AN ambitious experiment aiming to boost public interest in local government elections has been scrapped.

North Yorkshire County Council this week abandoned its plans to introduce voting from home as a way of increasing the turnout at next year's elections.

The authority had been considering applying to Home Secretary Jack Straw for permission to hold all-postal ballots in seven areas of the county in May.

But councillors have been told that if a General Election were to be called for May 3, the same day as the county council elections, the experiment would have to be scrapped anyway.

They now say it would be better to spend the £20,000 the experiment would cost on other front-line services.

The experiment was aimed at finding out whether all-postal voting would increase the turnout at local elections.

The current turnout in North Yorkshire is an average of about 38 per cent and councillors say they now want to look at ways of raising public awareness of the elections in the run-up to next May.

Chairman of the committee that took the decision, Coun Cliff Wilson, said: "We think there are better ways of using this money, such as directly on public services.

"We also think other methods of encouraging people to turn out and vote should be looked at before we try to change what is a tried and tested system of voting."

If the experiment had been approved, it would have been run in seven electoral divisions, including Great Ayton, Pickering, Eastfield in Scarborough and Granby, in Harrogate.

Postal voting would also have applied to Richmondshire North, the seat currently held by district council chairman Michael Heseltine. The turnout there is said to be average in a very rural area with plenty of polling stations