TODAY is the day that you can have your say on the future of this country.

Across the United Kingdom, millions of people will today make their way to leisure centres, churches and schools and will put a simple mark on a card that could have a profound impact on the place that we call home.

By breakfast time tomorrow we will know whether the United Kingdom will remain as one of the 28 members of the European Union or whether plans will be under way to cut our ties with the EU and go it alone.

You will have heard months and months of argument, debate and political discourse — but the time for talk is over and it is now vital that you play your part.

Across Bolton, there will be 149 polling stations open from 7am until 10pm — this gives you every opportunity to vote.

Don’t leave it too late, anyone arriving at polling stations after the 10pm cut-off will not be allowed to cast their vote, although if you are already queuing before 10pm you can still take part.

But just don’t risk it — you cannot complain about the outcome of this important moment in our national history if you have not made the effort to play a role.

If you registered on time, a polling card should have been posted to you, which tells you where your nearest polling station is.

It is not compulsory to bring your card to vote, but it will speed up the process.

If you have lost your card or didn’t receive one and would like to know where your nearest polling station is, you can contact the council’s elections team on 01204 331 2148.

Once the polls close at 10pm, ballot boxes across the borough will be taken to Bolton Arena to be counted.

The electoral commission is predicting a huge turnout — around 80 per cent — so the process of counting the votes is expected to take some time.

Once all the votes are counted, the local result will be verified in Manchester, before an announcement will be made in Bolton and we will know whether our town has voted for Leave or Remain.

We are expecting this announcement to take place between 3am and 4am.

That result will then be fed back to Manchester where all of the North West council results will be collated.

This will then be added to the national count and subsequent result — which will also be announced in Manchester and it is understood we will have an official result by breakfast time.

Of course you can follow all of the action from the Bolton count as well as updates, information and reaction to the national referendum result at theboltonnews.co.uk — we will be working through the night to keep you in the loop on what will be a historic night.

Finally, Saturday’s special edition of The Bolton News will contain all of the reaction and fall-out to the referendum result both locally and nationally.