Register of Electors 2023
The annual canvass ensures that the Electoral Registration Officer at the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead can keep the electoral register up to date, identifying any eligible residents who are not registered and encouraging them to do so.
The annual canvass for 2023 commenced around Friday 1 September. New legislation brought in during 2020 allows us to data match our register against other government databases and where we believe they are no changes to the property and we have an email address for the residents we will communicate in the first instance by email.
If we do not get a response from this we will then send out a form detailing the current information we hold. The annual canvass period for the 2024 Register of Electors concluded on Friday 23 November 2023, however amendments can still be made to the register, please contact our helpdesk or view our Electoral Registration webpage.
eCanvass
We will contact some residents, who are already registered to vote, by email in September and asked them to confirm the electoral registration details for their household.
Emails will be sent from the Gov.uk/Notify service and will come from: Electoral Registration - RB Windsor and Maidenhead <electoral.registration.rb.windsor.and.maidenhead@notifications.service.gov.uk>, which is hosted by central government and sent on behalf of Electoral Services at the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead.
Electors who receive an email are asked to confirm their household registration details by logging on to our secure website at https://www.registersecurely.com/rbwm If a household response is not made before Tuesday 12 September 2023, a paper form will then be sent in the post. These were sent out around Friday 30 September 2023.
Postal correspondence
Some households, whom we have not been able to email, will receive a paper form from us 8 September and through to November and we ask the residents to confirm the details for their household either by freephone or on our website at https://www.registersecurely.com/rbwm.
Not all of our postal communications will include a business reply envelope but details of how and where to respond will be detailed on each form. We would encourage you to respond via telephone or the internet if you are able to as this will save the council time and money.
Please look out for our canvass correspondence and respond as soon as possible so we do not have to send you a reminder. If we have to send you a reminder that will be done in October and November.
Electoral Services’ post, must be returned to the Town Hall, St Ives Road, Maidenhead SL6 1RF.
For more information about we how process your personal data, please refer to our privacy notice: https://www.rbwm.gov.uk
Telephone and door to door canvass
From mid October, Electoral Services will also make personal visits and or telephone calls to residents who have yet to respond to their household registration form. We will ask you to confirm your household's registration details on the door step or over the phone, to save you time rather than posting the form back to us or making the changes using our automated telephone response service or internet channels.
Registration eligibility
To be included in the register of electors, a person must:
- be resident at an address in the Royal Borough of Windsor & Maidenhead on the date of the application and of publication of the register;
- be a British, Irish, Commonwealth citizen, or a citizen of the European Union;
- be aged at least 16 years of age (although only able to vote from the age of 18).
- supply their date of birth and National Insurance number - this information is then verified against other government databases.
If you are a British citizen resident overseas then you must apply to become an overseas elector. As long as you were registered to vote in the UK within the last 15 years then you can register to vote from overseas. Please contact the elections office for application forms and advice or go to www.gov.uk/register-to-vote.
If you are a member of the British Army, the Royal Navy or the Royal Air Force, you can register as a service voter. This allows you to register at an address in the UK (for a period of five years) whilst posted abroad.
Alternatively you can complete an application as an ordinary elector and be added to the register at your home address in the UK. Please contact the elections office or your 'unit registration officer' for further advice if required or visit www.gov.uk/register-to-vote.
It is a legal requirement to respond to the Requests for Information we send you if the information we currently hold needs to be amended. Regulation 23 of the Representation of the People Act (England and Wales) 2001 outlines that electoral registration officers have a duty to request information from persons which is used to compile the parliamentary and local government registers of electors.
If any person fails to provide the information requested, they may be liable to a summary conviction or fine which is up to £1,000. You can respond to our requests for information via the internet, telephone or post. The quickest and easiest way to respond to the form is via the internet which will save the council money.