Annual Canvass of Electors - Part 3

[askit]

Thanks for the information Kempie and Bernardo.

That's the problem - no one is sure about this.  I have been going from memory (yes I can remember back to 1989!) and I feel sure that prior to the Poll Tax it was necessary (in order to be able to vote) to complete the forms and make sure you were on the Register.  If you didn't - tough, you could not vote.  With the advent of the Poll Tax we suddenly found that these forms carried a penalty provision (of up to �1,000) - which then continued even after the Poll  Tax was dropped.  They needed the compulsion (�1,000 fine) for the Poll Tax because they needed to know where everyone was in order to send them a Poll Tax bill.

[bernardo]

It has always been compulsory to fill in the form to register to vote.  There was never any connection between the Poll Tax register and the electoral register.

[Mrs_Pegasus]

The register of electors was in no way connected to the community charge.  They were 2 totally separate data bases and back when i worked on both Data Protection would not allow the 2 databases to run side by side i.e. picking someone up on the electors register for the purpose of community charge billing. 

It has always been law to complete the electors form but I know that in the 7 years I helped compile the register was I aware of a prosecution.