Andy Burnham’s campaign has criticised Labour’s “unbelievable” decision to close its telephone helpline for people yet to receive ballot papers on the final day of its leadership contest.

With less than 24 hours to go before the voting deadline, dozens of Labour members and supporters have publicly complained that they have still not received emails or papers allowing them to take part.

Some of the leadership campaigns believe hundreds if not thousands of members and supporters could be disenfranchised.

After receiving many complaints over the last week, Labour reissued thousands of ballots by email on Tuesday to people who had not yet voted.

It is understood that Iain McNicol, the party’s general secretary, then emailed all the leadership campaigns on Tuesday, saying the reminder email would “hopefully pick up any outstanding issues your teams have been contacted about non-receipt of ballot papers”.

The email, seen by the Guardian, added: “From today the party’s leadership call centre will no longer be accepting calls. Callers to the party’s leadership call centre will now receive a recorded message giving essential details of the final issue of ballots by email. In addition it is now too late to amend email addresses to which we send people’s ballots.”

It advised candidates to tell people complaining about their missing ballots simply to check their spam folders.

However, the problem still does not appear to have been solved given the scale of complaints on social media and a number of calls from Labour supporters to the Guardian.

Michael Dugher, Burnham’s campaign manager and a shadow cabinet minister, tweeted: “With thousands still to vote & many not had their ballot, UK Labour has closed the call centre to help members trying to vote. Unbelievable.”

Labour believes all ballot papers have now been sent at least once, and everybody who has not voted should have received a final email reminder on Tuesday.



It is understood that everyone who contacted Labour by 5pm on Tuesday will have been sent a new ballot from the Electoral Reform Services by close of play on Wednesday.

However, a source in one of the leadership camps said there was “a lot of concern the party has basically decided to stop taking calls and if you don’t have a vote, you’re now basically not getting one”.



Thousands of new supporters who paid £3 to take part in the vote have been disqualified from casting a ballot because Labour deemed them not to share the values and aims of the party – including hundreds of Conservatives and Green party members. However, all those people should have been informed if they have been purged from the list.

Some of those yet to receive ballot papers include family members of people working on the leadership campaigns, as well as the Guardian journalist John Harris, who said he was livid about the lack of vote and inability to get through to the party on its helpline. He also called the Electoral Reform Services, who told him they had been getting a lot of complaints but referred him back to Labour.

@UKLabour Still haven't received my email ballot. — Carrie J. Lyell (@Seej) September 9, 2015

@UKLabour I joined the party before the deadline for new members to vote in leadership election but havent received post or email ballot yet — Simon Case (@SimonJohnCase) September 9, 2015

When is my #labourleadership ballot going to arrive... ...if I really have been disqualified from voting then please say so! #frustrated — Mark Hemingway (@MarkHemi82) September 8, 2015

Meanwhile, George Osborne, the chancellor, has given an interview to the New Statesman in which he said the election of Kendall would cause the Tories “the greatest problems”. But he said a Corbyn leadership would be bad for the country and would set Labour back a generation.

“[In that scenario] the whole of the Labour party moves leftwards, abandoning the centre and, I think, therefore abandoning the working people of this country ... I don’t think that’s particularly good for the country that you have an opposition heading off to the wilderness.”