§ Mr. MitchellTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to his answer to the hon. Member for Tewkesbury (Mr. Robertson) of 8 March 1999,Official Report,columns 33–34, on elections to the European Parliament, if the number of votes cast for each group of candidates in each parliamentary constituency will be made known to counting agents, or any candidates present, when they are forwarded to the respective regional returning and calculating officers; and what arrangements will be made for recounts in each parliamentary divisional count where a recount after the completion of an initial calculation has been granted. [84687]
§ Mr. George HowarthThe counting of votes cast in the European Parliamentary elections will be conducted at the Parliamentary constituency level, though where the same person is the acting returning officer for two or more Parliamentary constituencies, these constituencies may be combined for polling and counting purposes.
Each registered political party and individual candidate will be entitled to be represented at each local count and to ask the local returning officer for a recount before the local result is transmitted to the regional returning officer. For this purpose, those entitled to be present will need to be informed of the provisional local result.
Once the local returning officer has transmitted the local result to the regional returning officer, there can be no further recount.