{
  "url": "https://openlegislation.uk/electoral-law-act-northern-ireland-1962/schedule-NINTH/paragraph-4A",
  "json_url": "https://openlegislation.uk/electoral-law-act-northern-ireland-1962/schedule-NINTH/paragraph-4A.json",
  "legislation": "apni/1962/14",
  "legislation_title": "Electoral Law Act (Northern Ireland) 1962",
  "legislation_url": "https://openlegislation.uk/electoral-law-act-northern-ireland-1962",
  "path": "schedule/NINTH/paragraph/4A",
  "kind": "paragraph",
  "number": "4A",
  "heading": "Offences relating to applications for postal and proxy votes at a local election",
  "text": "(1) A person (“P”) is guilty of a corrupt practice if P—\n(a) engages in an act specified in sub-paragraph (2) at a local election, and\n(b) intends, by doing so, to deprive another of an opportunity to vote or to make for P or another a gain of a vote to which P or the other is not otherwise entitled or a gain of money or property.\n(2) These are the acts—\n(a) applying for a postal or proxy vote as some other person (whether that other person is living or dead or is a fictitious person);\n(b) otherwise making a false statement in, or in connection with, an application for a postal or proxy vote;\n(c) inducing the registration officer or returning officer to send a postal ballot paper or any communication relating to a postal or proxy vote to an address which has not been agreed to by the person entitled to the vote;\n(d) causing a communication relating to a postal or proxy vote or containing a postal ballot paper not to be delivered to the intended recipient.\n(3) In sub-paragraph (1)(b), property includes any description of property.\n(4) In sub-paragraph (2) a reference to a postal vote or a postal ballot paper includes a reference to a proxy postal vote or a proxy postal ballot paper (as the case may be).\n(5) For the purposes of this paragraph—\n“postal ballot paper” means a ballot paper issued to a postal voter;\n“postal voter” means a person entitled to vote by post at an election as an absent voter or as a proxy; and\n“proxy postal ballot paper” means a ballot paper issued to a proxy postal voter.",
  "extent": null,
  "status": null,
  "version": "current",
  "annotations": [
    {
      "type": "F",
      "label": "F1",
      "text": "Sch. 9 para. 4A inserted (16.12.2010) by Local Elections (Northern Ireland) Order 2010 (S.I. 2010/2977), arts. 1(2), 4, Sch. 1 para. 30 (with art. 1(3))"
    }
  ],
  "outstanding_effects": [],
  "provenance": {
    "source": "legislation.gov.uk",
    "source_url": "https://www.legislation.gov.uk/apni/1962/14/schedule/NINTH/paragraph/4A",
    "retrieved_at": "2026-10-29T21:32:59.497504+00:00"
  },
  "licence": "Open Government Licence v3.0",
  "licence_url": "https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/",
  "attribution": "Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Source: legislation.gov.uk, The National Archives."
}