Key considerations for developing the poll

Your views on developing the poll

The purpose of the poll is to find out how many households are either in favour or against the proposed Hydrogen Village trial, so that the Council and Government understand the views of the Whitby community.

There are lots of choices about how the poll could be carried out, and this is your chance to shape how it is run. There also are some considerations, including legal issues, which limit the options for how the poll could be run. These are set out below.

Key considerations

A fair approach

We want to make sure that the approach is fair. For example, the poll needs to reach everyone in the trial area, the question (or questions) should be neutral and easy to understand, and it must be easy for people to respond.

Address list and use of electoral register

The poll does not meet the conditions set out in law for a referendum or parish poll. The Council can still run the poll without these conditions being met, but the legal powers associated with elections cannot be used.

This means that the Council is not legally allowed to use the electoral register for this poll. This is important because it means we are not able to issue one ‘form’ per person, as we do not have any alternative information to tell us exactly who lives in each property within the Whitby trial area.

We do have an address list and we are able to send one form to each property. This means the poll will need to be conducted on a “one household one form” basis, rather than “one person one form”. However, there are options outlined below for how we could ask about whether there are mixed views in a household.

Reference numbers

For the results of the poll to be accurate and representative, we propose to issue each household with a reference number to ensure that:

• we only receive poll forms from households within the Whitby trial area
• we only accept one poll form per household.

Reference numbers will only be used for this purpose. Responses will be treated with absolute confidentiality and in line with GDPR guidelines, just as in a normal election.

Administering the poll

The poll will be available by post and online. We will send a paper form to each property, with an option to post it back or respond online. We would use a reference number system to make sure only one response is received from each household as outlined above.

This way, everyone would have the same opportunity to take part, whether they access the internet or not, and whether they are at their property or not when the poll is carried out. Anyone who is away could contact the Council for their reference number to submit their poll online if they have access to the internet.

Timescales

Timescales for this engagement and for running the poll itself are tight. We were unable to start this engagement during the recent local elections, due to national regulations, which limit what councils can do during election campaigns. The Government is expected to decide on the Hydrogen Village trial in September 2023. Therefore, we have to conduct the poll and analyse the results by 31 August 2023, so that we can share findings in time to inform their decision.

Therefore, the timetable is: