- guardian.co.uk, Friday 5 May 2000 14.56 BST
Politicians, journalists and the public were kept waiting until after midday in the Queen Elizabeth Hall on the South Bank, central London, as Britain's first election using electronic counters ground to a halt.
The machines automatically scan unfolded ballot papers and, when working, can register two-and-a-half votes a second. Using the manual method, vote counting would have taken until Sunday due to the multiple choice nature of the ballot papers.
Delays began when a fault was found on the vote tellers in the Enfield and Haringey constituency.
At first the problems were blamed on dust. Greater London returning officer Rob Hughes said shortly before 4am that the result would not be announced until 9am "at the earliest". He said "static" from dust on some of the coverings on the tables had caused problems with the electronic vote counters at Enfield, adding: "There is nothing wrong with the counting machines or the computers. They have just got bunged up."
Other counts were hit by large numbers of incorrectly completed papers and delays in getting ballot boxes to the counting centres.
Mr Hughes said: "This is a brand new system of voting and a brand new system of counting. It isn't surprising we have had a few problems."
