot paper at home and return it in the post – FREE
• By proxy – This is when you are unable to go to the polling station yourself so you ask a trusted person to vote on your behalf

If you are voting in person then you will go to a local polling station to vote. You have to go to the polling station for the address you’re registered to vote at. You can’t go to one near where you work, for example. The address will be on your polling card. If you have lost the Polling card you can still vote and find out where your polling station is here: where is my polling station?

If you want to vote by post or have someone else proxy vote on your behalf, you must register for this service first. you can do that here.

Voter ID

To be able to vote at a polling station you will also need to take an acceptable form of voter identification with you to the polling station. You can find out more about this here.

Your local electoral services team

Need help? Contact the team at your local council who are responsible for electoral registration. They can tell you if you’re on the electoral register, or if you’ve registered for a postal or proxy vote.