YESTERDAY, representing the Dorchester Stronger in Europe group, I went to observe the sorting of our postal votes.

I was most impressed by the whole process carried out on our behalf by the staff in the council office to ensure that all the postal votes are correct, confidential and will be counted on Thursday.

I thought your readers might like to know how it is done.

The team first open the outer envelopes and remove the inner envelope and identification slip; the numbers are checked to ensure they agree.

If they do the identification slip is passed to the assistant at the computer.

She checks that the date of birth and signature match those on the original application for a postal vote, (already stored on the computer) to make sure they tally.

Where they differ the supervisor checks carefully too and if she is not satisfied they are rejected and stored.

Those applicants are informed of the decision.

The votes, in their separate envelope bearing only the number, are opened quite separately after the previous tests have ensured their validity.

They are placed with the vote side down before being secured ready to be counted with all the other votes on Thursday Every effort is made to ensure that incomplete votes get to be counted.

They are stored and should the identification slips arrive before polling day they are matched with the vote envelopes.

You can rest assured that everything possible is done to ensure your vote gets to be counted( unless it’s fraudulent, of course)!

As I came out the reception hall was full of officials collecting the ballot boxes to be placed in the polling stations.

I felt privileged to have seen something of the work of dedicated staff toiling behind the scenes to keep our democracy going.

Now we must do our bit and vote!

Margaret Bauwens

Maumbury Gardens

Dorchester