THE director of Wiltshire Council said he was surprised by Theresa May’s snap election announcement but is looking forward to the challenge it will bring.

Within one hour of the announcement being made on Tuesday, Dr Carlton Brand had contacted the printing firm that the council hires to let them know the council would be requiring its services to print the ballot papers, poll cards, campaign leaflets and more.

His team, who have recently been working flat out to prepare for the local election on May 4, will now have to work simultaneously on the general election.

He said: “The announcement came as a total surprise.

“I thought if there was going to be a general election, it would have been announced months ago to coincide with the local elections. I certainly did not see it happening in June.

“Getting all of the printing done in such a short space of time will be one of the biggest difficulties but we work with a very good printing firm in London which is doing all of our printing for the local election.

“Printing for 500,000 people ahead of an election is a very complex job and there are only a few firms in the country that can do it well, so it’s important to keep them on board.

“The other main difficulty will be finding and booking the 400 or so polling stations we’ll need. As the election will fall in the GCSE exam period, a lot of them will be in use so it will be a bit of a headache.”

Dr Brand said that the general election will cost Wiltshire Council roughly £850,000, most of which will be returned by the Government, on top of the £700,000 that the local election will cost.

The election will take place on June 8, with May claiming that she announced it to “make a success of Brexit”.

“We usually see a 70 per cent turnout for a general election but we think it might be more this time in light of Brexit,” added Dr Brand.

“There wasn’t an element of ‘oh here we go again’ when I heard, it’s very exciting and all good fun.”