Welsh Ministers have approved a tidy but important update to the country’s official elections website. The Welsh Elections Information Platform (Amendments) Regulations 2026 (S.I. 2026/9) were made on 19 January 2026 and will take effect on 11 February 2026, according to legislation.gov.uk.

Signed by Jayne Bryant, Cabinet Secretary for Housing and Local Government, the move adjusts how information is defined and presented ahead of upcoming Senedd contests. It’s framed as a technical fix, but it matters for campaign teams and voters who rely on the platform for clear, timely notices.

The headline change swaps out older references to the Government of Wales Act 2006 and pins the platform to the Senedd Cymru (Representation of the People) Order 2025 (S.I. 2025/864 (W. 150)). In practice, it ties publication duties to specific rules in Schedule 5 of that Order - including rules 3, 17, 31, 32(2) and 62 - so the documents seen online match the law to the letter.

Definitions are sharpened. The regulations add ‘individual candidate’ to make clear who is standing in a personal capacity as opposed to a party list candidate, and they tidy the wider ‘candidate’ definition carried over from 2025. That clarity should reduce admin queries once nominations open.

There’s also a pragmatic tweak for local government races. The condition about font style in candidate statements for ordinary elections to principal councils is removed, cutting out a cosmetic rule that risked tripping up volunteers laying out statements at speed.

For readers across the North West and the border counties - Chester to Wrexham, Deeside to the Marches - this is useful. Plenty of parties, unions and civic groups organise across county lines; clearer labelling between list and individual candidates should make the Senedd pages easier to use and share with supporters.

The platform will carry the key statutory notices the public expects: the notice of election, the statement of persons nominated, details of the poll and polling station locations, and formal declarations after the count. By anchoring these to the 2025 Order, administrators and campaigners are all working from the same script.

An explanatory note to the instrument confirms ministers did not consider a regulatory impact assessment necessary. The amendments sit on top of the 2025 platform regulations (S.I. 2025/331 (W. 66)), which were made under the Elections and Elected Bodies (Wales) Act 2024 and created the online hub in the first place.

The takeaway for Northern campaign teams is straightforward. From 11 February, rely on the Welsh Elections Information Platform for the documents named in the 2025 Order, and prepare candidate statements without worrying about font rules. It’s a small change, but it should mean fewer headaches once the campaign gets going.