Candidates Revealed for Council Elections

The list of candidates hoping to become an Orkney Islands Council Elected Member at the local elections in May has been published.

All voters in Orkney will have the opportunity to go to the polls, with an election taking place in all six wards.

There are 5 candidates standing in Kirkwall East, 8 in Kirkwall West and Orphir, 6 in Stromness and the South Isles, 6 in the West Mainland, 5 in the East Mainland and 5 in the North Isles.

Voting will take place on Thursday May 5, with the count taking place at The Pickaquoy Centre in Kirkwall on the morning of Friday May 6.

The full list of candidates is available at www.orkney.gov.uk/LGE22

Karen Greaves is Deputy Returning Officer for Orkney Islands Council. She said "We are pleased to present the candidate list for the election.  There's been plenty of conversations going on locally about who is and isn't standing and I know folk will have been waiting to see the final list.

"There's a tremendous amount of work goes into running an election - and our elections team has been working hard in the background  and that'll continue right up to polling day and count day.

"We'll be providing lots of information in the coming weeks about polling day.  Folk will remember the voting system is different to usual - proportional representation as opposed to first past the post - so we'll be doing lots of public information to make sure that's well understood.

"The run up to the election is always exciting and this time should be no different. We'll now will see candidates making themselves more widely known, perhaps through knocking on doors, leaflets and through husting events."

The deadline for making sure you are registered to vote is Monday 18 April.  If you haven't received your poll card yet then you should make sure you are registered

There are currently 17,659 registered electors in Orkney, 5950 of whom have a postal vote.

Postal voting packs will start arriving between Thursday 14 April and Tuesday 19 April and the deadline for getting a postal or proxy vote  is April 19.

The turnout for the 2017 elections was 49.7% with one ward uncontested.