The inaccuracy of UK voting rolls is not a new problem but is has become far worse since 2001. The latest research has shown that earlier denials by the Electoral Commission were incorrect. Moreover, the number of omissions could well grow as a result of the introduction of individual (instead of household) registration. The move to individual registration is much-needed but requires thorough administration. To its credit, the government has made special grants to local authorities but their effectiveness has yet to be seen. In any case, in a bout of false economy the government decided in 2011 to ditch plans for a unified national computer system which would permit an elector who registered at a new address to be removed from the one in his or her old one. The saving was £11.4 million to set up and £2.7 million a year to maintain, arguably a relatively trivial sum given the crucial importance of elections for any democracy.

A third shortcoming is the failure of the different bodies tasked with electoral administration to enforce the regulations. It is a legal requirement, rarely enforced, to fill out electoral registration forms. The legal limits on campaign spending  in national and local elections are likewise seldom enforced: claims made by candidates are hardly ever investigated for accuracy. The Electoral Commission admits that it has never carried out any field audit to determine, for example, whether the costs of printing campaign literature declared by a candidate are genuine and whether they reflect actual market rates. The commission has barely acted on the recommendations about enforcement of campaign finance laws set out in 2007 by the Committee on Standards in Public Life in its devastating review.

Fourth, there is the controversial issue of postal voting on demand, introduced by the last Labour government. Intended by Labour to encourage participation by voters from disadvantaged groups likely to be natural political supporters, postal voting seems to have been quietly welcomed by the Conservatives. They have calculated that the new system has actually worked to their advantage. To some observers, such as Judge Richard Mawrey QC, postal voting on demand has made elections, especially municipal contests, open to fraud.

For all these reasons the administrative infrastructure of the coming poll will be alarmingly poor. Blame gets pushed between the Electoral Commission, Whitehall (until 2010, the Ministry of Justice and after 2010 the Cabinet Office), and Electoral Registration Officers employed by local government. The culture of denial of responsibility and acceptance of low standards has led to condemnation by the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe and by an inspection held by the Council of Europe at the behest of a British Conservative member of its Parliamentary Assembly. Neither their strictures nor those of the Standards Committee have led to the necessary change in administrative culture.

The striking absence of ideas in recent electoral discourse is a different kind of problem. Of course, it is unreasonable to expect every single general election to revolve around ideological disputes. That would not be desirable. Voters are swayed by specific issues, by evaluations of the competence and personality of the rival leaders, by feelings of economic wellbeing or hardship, and by their impressions of the success or lack of it of the incumbent government. However, if election after election avoids discussing underlying public concerns, if there is little or no vision, the electoral process itself is discredited.