The grammatical gaffes were condemned by campaigners for better use of language Photo: NEWSTEAM

The forms gave a return address for inquiries as ‘Great Charles Street, Birmingam.’

The error came a week after the council sent out 60,000 postal ballot cards with a return deadline of May 29 2009 – last year’s European Election date.

A second set of polling cards later arrived on doormats with the correct deadline for this year’s local election of April 29, 2010 – but missing the ‘h’ in Birmingham.

A list of instructions also stated: “Make it is not left where someone else can pick it up” – leaving out the word “sure”.

The grammatical gaffes were condemned by campaigners for better use of language.

Marie Clair, of the Plain English Campaign, said: “It is disappointing – we have done a lot of work with Birmingham City Council over the years so this is very naughty of them.

“This is an important document that is widely distributed – so to communicate like this is not acceptable. There really is no excuse for this. Its poor proofing – somebody needs their wrists slapped and processes put in place.”

Bill Ball, treasurer of The Queen’s English Society, said: “I’m absolutely appalled that a city council can have such disregard for the English Language.

“The standard of English in education and schools is bad enough without a authority that overseas LEA’s making an error like this.

“These sort of things must be proof read and to see a simple mistake like this, is beyond belief. There has been an absurd deterioration in the standard of English in Britain over the last 40 years.”

The mistakes come at a time when the postal vote in Birmingham is under extreme scrutiny following the industrial-scale election fraud of 2004, which led to the city being compared to a banana republic.

Council proof readers were first criticised two years ago when they used a photograph of Birmingham, Alabama, on 720,000 leaflets issued to promote recycling.

A council spokesman confirmed that the printing cost of the initial date mistake would be covered by the printer and the misspelling of Birmingham would not need another print run.

“We would like to apologise for the printing errors which have occurred on the postal ballot cards, and thank members of the public for bringing this to our attention,” he said.

“Over recent years we have introduced rigourous checking processes to ensure the integrity of local elections and results are protected to the highest possible standard, and we accept these same standards need applying to all election literature.”