67Provisions related to rule 66

67 Provisions related to rule 66

(1) Notwithstanding any arrangement in force under rule 66, a visit under that rule to a patient in a hospital must not be made if the presiding officer, electoral visitor or liaison officer, as the case may be, is informed by a registered medical practitioner or a member of the staff of the hospital that such a visit is forbidden, on medical grounds, by a registered medical practitioner.

(2) Literature relating to an election may be supplied to the general office of a hospital to which rule 66 applies, and any literature so supplied must be made available on request to patients entitled to vote under that rule.

(3) An electoral visitor who visits a hospital under rule 66 may, at the request of an elector who is a patient in the hospital, give the elector literature, including how‑to‑vote cards, made available by candidates in the election.

(4) So far as is practicable, a vote under rule 66 is to be taken as if it were taken under the other provisions of these Rules (including such of those provisions as relate to absent voting) and, in particular, in the application of these Rules for the purposes of subrule 66 (4), these Rules have effect as if:

(a) a person who, with the approval of an appropriate person on the staff of the hospital, enters or remains in a room, ward or other place in the hospital at a time when, under that subrule, it is to be treated as if it were a part of a polling booth were, for the purposes of rule 62, doing so by permission of the presiding officer there present; and

(b) paragraph 75 (a) were omitted and the following paragraph were substituted:

‘(a) mark his or her vote on the ballot‑paper in a manner that ensures the secrecy of his or her vote;’; and

(c) rule 78 were omitted.

(5) Subrule 135 (1) applies in relation to a special hospital within the meaning of rule 66 as if:

(a) the reference in that subrule to polling day and to all days to which the polling is adjourned were a reference to the period commencing on the day of publication in the Gazette of the notice under subsection 142Y (2) of the Act and ending at the expiration of polling day or, if the polling is adjourned, the expiration of the last day to which the polling is adjourned; and

(b) the references in that subrule to a polling booth were references to the special hospital.

(6) Where a voter has voted under rule 66 in an election, any postal ballot‑paper received by the Returning Officer that is, or that purports to be, a postal ballot‑paper of the voter must not be admitted in the scrutiny in relation to the election.

(7) Where an arrangement is in force under rule 66, the Returning Officer must, before 4.00 o’clock in the afternoon on the day before the day, or before the first day, on which votes are to be taken under that section, cause to be prominently exhibited at his or her office a notice setting out the hospital to which the arrangement relates and the day or days on which, and the time or times at which, votes are proposed to be taken under rule 66.