In the run up to the General Election, Athelstane Aamodt explains how the Election Court operates
As lawyers know, there are all sorts of courts and tribunals in the UK whose function depends on the matter to be decided. For the most part they derive their existence and the limits of their powers from statutes and statutory instruments. They are familiar to us: the Employment Tribunal, the Upper Tribunal (Lands Chamber), the First-Tier Tax Tribunal, and so forth. They all have their quirks and idiosyncrasies. Of all the courts in the UK, however, none is quite as unusual as the Election Court.
The law expressly allows people to question the outcome of parliamentary elections as well as European Parliament elections, local elections, Welsh assembly elections and local referendums by presenting a petition, which is essentially a claim form, that sets out the reasons for questioning the election and the relief that is sought by the petitioner.
Petition requirements
To be able to petition—by way of example—a parliamentary election, the petitioner needs to be one of the following:
- a person who voted (or could have voted) at the
