Electors in UK Law

2. If the election was so conducted that it was substantially in accordance with the law as to elections, it is not vitiated by a breach of the rules or a mistake at the polls - provided that it did not affect the result of the election. That is shown by the Islington case where fourteen ballot papers were issued after 8 p.m.

It is necessary to examine not just the information which is disclosed but also the anticipated use to which it will be put. In the present case one therefore has to focus not only on the raw data —names and addresses and, by implication, the fact that those named are all over 18 (and, in some cases, recently so). Account also has to be taken of what is known and anticipated about the use to which it will be put.

That question obviously does not have to be answered in terms of statistical evidence or specific evidence of actual cases of deterrence. In practice the claimant's assertion about the potential effect of the 15 year rule on free movement is very difficult to demonstrate by any means, because it does not square with ordinary human experience.

The second principle is that temporary presence at an address does not make a man a resident there. The third principle is that temporary absence does not deprive a person of his residence. If he happens to be away for a holiday or away for the weekend or in hospital, he does not lose his residence on that account.

M, a Netherlands national, moved with her parents in 1993 to Belgium where her father was employed and where the family remained. A Netherlands law enacted in 2000 made eligibility for funding for higher educational studies pursued outside the European Netherlands dependent on the student being resident in the Netherlands for at least 3 out of the 6 years preceding the commencement of the course of study.

I phrase the question in this way because of the negative formulation of section 48(1). It was stated by Lord Denning MR in Morgan v Simpson at page 161 of his judgment that the section should be transformed to read positively, so that it must be shown that the election was not conducted substantially in accordance with the law as to elections or that the act or omission did affect the result.

On September 2, 2009, the claimant applied to Wandsworth Borough Council, the first defendant, to be registered to vote in UK elections. By letter received on December 15, 2009, the first defendant rejected the claimant's application, by reason of the application of the 15 year rule.