E-voting in trial municipalities starts in the autumn

This autumn, six municipalities will carry out either elections for young persons' councils or consultative referenda with the aid of the new solution for electronic voting via the internet. After New Year facilities will be available for further four trial municipalities to perform consultative referenda.

For the municipal and county council elections in 2011, 10 municipalities will take part in electronic voting trials. The e-voting 2011 project at the Ministry of Local Government and Regional Development is now working constantly on developing the e-voting solution in collaboration with the trial municipalities and ErgoGroup, which is the supplier.

Testing and further development

As part of the work of testing and further developing the e-voting solution, all the trial municipalities will test electronic voting via the internet during voting for young persons' councils or referenda during the autumn and winter. Some of the municipalities will also have traditional ballot papers available for those who do not wish to vote electronically. The e-voting solution that will be used this autumn and winter is not the complete e-voting solution that will be used for the municipal and county council elections in 2011. For this even more functions will be used.

The municipalities inform their own residents and voters about how the elections and referenda are carried out. The referenda will be consultative.

Back-up solutions

All the trial municipalities will have back-up solutions in case there are problems with the electronic voting.

Must have MinID

All those who are entitled to vote in the electronic elections must be registered as users of the the MinID identification solution. Those who have not used MinID before must register in good time before voting starts. New PIN codes may be ordered from MinID: www.minid.difi.no. It takes a few days for a new PIN code to arrive by post.

Those who are unsure whether they are registered as users of MinID can check by logging on here: www.minside.no.

Elections/referenda in the trial municipalities

Below is a list of when the elections and referenda occur:

Kommune	Tema	Valgperiode
Ålesund	Election to young persons' council	15.10.-18.10.2010
Bodø	Election to young persons' council	25.10.-27.10.2010
Sandnes	Referendum: on establishing a town park at the bus station.  (9th and 10th year pupils are entitled to vote)	2.11.-5.11.2010. There will also be a separate day for voting with ballot papers 8.11.2010.
Mandal	Referendum: name of new bridge	10.11.-11.11.2010
Vefsn	Referendum: traffic arrangement questions	22.11.-25.11.2010
Hammerfest	Referendum: traffic arrangement questions	30.11.-1.12.2010

After New Year it is planned to carry out referenda in the municipalities Bremanger, Radøy, Tynset and Re.