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ELECTIONS BUSINESS BULLETIN
Elections Directorate
Issue 8 – May 2025
Introduction
Hello and welcome to the May edition of our Elections Business Bulletin. We hope those who held elections had a successful polling day earlier this month.
It was great to see many of you joining our digital drop-ins during April. We recently circulated a Q&A document answering questions which were received during the drop-ins. This Q&A is re-attached to this Bulletin.
We will be running a further digital drop-in on 20 May from 10.30-11.30. This is a correction to the time provided in the previous Bulletin – apologies for any confusion caused. We hope to see you there
Highlights
In this month’s Bulletin, you will find:
· An update on the next Justification-Led Bid window, which is now open
· Information on postal vote reapplications
· Information on the Canvass Data Matching window
Attachments
The following documents are attached to this Bulletin:
· JLB 2025 one-pager - the JLB process explained
· Cost items funded to date - a guide to eligible expenditure (FY25-26)
· JLB 2025 New Burdens Excel Template
Key Dates & Reminders
· 14 May – JLB window opens
· 20 May – Online Digital Drop in 3, 10:30 – 11:30. Joining link here.
· 28 August – New Burdens Funding Drop-in: we will provide an overview of the JLB process, what you are eligible to bid for, and provide the opportunity to ask any questions you
may have. A link will be provided in due course.
Funding: Justification Led Bids
New Burdens funding is provided to local authorities to cover the additional costs incurred through implementation of the Elections Act 2022. JLBs are retrospective: they can only be used to claim back money already spent and therefore your costlines must be from a date that has already occurred.
During the 2025/26 financial year there will be one JLB window. The JLB window opened on 14 May and will close on 14 September 2025.
Attached to this Bulletin are the required forms and updated guidance for JLB submissions to support you through the FY25/26 process. We hope you find these materials helpful.
If you have already submitted a JLB in this window (i.e. prior to the receipt of this Bulletin and corresponding documents) you will need to resubmit on the new forms provided. We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause you.
To submit your JLB successfully you must complete the ‘JLB 2025 New Burdens Excel Template’ and ‘JLB 2025 – Grant Claim Form’ and return to elections@communities.gov.uk by midnight on 14 September 2025.
Postal Vote Reapplication Requirements
Under the Elections Act 2022, Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) are required to notify electors when their postal vote is due to expire. This notice must include the expiry date and information on how to reapply.
While the Electoral Commission recommends sending these notices around six weeks before the expiry date, we are aware that some EROs have already started contacting electors whose long-term postal votes will expire on 31 January 2026.
Although some funding for online absent vote applications was included in the 2025/26 local government finance settlement, we understand that you may have questions about additional costs related to this activity. Additional costs relating to postal vote reapplications will be claimed via JLB in FY26/27; as activity will be ongoing through this year and into next, this activity is not included in the cost lines for the current JLB window (FY25/26).
We’re currently working on further advice to clarify what postal vote reapplication activity will be funded and will share this with you soon. As ever, we are happy to have conversations about funding – please contact elections@communities.gov.uk for any discussions on funding assurances.
EIP Evaluation Report
The Government has today published an evaluation of the impact and implementation of the measures introduced by the Elections Act 2022 during the 2024 UK Parliamentary general election. The full report by independent research agency IFF Research can be found on GOV.UK.
Evaluation of the Electoral Integrity Programme: Year 2 Report - GOV.UK
We would like to thank all those who have contributed to this report, either through the gathering of polling station data, completing an implementation survey or taking part in an interview conducted by IFF Research; we appreciate your support in understanding the implementation of these measures
Digital Download
Update from the Digital Electoral Services (DES) Team
Application figures for the month of April show that just over 700k applications were submitted across the elections digital portfolio ahead of local elections on 1 May. Breakdown by service together with the deadline day totals are shown below:
If you would like to see how our services are performing, please visit our data.gov.uk account here: Digital Electoral Services - Performance Data - data.gov.uk
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Canvass 2025 |
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The annual canvass The annual canvass is carried out each year to ensure that everyone who is eligible to vote is included on the electoral register, so that they can take part in elections. Canvass is split into two parts: 1) National Canvass Data Match & 2) Actual canvassing
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National Canvass Data Match (CDM) 2025 The 2025 CDM will be taking place from 2 June to 29 August. The DES team runs and maintains the CDM. CDM is where all elector records are matched against Department for Work & Pensions (DWP) records to determine which route to send an elector down. There are three routes – each route leads to a different action from the Electoral Registration Officer (ERO). The DES team will shortly be sending out invites to all EROs to schedule their upload day. It is expected that MHCLG will process around 48 million records during the CDM period.
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Quote of the Day
“Believe you can and you're halfway there."
- Theodore Roosevelt
We are keen to hear from you
If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions, or if you would like to subscribe to the mailing list for this Bulletin, please contact us at elections@communities.gov.uk
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