General Election 2024
A general election is taking place on 4 July 2024.
For a general election, Braintree district residents are divided into two parliamentary constituencies:
- Braintree
- Witham
You can check your parliamentary boundary online.
You do not need to re-register to vote for each election. If you voted in the last elections and nothing has changed (such as you haven't moved house), then you do not need to do anything. If you are not registered to vote, or something has changed since you last voted, you can register to vote online. The deadline to register to vote for the general election is midnight on Tuesday 18 June 2024. Poll cards are currently being issued. You need to read your polling card carefully to check your voting arrangements. You do not need to take it with you to vote. Some polling stations may change since the last election. Check your poll card to see where your polling station is when it arrives. Polling stations will open from 7am to 10pm on Thursday 4 July. Your poll card will tell you where your designated polling station is to vote. You can also search using your postcode on our Find your polling station page. We are aware that some households have received their poll cards that stated the wrong parliamentary constituency on it, due to a system error which wasn’t updated by our external provider following the parliamentary constituencies boundary changes and would normally be updated by the provider. 8 polling districts have been affected which are: The polling station details on the poll card are correct. The poll cards for these areas will be reissued as soon as possible. Postal votes and ballot papers are unaffected. We apologise for any inconvenience or confusion caused. To view what parliamentary constituency you fall in, visit the Boundary Commission for England website. The UK government has decided that voters must show photo identification when voting in person. You can find out more information about voter ID. This includes a list of acceptable documents. If you do not have ID, you can apply for a voter authority certificate for free. The deadline for applying for the certificate is 5pm Wednesday 26 June. We know some postal voters are concerned they have not yet received their UK Parliamentary general election ballot pack. Postal votes are currently being issued. If you apply to vote by post, we will send your ballot papers to you by post. You must return your ballot paper by 10pm on election day. Delivery sits with Royal Mail but due to the short notice for the General Election on 4 July, they have been working at capacity to deliver an anticipated 10 million postal votes across the UK. We will continue to do our best to help postal voters in the days leading up to the poll and will hand deliver to anyone who has contacted us and told us they have not received theirs yet. You can send your vote back to us by post or deliver it to us by hand at our offices at Causeway House, Braintree or a polling station in your area. When you return a postal vote pack by hand, you must fill in a form for the pack to be accepted. An individual can return their own postal vote and up to five additional postal votes at this election from family, friends or neighbours. Candidates and campaigners are not allowed to collect or return postal votes on electors’ behalf. If you have a lost or damaged postal vote or concerned you have not received yours yet, the deadline for a replacement is 5pm on polling day. You will need to contact us in advance about any possible replacements. We are aware that some residents in the following areas who are registered to vote by post have received duplicate postal vote packs today (Friday, 28 June): These were sent out by our print supplier in error following a data correlation issue as a result of the changes to the parliamentary boundaries. There is a total of 1,534 postal votes in these areas. However, only those postal vote packs received by electors from Friday, 28 June are affected. We are asking those who have received duplicate postal vote packs to destroy the duplicate pack and return only one voting pack. Any duplicate packs received will be removed from the process and rejected. Each postal vote received is processed and is subject to a robust validation process, which records those that have been received against the electoral register and ensures that only one vote will be counted. We know some people have received two postal vote packs with different print ID numbers – this doesn’t affect the voting process. We have checked the systems and are satisfied there is no risk of duplicate voting occurring. It is a criminal offence for anyone to submit two votes. Please be assured that no-one in the Braintree and Witham constituencies will be able to vote twice. We apologise for any inconvenience or confusion caused. If you have returned your postal vote already in these areas prior to Friday, 28 June, this postal vote is not affected, and has already been processed. If you're worried that you've run out of time to send your vote by mail, you can also drop off your postal vote at our offices at Causeway House in Braintree or any polling station in your area on 4 July between 7am-10pm. If you hand in your postal vote in person, you’ll need to fill out a postal vote handling form provided by polling station staff, otherwise your vote can't be accepted. Up to 5 postal votes (in addition to your own) can be handed in as long as you are not a candidate, party worker or campaigner. If you have applied for a postal vote but have not yet received it, you can apply for a replacement up until 5pm on polling day, 4 July. To do this please call us on 01376 552525 or email elections@braintree.gov.uk. Before we can give you a replacement postal vote pack, we will ask for proof of identity. A legal change has now taken place about postal vote handling. Postal ballot papers must now be posted back via a Royal Mail post-box. Alternatively they can still be hand delivered back to the council offices but only during normal office hours as you will need to sign a form giving your name and address in order to validate the postal vote. You can hand deliver up to 6 i.e. 5 and your own. Likewise, you can still return up to the 6 maximum number to your polling station, but again you need to sign the postal vote handling form before you leave. Failure to complete the form unfortunately means that the postal votes are rejected. If you apply for a proxy vote, you can appoint someone else to cast your vote for you. This should be a friend or family member that you trust. Unless your proxy sets up a proxy postal vote, they will have to go to your polling station to cast your vote. You can no longer apply for a proxy vote for the General Election on 4 July. The deadline was 5pm on Wednesday 26 June. If you missed the deadline you may be able to apply for an emergency proxy vote - Postal votes issued: 17 June (for those who have an existing postal vote or have applied before 31 May) - Postal votes issued: 26 June (for those who apply between 1 June and the deadline of 5pm on 19 June) You can find out the candidates standing in the General Election in our statement of persons nominated download: You can visit the‘Who Can I Vote For?’ website to find out more about candidates in your area. The Electoral Commission has produced a number of helpful videos to explain various aspects of the voting process. This includes videos in British Sign Language. You can visit the Electoral Commission's YouTube channel. The parliamentary boundary changes have come into place following the Boundary Commission’s 2023 Review of Parliamentary Constituency Boundaries in England. 6 wards within our district will now come under the Witham parliamentary constituency at the general election, these being: 2 wards within our district will now come under the Braintree parliamentary constituency at the general election, these being: You can view what parliamentary constituency your ward falls in on the Boundary Commission website.
Register to vote
Poll cards and polling stations
Voter ID
Notices of election
Postal and proxy voting
Key dates
Candidates
Results
Useful videos
Parliamentary boundary changes