HUNDREDS of people could have lost their chance to vote today thanks to confusion over the new electoral registration system.

City of York Council has released figures which show around 1,000 fewer people on the electoral register for York Central since the last election, even though the area's population has boomed.

While 76,439 people were registered to vote in 2010, only 75,351 are registered for this election.

But while the voter numbers have fallen by 1,000, the total population soared by more than 5,000.

The most up to date Office of National Statistics figures available show that in mid 2013 York Central had a total population of 107,244 - around 4,700 more than at the time of the 2010 General Election.

It is a phenomenon that Labour candidate Rachael Maskell has blamed on new voter registration rules, and said it could make a significant difference in the constituency.

"The fact is that people are denied their engagement with democracy by this change in the law which makes it much harder for people to register."

She said she has heard from many people who have struggled with the new system, or thought they would be registered as they had previously been on the register.

Blockages in the registration system need to be investigated after polling day, she added.

But the large student population in York could make the situation appear worse than it is, Conservative candidate Robert McIlveen said, with many students in York choosing instead to register and vote at home.

He added: "The old system was very open to abuse, unacceptably so, and there had been problems in other cities.

"There was a lot of publicity around voter registration, and the old system did have problems with people being registered to old addresses."

In York Outer the number of people registered to vote went up from 75,939 in 2010 to 78,561 in 2015.