A delay in issuing postal ballots was having a knock-on effect across Scotland last night as voters complained they had been denied the right to take part in the Holyrood election.

Last week The Herald reported ballot papers in the Edinburgh, Aberdeenshire, Highland and Fife areas were delayed by a distribution problem with forms.

Yesterday it emerged voters in the west of the country had also been affected with election officials delivering papers with fewer than seven days to the vote.

Voters in Aberdeen, Ayrshire, Glasgow, Fife and East Dunbartonshire complained that their papers for the parliamentary elections had not arrived and they may be unable to vote.

John Breckinridge, from Milngavie, was one of those who complained. He said he was unable to register a vote for the first time in more than 40 years, as he is travelling to Singapore today and has not yet received his ballot paper. He said: "I have always voted, at every election and this is the first time I have applied for a postal vote.

"It is now too late. I won't be here when it arrives. It is not acceptable in a democracy. I want my vote to be counted."

Church minister Colin Renwick, from Jordanhill in Glasgow, said he had lost the chance to vote after leaving the country to carry out work in Lebanon as convener of the Kirk's World Mission council. Before he left he told The Herald: "I am very disappointed and angry. I have voted at every election since I was 18 and I feel this is a particularly important election for Scotland.

"I did everything required of me but due to some administrative blip I will not be able to vote.

"The right to vote is not something that was lightly won. Now I am being denied that right, I can understand just how important it is." More than 120,000 postal ballot are understood to have been affected by the delays but it is not known how many are still to be received by voters.

Yesterday the country's councils, which administer the ballot forms, said all the postal votes had now been issued.

The Electoral Commission, which said it was aware of delays last week but not of further delays yesterday, said it had not received any complaints.