Last chance for proxy vote

Following our articles today on our readers’ responses to the coming referendum, we would like to remind anyone who has not yet applied for their chosen voting method that 17.00 tomorrow (Wednesday) is the absolute final deadline to apply for a proxy vote.

We would also like to remind anyone voting by post to post their envelopes as soon as possible. If you received a return envelope franked International Business Reply Service (IBRS) and marked in French ‘Réponse payée Grande-Bretagne’, it does not need stamps but it will not matter if you did put stamps on it (this should apply to most people in France). However if it was franked for the ordinary UK Business Reply Plus, then it does need the appropriate stamps for its weight.

If you chose a postal vote but the ballot has not come, you should contact the elections office in your old constituency immediately. You may be able to cancel and change to a proxy vote.

Anyone who wants to apply for a proxy vote and who has registered as a voter in the UK (unless your former UK home was in Northern Ireland, for which the deadlines have passed), must firstly make sure that a UK resident has agreed to be their proxy. This person can be a friend or relative – or even a stranger such as an activist for a political party.

The proxy must be a registered UK voter and able to physically go the polling station in your old constituency for you on Friday June 23.

At this late stage you will also need to telephone the elections office for your former UK constituency and double check with them that they can accept your application by email (most of them do), and check what email address to send it to.

Contact details for elections offices in UK constituencies may be found by putting in your old UK post code here: aboutmyvote.co.uk.

The Electoral Commission says that if your UK elections office agrees to accept an email and if the email is received on the elections office’s computers by 17.00 tomorrow that will be acceptable.

A proxy form for people living overseas can be downloaded here: Proxy form.

Where someone has been designated your proxy, they should be sent a proxy poll card in the next few days which they can take to vote for you.