By James Truswell: Stafford Borough Council are hoping to boost the electoral turnout by allowing people to vote in unusual locations.

People have been voting in pubs, hairdressers and also Marstons Road – home of Stafford Rangers – as well as usual locations such as schools and village halls.

In order to maximise the turnout, Chief Executive and Acting Returning Officer Ian Thompson has increased the number of polling stations that cover the two constituencies of Stafford and South Staffordshire.

“One of my duties as acting returning officer is to ensure that as many people as possible exercise their right to vote and that the turnout is as high as possible,” he said. “A success in that regard would be a turnout in excess of 65 per cent.

“One of the ways we can encourage people to vote is to make our polling stations, in which we have over 200 in two constituencies as convenient as possible so apart from the obvious venues like village halls and schools, we also use a church, at least two pubs and also somewhat unusually – a hairdressers.”

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