Voter Registration Champions

Could your church become a Voter Registration Champion? This free initiative is organised by Citizens UK to encourage more people in the UK to use their vote.

Read on to find out how your church might get involved.

Why the scheme is needed

It is estimated that 8 million people missed out on voting in the latest general election because they were not properly registered.

Many of the people who are statistically less likely to vote belong to the most marginalised and disadvantaged groups in our society. 

We believe that everyone, especially marginalised and socio-economically disadvantaged groups, should be involved in the process of choosing our government and political leaders.  

Churches, as hubs in communities, can play an important role in enabling participation in the election process. The voices of those who are part of our churches on Sundays or who attend activities throughout the week should be heard. 

‘In a just and compassionate society, exercising our right to vote is one of the key ways in which we can not only participate in democracy, but demonstrate our love for our neighbour as we engage in the issues that affect us all and we seek to hold our leaders to account.’

Revd Dr Tessa Henry-Robinson (Moderator of the General Assembly of the United Reformed Church 2023-2024)

This is why we are working with Citizens UK to help churches become Voter Registration Champions [LINK www.voterchampion.org.uk/]. As local churches, you can help people’s voices to be heard through increased democratic participation, encouraging people to register to vote, providing information about valid photo ID and encouraging people to vote on polling day. 

The Voter Registration Champion scheme is designed to be suitable for all kinds churches, is free to join and won’t take much time to do, but we believe it will make a positive difference.

What does it mean to be a Voter Registration Champion?

As a Voter Registration Champion, your church commits to supporting all members who are eligible and wish to vote to ensure they are registered, are aware of the need for valid voter ID, and are able to ask for help to get to their Polling Station or perhaps to register for a postal vote.

Your congregation is then encouraged to think about supporting others who live locally or might use your building (if you have one) during the rest of the week, so that they too are aware of and encouraged to participate in the voting process.

To gain Voter Registration Champion accreditation, you need to engage with your congregation about this on at least one Sunday before the election, and invite each person present to choose one of three options:

• I am 100% certain I am registered to vote in UK elections. 
• I am not registered to vote, or not sure, but I will register/check by the deadline. 
• I am ineligible to vote or I do not wish to be registered to vote.

Just like in the election itself, privacy is important: names should not be collected, and a show of hands should be avoided. We’ll suggest ways below to carry out this quick survey.

Frequently asked questions about registering to vote

Create a Voter Registration Sunday

Choose one Sunday as a Voter Registration Sunday in the lead up to an election, before registration closes! You might wish to keep things simple and explain the ‘voting’ activity during your ‘announcements’, or perhaps you will want to theme your whole service around politics and elections and have this as a ‘response‘ activity. If you have a range of ages in your congregation, why not make it an all-age activity?

Perhaps theme the whole service around the election?

For instance, how about inviting your parliamentary candidates to talk about their motivations, then pray for them and share how your congregation is active as part of the community? This might be a challenge in a busy time for candidates, so you would need to be quick off the mark.

Or link your prayers and/or sermon to a topic such as democratic participation, good government, the qualities of good leaders, choosing leaders that can do the most good for a community, or focusing on justice issues in your local community or the UK more broadly. JPIT’s weekly Politics in the Podcast https://jpit.uk/politicsinthepulpit has lots of advice for how to carefully address this in a church service.

The ‘voting’ activity

During the service, explain why it’s important that we are ready to vote, are mindful of people in the neighbourhood who might be less likely to be ready to vote, and how we can lead by example. Everyone in the congregation who is eligible to vote should:

• Be encouraged to register to vote before the deadline (if they aren’t sure they are registered already)
• Know they need to produce valid photo ID at the polling station
• Be encouraged to vote on polling day.

Next, conduct a very simple survey of the congregation that is present, to discover how many of them are registered or are going to register to vote. This should be done anonymously. We suggest using ‘voting slips’ (you can download an example using the button below) and a ‘ballot’ box (any box will do!), to keep with the election theme.

Even those ineligible to vote are asked to be part of the survey: this helps reinforce that everyone in our country has a voice, even if they are currently too young to vote or have other reasons why they cannot or will not register.

Collect the voting slips during an appropriate moment – perhaps immediately, or wait until the service has finished and people are chatting or preparing to leave. You will know what would work best in your context.

The aim is for at least 90% of the people in the service to participate in the survey (ideally 100%!), so you will need to ensure that someone has counted and recorded how many people are present in total.

Optional, but recommended:

• For those who are not yet registered to vote, or aren’t sure if they are, you might wish to bring a laptop or table, connected to the internet, or even some paper copies of the form (see below for links), and let them register at the end of the service.
• Please remember that this should only be with their consent and any personal data should be deleted from your device (tip: use a web browser in ‘private browsing’ or ‘incognito‘ mode, which does not keep data once the window is closed).
• For paper copies, you could seal them all in one large envelope and post to your local council’s electoral office.
• You might wish to print out or display the QR code and web address for people who might wish to register on their own device (see download button below)

You will need:

• a ‘ballot box’ (could just be an empty cardboard box with a wide slot in the top) 
• enough ‘voting slips’ for everyone who is present (see the download button below)
• some pens or pencils for people to use 
• optional: a laptop/tablet with internet connection for people to register online
• optional: some printed copies of the voter registration form and a large envelope to post them afterwards.

Suggestions

As soon as you have a plan in place to run a ‘Voter Registration Sunday’, sign up as a Voter Registration Champion via the website: www.voterchampion.org.uk. 

If using the ‘voting slip’ handout. encourage the participants to tear off and keep the top part of the page before submitting their answer to the ballot box.

If you don’t have access to a printer, you could just use small scraps of paper and the congregation could write their answer (you could provide a code so they just have to write one letter or number down to represent their response from the three options).

It is useful to spend a moment in the service reading out the three ‘voting’ options available, giving time for each person to tick the box appropriate to them, then invite everyone to [tear off and] put their slip in the ballot box (this could be on their way out, or someone in the congregation could walk round with the box during the service, or whatever would work best in your context).

After the service

• Count the total number of responses.
• Compare the total number of completed slips with the number of people who attended. Hopefully, you will have surpassed the 90% participation threshold (regardless of what those responses were). 
• Submit these results to voterchampion@citizensuk.org with your church’s name.
• Consider who else in your neighbourhood needs to hear this message. Do you have mid-week groups that use your building? Could you do something similar with them? Could you display the QR code outside your building or include it in your church news bulletin or email?
• Let us know how it went – we’d love to hear from you.