London Elects is the independent body in charge of organising the election of the Mayor of London and the London Assembly.[1] The previous election took place on 1 May 2008. The London Elects team works directly for the Greater London Returning Officer (GLRO), Anthony Mayer, under a separate budget and reporting lines from the Greater London Authority (GLA). London Elects has two distinct functions – operations and communications.
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The operations team is responsible for the planning and co-ordination of all logistical aspects of the elections. This involves:
The communications team works to ensure that the election process is transparent and that information is made available to everyone – to London voters, candidates and political parties, the media and other election stakeholders. An important part of the team’s work is voter education. London Elects explains the registration and voting process and addresses the relevance of the Mayor and the London Assembly to the lives of Londoners. Activity is targeted at all of London’s diverse population. This includes the 5.5m registered voters and the unknown number of people in London who are eligible to vote but who are not on the electoral register. The communications team is working with the Electoral Commission on a public awareness campaign to raise the number of registered voters in London and explain the voting process.
Activities in the communications plan include:
The communications team is also responsible for co-ordinating communications and media management during the counting of ballot papers and results announcement.
London Elects has a budget of over £18m. This pays for:
The majority of the budget comes from the GLA reserve – money is put aside by the GLA every year to pay for the elections
Following the 1999 GLA Act, the first London Mayoral and London Assembly elections were held in 2000. These first elections were organised by the Government Office for London. Following a report into the running of this election, and continuing the transfer of powers to the new GLA, London Elects was established in 2003 at the request of the GLRO. The first election organised by the team was the 2004 London Mayoral, London Assembly and European election.