The Electoral Affairs Commission has made 11 recommendations in its report after reviewing the Chief Executive election and Election Committee Subsector by-elections held earlier this year.

The report, submitted to the Chief Executive on September 14 and published today, reviewed election arrangements and proposed improvement measures for future elections.

The commission said the elections were organised in an open, fair and honest manner. To improve the conduct of future elections, the commission made a number of suggestions, covering ballot papers, poll card design, polling station operation, contingency planning, electoral statistics collection, staff training, polling hours and venue selection. For details, click here.

The commission said the arrangement for drawing up a comprehensive contingency plan for electoral arrangements to cater for unexpected difficulties for each and every election or by-election should continue.

Contingency planning and crisis management training for Registration & Electoral Office staff as well as polling and counting staff should be enhanced to equip them with the necessary skills in handing unexpected situations.

Statistics reporting by fax effective

The commission found statistics reporting by fax has proved to be more straightforward, simple and easy to operate with a high level of data integrity maintained, as compared with other methods used in previous elections such as verbal reports by telephone or electronic reports through the Interactive Voice Response System.

While consideration should be given to using fax machines as the means for reporting electoral statistics for future by-elections of a similar scale, the commission said more review is needed to see if this method suits large-scale ordinary elections in which the number of polling stations and electors can be more than 10 times that of the 2005 Election Committee Subsector by-elections.

The Constitutional Affairs Bureau will work closely with the commission to follow up on the recommendations, having regard to the community's views.

For details of the report, click here. Copies are available for collection at district offices.