Blind and partially sighted people experience a unique set of challenges when voting. The practical act of voting, making a cross in a specific location on a piece of paper, is fundamentally a visual exercise. It requires the ability to locate the boxes, read the names of the candidates and make a mark on the paper. Current provisions provided in every polling station to allow blind and partially sighted people to vote are a large-print ballot paper that can be used for reference and a tactile voting device. Although in practice, because of this inability to read the names of candidates on the ballot, the majority of the 350,000 blind and partially sighted people in the UK currently find it impossible to vote without having to share their vote with a companion or presiding officer in the polling station, often finding they have to name the candidate they want to vote for out loud. As a result, despite 2022 marking 150 years since the Ballot Act 1872 guaranteed the right to vote in secret, the vast majority of blind and partially sighted people are unable to exercise this right. But instead of proactively developing a new way to vote independently, this Elections Bill weakens the guarantees for blind and partially sighted people already existing in legislation, allowing for individual returning officers, instead of the Government, to make the decision as to what to provide, creating a postcode lottery of provision.

Nobody's right to vote should be undermined. Everyone who is eligible to vote deserves not only to do so, but they also should be able to expect their Governments encourage them to do so, enable them to do so and take away any barriers that could stop them doing so. The Bill is nothing more than a masked act of aggressive voter suppression; a well-recognised conservatory reactionary tactic to silence debate, to disenfranchise those who might vote for different kinds of representations and policies and the shore-up power of the privileged. We must do everything we can in Wales to stop its implementation. Diolch.