GET IN TOUCH

Delegated Nominating Officers: Summary of Duties

The only reason why political parties exist is to allow them to stand candidates in their name for public office in elections. Without candidates a political party is merely a pressure or lobby group.

Electoral law requires that each political party appoints a Leader, a Treasurer and a Nominating Officer. The role of the registered (National) Nominating Officer is to authorise people to stand in the name of the Party. The current national incumbent is Janice Mackay. Her deputy is Ben Walker.

"The primary function of Branches is to select and support candidates for local, Parliamentary and other kinds of elections, recruit new members, raise funds and generally to promote the Party and its policies" (Rule B.1.5). Note that the selection and support of candidates is listed first, implying that this is the most important function of a branch.

There are over 21,000 councillors in the UK and if UKIP were to stand candidates in all of them then the registered Nominating Officer could not be expected to nominate every candidate. Therefore, the registered Nominating Officer (or National Nominating Officer, NNO) appoints deputies, called Delegated Nominating Officers (DNOs).

The authority of a Delegated Nominating Officer is indicated by a certificate issued by the National Nominating Officer. The authority will be limited by:

Area in which they can authorise candidates, this will be listed by region
The time period, all certificates expire and need to be renewed periodically, and
Type of election, although currently all Delegated Nominating Officers' certificates are for all elections in their area within the authorised time period.

Elections are managed by the staff of a Returning Officer. There is one Returning Officer in each of the second tier councils which are normally District, Borough, London Borough, Unitary, or Metropolitan Borough Councils. Returning Officers are generally figureheads and in practice elections are run by the staff in the council's Electoral Services department. Therefore, the important person in the council is the Electoral Officer who at the time of elections is normally a Deputy/Assistant Returning Officer.

In UKIP Delegated Nominating Officers have two functions:

They are expected to make contact with the electoral officers in the second tier councils in their area to form a working relationship and hopefully be informed at an early stage that they is a by-election shortly to be announced.
To assist members in getting approved as local candidates; to assist the branches in their area in selecting their local candidates; and to help the candidates with the actual nomination process (they are not there to merely sign a piece of paper).

"The selection of any UKIP candidate for any public election shall be subject to a vetting procedure, as from time to time determined by the NEC, to verify that the candidate is an appropriate person to stand for public elected office for UKIP" (Rule R.11). Only fully paid-up members of the Party may stand and all candidates must be approved by the Party for the type of election where they are standing.

In general there are two types of approved candidates:

Those who can stand for Parliamentary Elections, and
Those who can stand for local elections to be a councillor.

Elections to Mayoral, Assembly, Police and Crime Commissioners and devolved Government positions are covered by different procedures. However, once selected those candidates will be authorised by the relevant Delegated Nominating Officer.

When authorising a candidate to stand the Delegated Nominating Officer must ensure that all candidates that they authorise must be on the approved local or parliamentary candidate list before being authorised; Party officers can provide DNOs with access to that list if required.

"Authority to use the Party’s description and emblem on nomination papers at elections within the branch’s parliamentary constituencies and local government boundaries is the responsibility of the relevant Delegated Nominating Officer, who is appointed by the Party’s registered Nominating Officer" (Rule B.6.1).

The use of the Party's emblem is actually the choice of the candidate but since the emblems available are limited, the choice is fairly obvious. To avoid doubt the normal emblem is indicated by the words: "a pound sterling sign with the letters UKIP through the middle" [Emblem id 101]

These details are displayed on the Electoral Commission’s website: http://search.electoralcommission.org.uk/Registrations/PP85

N.B. There are also emblems for Scotland and Wales:

Scotland: "a pound sterling sign with the letters UKIP through the middle and the letters SCOTLAND above and EST. 1993 below
[Emblem id 8163]"
Wales: "Emblem 3 [Emblem id 7666]"

In order to authorise a candidate the Delegated Nominating Officer will need to complete and sign in ink (no scanned signatures) Section 4 of the candidate's nomination pack; the Certificate of Authorisation. The details required are:

The name of the area where the election is taking place i.e. ward, division, or constituency [This must match that shown in the Notice of Election which would have been issued by the local authority].
Date of election.
The full name of candidate [This must match the candidate's name as shown in Section 1a of the candidate's nomination pack].
The full name of the Party [Which is 'UK Independence Party (UKIP)'].
The Party Description that the DNO is authorising the candidate to use [This must match the Party Description shown in Section 1a of the candidate's nomination pack. By the way all details shown in Section 1a must be completed BEFORE the first of the 10 nominator/seconder/assentor signatures have been obtained. Candidates must not add that information after the first signature has been obtained. See below for list of Party Descriptions available].
Signature of the Delegated Nominating Officer [This must be in ink, It is advise to use blue ink in order to show that it is ink and has not been scanned].
Name of person signing this form: [Name of the Delegated Nominating Officer]

For the Party Descriptions most candidates should use: