The Representation of the People (Absent Voting at Local Government Elections) (Scotland) Amendment (No. 2) Regulations 2026 is a corrective instrument published on 18 September 2026. On the text of the instrument supplied here, it addresses a defect in SSI 2026/251, the earlier regulations that updated absent voting rules for Scottish local government elections. The measure is narrow, but it matters because election law depends on exact cross-references and exact deadlines. (commons-sense.co.uk) This is not a fresh policy package. Its function is to complete a rule that the earlier September instrument had already tried to create. That distinction is important for administrators and voters alike: an entitlement can exist on paper, but if the closing-date provision is missing or incomplete, polling-day decisions become harder to defend in law. (legislation.gov.uk)
SSI 2026/251 introduced a new emergency proxy route for a voter who cannot reasonably be expected to vote in person because they are accompanying another person who is receiving medical care or treatment on the date of the poll. The same instrument also set extra application requirements, including a statement explaining why the voter could not apply before the ordinary deadline, and attestation by someone aged 16 or over who knows the applicant and is not related to them. (legislation.gov.uk) That earlier instrument therefore established the substantive ground for the emergency proxy. Scottish Government impact material on related absent voting reforms has already framed this area as one affecting both voter access and electoral administration, which is the right way to read this change as well. (gov.scot)
The defect sat in the gap between eligibility and timing. The earlier regulations inserted the new medical-companion ground into regulation 10 of the 2007 framework, but the closing-date rule in regulation 11 still needed to be updated to match it. On the text supplied for SSI 2026/263, the new instrument does that by inserting a further limb into regulation 11(4). In practical terms, the correction means that an application on this medical-companion ground may be made up to 5 p.m. on the date of the poll, where the applicant became aware of the relevant circumstances after 5 p.m. on the sixth day before polling day. That is a small drafting amendment with a decisive operational result: it turns the earlier policy change into a deadline that registration staff can lawfully administer.
For voters, the scope remains tightly confined. The amendment is aimed at a person who only realises late in the process that they will need to accompany someone for medical care or treatment and, because of that, will be unable to attend their own polling station. It is not a general relaxation of proxy voting and it does not disturb the ordinary timetable for other absent vote cases. For electoral administrators, the benefit is clarity. The Scottish Government's own material on absent voting reform notes that these measures affect both electors and administrators. Read alongside SSI 2026/251, this correction gives electoral registration officers a clearer legal basis for accepting and processing a very late emergency proxy application in this specific circumstance. (gov.scot)
A further point in the instrument is easy to miss but central to its real-world effect. Although the regulations come into force on 13 November 2026, they have no effect for any election where the date of poll is on or before 5 May 2027. The law is therefore commenced in late 2026, but held back for earlier polls. That makes the Scottish local government elections scheduled for 6 May 2027 the first routine contest likely to be affected. That reading is an inference from the transitional wording in the instrument and the Electoral Management Board for Scotland's published timetable, but it is the most practical planning assumption for councils and election teams. (emb.scot)
The note that this SSI is being issued free of charge to recipients of the earlier instrument underlines its character as a defect correction rather than a broader policy reset. The Scottish Ministers are not widening the franchise or redesigning absent voting here. They are making sure that a previously announced emergency proxy entitlement works inside the statutory timetable. For practitioners, the next step is procedural. Guidance, staff training, forms and voter communications will need to reflect that this medical-companion route can run until 5 p.m. on polling day once the 2027 transition point has passed. For voters, the message is equally clear: this is a narrow safeguard for an unexpected medical-companion situation, not a substitute for arranging an absent vote through the normal process. (legislation.gov.uk)