AN INQUIRY into the postal votes muddle in Blackburn and Darwen is to be carried out by the local government ombudsman.

The move follows a formal complaint by the local Conservative party following concern that people applying for votes in tomorrow's local and Parliamentary elections may not receive them in time.

But chief executive and returning officer Phil Watson today said he felt he could justify the council's actions and said all postal vote forms had now been sent out.

He blamed the aftermath of last month's postal strike for the delays, adding that a firm contracted to ensure delivery of the forms had let them down at the last minute.

Last week, it was claimed that scores of people faced missing out on the right to vote by post after a series of setbacks and delays slowed down the delivery of forms.

Council officials told people receiving their postal vot forms late to fill them in and take them to the town hall on election day.

Home Secretary and Blackburn candidate Jack Straw pledged a review of the system after council bosses said they had not be left with enough time to send out voting papers after the close of nominations.

He said all parties had been involved in discussions to promote postal voting. But the Blackburn Conservative Association today confirmed its members had made a formal complaint to the ombudsman over the electoral voting system.

A change in the law this year allows anyone to vote by post.

The council wrote to every voter in the borough asking them if they wanted to vote by post -- and council workers received 12,000 responses.

But Coun Colin Rigby, group leader of the Conservatives on Blackburn with Darwen Council, said: "Overall, I believe this to have been an ill-thought out plan, poorly executed, with apparently no organisational skill.

"Everything appears to have been too little, too late.

"At no time have I been involved in or advised of any meetings to consider the use of a borough-wide advertising campaign to promote postal application forms. My understanding was that this would happen at next year's local election campaign." Ann Law-Riding, chairman of the borough's Conservative Association, the author of the letter to the Ombudsman said: "Why advertise postal votes if you can't get the forms out in time?

"People are being told to go to the polling station with their postal vote. What is the point of that?"

The council has been tasked by the government with raising voter turn-outs at local elections to more than 40 per cent.

Mr Watson said: "We have been affected by things outside our control including being let down by a firm who were supposed to deliver the ballot papers.

"We made sure the last batch were in the post by Saturday lunchtime and the Royal Mail have promised to deliver any late ballot papers to us by 10pm on Thursday so they can be counted." A spokesman for the Local Government Ombudsman, based in York, said: "All complaints are investigated as soon as they are received."

Home Secretary Jack Straw, fighting to keep his Blackburn Commons seat said: "The changes were made to postal voting after full consultation with the Conservatives nationally.

"My agent will be talking to Blackburn with Darwen Council about this issue."

People with queries about voting can ring 01254 585654.

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