6th February 2024

Engaging disabled voters

Councils and supporters play a vital role in engaging disabled voters when registering to vote and casting their ballots.

Background

Over 1.5 million adults in the UK live with a learning disability, and there are over 700,000 autistic adults. Nevertheless:

• 40% of the general public don’t know these groups have an equal right to vote.

• 80% of people feel that polling stations are inaccessible for disabled people as a whole.

• As few as 12% of disabled voters were aware of their legal entitlements during the 2023 local elections, in the wake of new rules around voter identification and available onsite support.

How you can help

• We want local councils and their Returning Officers to sign our accessible voting pledge and signpost people to our resources on their websites – this will make it easier for us to conduct voter registration drives and make a bigger splash.

• We want supporters to contact their local authorities , to build critical momentum and push them to sign up to My Vote My Voice. We’ll also be sending them the resource pack to share with the people they support.