Windsor Parliamentary candidate accuses Royal Borough of failing to update electoral roll for general election

The Royal Borough has been accused by a Windsor parliamentary candidate of failing to fully update the electoral roll in time for this year's general election.

Fiona Dent, Labour's Prospective Parliamentary Candidate for the town, has claimed that the number of Windsor constituents able to vote in the next general election could be reduced by 25 per cent.

The former NHS worker claims a quarter of those entitled to vote will not be registered in time for the election on May 7, due to names being moved from the old system to the new electoral roll.

The government made the decision in July to move from the 'head of household' electoral registration system to the Individual Electoral Registration (IER) system in order to update the procedure.

Fiona said she was 'distressed' to find the names on the roll had not been fully updated and have 'a serious impact' on the number of people entitled to vote.

In a letter to the Express she said: "Other councils published their electoral registers in December but the Royal Borough is finding it so problematic that it is not planning to do this until the end of January.

"I have no intention of criticising Royal Borough staff as they clearly have a very difficult job to do and they have suffered endless staff cuts. No, this sounds like mismanagement by council leaders."

When contacted by the Express the council was unable to confirm or deny whether the electoral roll had been fully updated.