Councils throughout England are being invited to submit bids to run innovative voting pilots in next year's local elections.

They will include voting on the internet, by mobile and touch phone, interactive digital television and post.

The announcement by local government minister Nick Raynsford follows the success of last May's trials when 2.5 million people, 11.5 per cent of the electorate, had the chance to vote by different methods.

Many of these pilots resulted in big increases in turnout, particularly in those areas where all-postal voting was used.

Next year's programme is a partnership between the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, the Office of the E-Envoy, the Electoral Commission and the Local Government Association.

Mr Raynsford said: "The invitation follows from the success of last May's pilots, when people in many parts of the country had their first real experience of voting electronically and by post. Such was the scale of the programme, the UK is quite rightly regarded as being among the pioneers of electoral modernisation.

"Next May's elections provide a further opportunity to take this programme forward. I want to see a significant number of pilot schemes that explore the opportunities for postal voting and online voting from remote locations, home, work or elsewhere."

The Government has earmarked £30 million over the next three years for the programme with the aim of of an e-enabled general election some time after 2006.

The invitation came as the Government published its response to the Electoral Commission's evaluation report of the May 2002 pilots.

Although some concerns were voiced about an increased risk of fraud, the Commission found no evidence this occurred. Turnout was increased to 38.7 per cent on average compared to 32.8 per cent nationally.

Details of how councils can apply to take part in the programme can be found in Prospectus for Electoral Pilots 2003. Closing date for applications is November 29 with the pilots areas announced in December.

A spokesman for Brighton and Hove Council said: "We always try to view positively new ideas for increasing the number of people voting in elections in the city.

"Last year's mayoral referendum was the first local poll ever to be done entirely by post and we regard the 31.6 per cent turnout as a major success.

"No decisions have been taken with regard to next year's council elections but, like many other local authorities, we are exploring a number of different voting methods."

www.odpm.gov.uk
www.electoralcommission.gov.uk
www.brighton-hove.gov.uk