With 4.5 hours to go before voting ends in the local elections, turnout is about the same as four years ago, opinion poll organisation Ipsos said on Wednesday afternoon.

Voting is underway to elect local councils in 380 of the country’s local authority areas. There are no local authority elections in 23 areas because they held votes within the past four years because of boundary changes.

In Utrecht, a number of people have voted for Els Borst, the former health minister who was killed last month. It had been too late to remove her name from the voting papers.

In Amsterdam, a ‘woman’ in a Muslim niqab was turned away by a polling station official who thought the eyes and eyebrows were that of a man, the Parool reports. He and his male partner left after being challenged.

In some places, clubbers were able to vote at midnight. In Tilburg, for example, the council set up a mobile polling station in an area popular with night owls. There was also an open polling station in the heart of The Hague.

In most places, the polling stations opened at 07.30 and will close at 21.00 tonight.

Close vote

The race for council seats is particularly close in the four big cities.

In Amsterdam, the Liberal democratic party D66 is neck and neck with Labour, while in The Hague the race is between D66 and the anti-immigration PVV.

In Rotterdam, the independent populist party Leefbaar Rotterdam could be the biggest. In Utrecht, GroenLinks are likely to lose their leading position on the city council.

Coverage

DutchNews.nl has a special website section with a summary of party policies affecting the main international centres.

DutchNews.nl will run a live election blog on Wednesday evening as the votes come in. You can also keep up-to-date via Twitter.