General Election 2017: Police to guard polling stations in Tower Hamlets to stop voter intimidation

From the London Evening Standard

Exclusion zones will be set up  outside almost all of Tower Hamlet’s 75 polling stations to stop potential voter intimidation.

All leave has been cancelled for Met police working in the borough so that each venue can have an officer stationed outside for Thursday’s election. The exclusion zones will extend up to 30 metres. 

The extra security aims to stop campaigners trying to influence voters in the Bethnal Green & Bow and Poplar & Limehouse seats. Labour candidate for Poplar & Limehouse, Jim Fitzpatrick, said the police presence was justified as you “can’t put a price on democracy”.

Since 2012 half of the allegations of electoral fraud in London — 224 accusations — related to Tower Hamlets.

Further east in Essex armed police will be patroling some polling stations as all public gatherings have become ‘more vulnerable’. From the Essex Echo

Essex Police’s chief constable Stephen Kavanagh vowed to keep residents safe after the “vile challenge on our lifestyle” which left seven people dead in London at the weekend. 

He said: “Following the awful event of the weekend we are looking at all of the events where people will be gathering, whether that’s on the coast, whether that’s market places, and that will include the polling stations.

“We do need people to go out there and use their democratic mandate for whatever purpose they want, but I think when you see this type of vile challenge on our lifestyle, more than ever people need to go out there and vote and we will do our very best to try and keep them safe.”

In an interview with BBC Essex’s Sadie Nine, Mr Kavanagh said the attack on London Bridge and Borough Market showed public events are becoming increasingly vulnerable.

Mr Kavanagh, who once worked in the Met’s anti-terror squad, also pointed out that subsequent raids and arrests have taken place in Barking and Dagenham, just miles away from London’s border with Essex. Those boroughs of Greater London still retain Essex in their address as well.