A woman has criticised Barnet Council after it failed to send her postal voting paperwork in time for the election.

Rachel Jasper, of Holden Road, Woodside Park, applied for a postal vote last month because she knew she would not be able to get to a polling station today.

She received a phone call saying she was registered to vote by post ten days ago – but did not receive the form until she got home from work yesterday evening.

Ms Jasper, who lives in the Chipping Barnet seat, spoke to the council yesterday morning about the problem.

She was told she could visit North London Business Park before 5pm yesterday to pick up a voting form, but was unable to get away from her office in central London.

The communications worker has since cancelled her plans for this evening, which originally led her to apply for the postal vote, but worries other people may have been affected by the same problem.

Ms Jasper said: “I got home last night, and there they were. What on earth is the point of asking people to do it, if they don’t arrive in time? It’s absolutely pointless.

“I want to vote but what concerns me more is how many people are affected in Barnet, and have their vote compromised. It’s ridiculous.

“I gather I have until 5pm register to vote by proxy today. I didn’t know that, and I doubt many will.”

In a statement, a Barnet Council spokesman said: “We sent out the first 39,500 postal ballots by Royal Mail first class post on April 20 – a day before the deadline to register to vote by post on April 21. The final batch of postal ballots were sent out, again by Royal Mail first class post, on April 24.

"As of this morning, our teams have processed 34,500 postal votes, which points to a high postal vote turnout figure of around 78 per cent. This is substantially up on previous years.

"If anyone received their postal ballot too late to post they have until 10pm this evening to drop them off at any Barnet polling station. If anyone has any queries they can call our election call centre on 020 8359 4111."