BURY'S returning officer has admitted that a missing bundle of voters' declaration forms has still not shown up.

The missing batch caused a delay in Redvales ward, because tellers had counted 48 more votes than they had matching declarations.

Mr Mark Sanders said officers investigated all the options, for example if the forms had got mixed up with the European voting papers, but had found nothing.

"I said to the election agents that I was prepared to declare a result on the basis that I was out of options, and they had no objections," he said.

Despite the loss, Mr Sanders was confident that the integrity of the poll was intact.

He said the council's security systems ensured that no voting forms reached the counting stage without having first been tallied against their voter declaration sheets.

"It's not satisfactory to lose a batch of declarations, but there were 200,000 sheets of paper floating around."

Overall, he was pleased with how the first all-postal election had gone.

"The turnout is a remarkable step forward from what we might have otherwise expected, and better than any other metropolitan council in the region.

"There have been teething problems, including problems with the printers and new boundaries, and we have reported them to the Electoral Commission."