How the House of Commons Library verify election results

General elections

Once the date of a general election has been announced, the House of Commons Library follows a three step process to ensure that the information we publish is accurate:

1. Recording candidates

Once statements of persons nominated have been published by Returning Officers, a team gathers statements in a particular region and records candidates and any party information. A second team then goes back over the information gathered and verifies it by referring to the statements of persons nominated. Democracy Club records are also used to verify candidates.

2. Identifying winning candidates

On the night of the general election and into the next day, teams identify each winning candidate in each constituency election in a particular region. Winning candidates are confirmed by checking against the BBC, Financial Times and Press Association websites. Where at least two of these sources agree, the winner is deemed to be confirmed.

Where available, additional information - such as vote counts and electorates - is recorded. This additional information is published only after it has been verified in step 3.

3. Verification

Following the general election, teams examine the result notices published by returning officers from a particular region and record information from those notices: votes for each candidate, the electorate and the number of invalid ballots.

If published information needs to be corrected - for example: the valid vote count appearing in the electorate field, or where information is missing - this team contacts the relevant Returning Officer, either by email, phone, or occasionally in person. A second team verifies the work of the first team by referring to the result notices.

In order to retain provenance, information gathered is stored together with a PDF or a screenshot of the results notice made available by the local authority, or by the Electoral Office for Northern Ireland.

We aim to complete step 3 within a week of the election.

Verifying historic election results

Results for historic elections have been compiled from local authority websites, or by communicating with local authorities. In some cases, we have not been able to identify the number of invalid votes. Local authorities have confirmed that they no longer hold this information.