ISSUE NO. 1659
20 - 26 April 2017
COSTA DEL SOL
YOUR PAPER, YOUR VOICE, YOUR OPINION
No X factor Vote shock for long-term Brit expats By Matt Ford Tens of thousands of British expatriates will NOT get a vote in the UK General Election on June 8. Six months ago the British government said it would change the law so that longterm expats who had lived outside the UK for more than 15 years would get a vote in forthcoming polls. But as Prime Minister Theresa May’s sudden General Election decision was confirmed yesterday (Wednesday) by MPs in Westminster, it became obvious th at th e p o ll a n n o u n ce me nt ha d thrown a spanner in the works over the planned law change. A British embassy official in Madrid admitted that while remaining committed to changing the law to enfranchise all British expats, “unfortunately there is not sufficient time to implement this for this General Election.” The government announced plans to scrap the current 15-year limit in October 2016, but the parliamentary bills to amend the so-called ‘primary’ legislation have not yet been tabled. M e a n w h ile, th o s e eligible to vote by virtue of having been registered to vote in the UK within the last 15 years must firs t en s u re th e y a re o n the electoral role before applying for a postal vote. If y o u reg is tere d to
vote in last year’s local and mayoral elections, you may not need to re-register. Otherwise, you can register online, for which you will need your National Insura nc e numbe r a nd pa s s port, by vis iting https://www.gov.uk/register-to-vote. Information on postal voting can be found at https://www.yourvotematters.co.uk/how-doi-vote/voting-by-post.
PRIME MINISTER: Theresa May.
WWW.EUROWEEKLYNEWS.COM
Death pledge MALAGA is to repair the province’s fire engines after a blaze killed one and left two others injured. The fire broke out on the eighth floor of flats in Ciudad Jardin in Malaga in the early hours. Had the killer blaze been one metre higher firefighters would not have been able to reach it since the only fire engine with the capacity has been out of action since 2015. Firemen discovered the dead man - aged 50 - and then rescued his mother from a window. The highest that firemen can currently work using a vehicle is 32 metres. A €900,000 fire engine bought 12 years ago which extends to 42 metres has “been out of service more time than it has been operational,” say sources, and has been in Madrid awaiting repairs for two years.