County Council libraries were and possibly still are blocking independent Isle of Wight candidates campaign websites during the May 2026 election period likely due to understandable ignorance. This matters if votes are close. This problem is likely nationwide.
The problem is the Websites Filters have not been checked.
Library computer systems run standard content filters. The Isle of Wight County Council ICT team manages them from County Hall. Independent candidates on budget hosting deals get swept out and excluded from thierlegally required equality. Party sites on established domains are not subject to these concerns.
The first warning came by chance six days before the election.
I a candidate went to the council’s main reception after seeing the problem in a County Council Library. I was denied any access to the ICT team via telephone at reception or an email address and told to “go home”.
My Warning had gone nowhere.
I on the next normalworking day flagged the problem to the Council via the CustomsServices telephone line and later emailed the licql Elections Returning Officer and later after a concerning reply the Electoral Commission via email. The Commission’s correct reply was “Outside our remit.” Correct in law, but not correct enough when the problem is quite possibly nationwide with many very close votes potentially going the wrong way due to illegal discrimination even if innocent.
Not enough time to contact the countries relevant Council or City Monitoring Officers and Returning Officers with a FYI , heads-up with legal implications?
Apparently not yet.
Nobody asked “ Is this happening in every library? Is the filter blocking Independent candidates systematically politically corrupted “
Democracy has serious protections criminal (years in jail) legal sanctions.
Nobody has applied nationwide correctness to my warning? The Electoral Commission a public servant charged with promoting and defending has applied procedure only passing any and all responsibility to a local county council.
What I think correcting the errors looks like.
Correctness means the council and councils contacting all candidates with ” Do you have a campaign website we should be aware of? Let us verify our libraries aren’t blocking it.”
Correctness could in future mean checking filter logs against candidate lists. Not waiting for complaints.
Correctness means the Returning Officer issuing a statutory direction “Suspend filtering of these candidates websites for at least the election period.”
The Ignorance Stack
ICT teams don’t know that all electoral law.
Local managers don’t know filters illegally banning candidates websites
Returning Officers rely on the public and or staff to flag new problems.
AI error spotting has not been sufficiently if at all developed.
At every layer people are doing their job. At almost every layer not knowing what they don’t or didn’t know even when notified.
The Cost
Mostly independent candidates still can’t reach potential voters due to illegal blocking of websites in libraries. The election proceeds unlevel and legally “overturnable”
Later trust erodes even further in politics as normal with 10% trust in Politicans whilst Nurses get 90%.
The question isn’t whether there was a plot. It’s whether anyone with authority stepped back and applied a correction the situation should have demanded.
Six days to make the right thing happen and it has in part for me as of 2 days ago when the earlier described official reasons given to the blocking of my website apparently vanished with changes I made to my website status.
Did it work out for others? Have any others censored Independent candidates been told wha5 they should know as Councils democratic errors or exposed corruption is apparently normal nowadays denied or hidden?
Council officers please Contact your May 7th candidates. Ask if their sites are or might be blocked. Not because you’re accused of any conspiracy but because you might not know and in an election, not knowing is not a defense when many votes are likely to be close.