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5.35 pm
Mr. William Ross: The Home Secretary said earlier that he was pleased that the working party had been able to proceed on a basis of consensus, and that, with a single exception, all its recommendations had been accepted by all representatives, including those of the three political parties. However, none of those three parties included a member from Northern Ireland, the one part of the United
Kingdom where there is a clear understanding of the capacity for fraud in the electoral system. An opportunity was missed, and I hope that the Minister will bear that in mind in the event of any such exercise in the future.
Mr. Mike O'Brien: The electoral registration officer for Northern Ireland was, of course, a member of the working party.
Mr. Ross: He is an official, not a politician. I am talking about political parties.
I am deeply concerned about the possibility that postal voting will be made easy. When it was tried in Northern Ireland in the 1970s, or possibly the 1980s, it was a massive disaster: it led to an immense increase in the amount of fraud and, over the years, further measures had to be introduced successively in an attempt to combat the problem.
The question of identification has been mentioned. We in Northern Ireland have been driven, relentlessly, to a point at which we believe that the only possible means of identification is a common identity card tied to a unique number of members of each electorate, and featuring a photograph. Nothing else will do if we come up against carefully organised fraud in the electoral system.
On Second Reading, the Home Secretary said:
The Minister will recall a point that I made earlier about the qualifying date, as it is still called. He said that people would be able to register at any time, but that there would be an annual canvass--which constitutes a qualifying date, in a new guise. He told me that my proposed date of 15 September would mean that the canvass would have to take place during a holiday period.
The date of the canvass is a legal date. It is not possible to consider who is entitled to be on the register until that date, or beyond. People may die or move away right up to the date, whatever it may be. It would be possible to move the first register from 1 November rather than 1 December. That would involve a good deal of canvassing in the second half of September and the first half of October, when the weather would be better.
The intention is clearly to make the register as accurate as possible. That surely demands a common computer system, enabling us to marry all the different United Kingdom registers and check whether people are engaged in multiple voting.
I am not in favour of rolling registration, which I consider to be misconceived. There used to be a better system, enabling names to be added and registers to be
corrected. I mentioned earlier that a cost was involved. On 20 December, the Minister told me that it cost £40 million to register electors in England and Wales at approximately £1 per elector. The Secretary of State for Scotland told me that, in Scotland, the cost was about £4 million a year, just under £1 per elector. The cost of registering an elector in Northern Ireland was 44p.
This is the most comprehensive system in the United Kingdom. All premises are visited at least once a year. Perhaps the Minister will examine the position, and see why the cost is nearly two and a half times as much in the rest of the United Kingdom. The interesting thing is that it costs only 20p to correct a clerical error, but £1.27 for a postal vote.
Mr. Forth:
I do not agree with the Bill. It is not necessary. The analysis, such as it is, has not demonstrated the need for it. I fail to see how, given that there are different turnouts at different elections, the Bill will make much difference.
Nor do I agree that the magical new process of a working party is an acceptable, or desirable, part of our processes here. The simple, repeated use of the word "consensus" does not validate a measure and should not eliminate proper legislative scrutiny.
For what it is worth, the only acceptable provision in the Bill is that on the rolling register. It is valid. If the Bill had consisted just of that, it would probably have taken us forward. The rest of it is partly unnecessary and partly extremely dangerous.
During scrutiny of the Bill, we have exposed its loopholes and weaknesses, which still exist. Despite Ministers' undertakings, I am not convinced that, when the pilot schemes are launched, they will take place in a secure environment that will make us happy with the way in which our elections are proceeded with. That is particularly the case with the ludicrous local connection provision, which strikes me--it has been mentioned many times--as an open door to fraud, manipulation and misuse of our electoral system.
Mr. Hancock:
I am grateful for the 90 seconds that I have to praise part of the Bill.
Most people would welcome the opportunity for an improved register. Still, much needs to be done. We need to ensure that local authorities fund the improved register properly and that there are not the wide variations in accuracy from local authority to local authority that occur at the moment. The opportunity to have elections on
another day and allowing elections over the two days in a weekend will be a major breakthrough and might, in itself, be significant in increasing the number of people who take part in elections.
I agree with the points that were made by the hon. Member for North-East Derbyshire (Mr. Barnes) on access for disabled people. More needs to be done. There are still polling stations that are very difficult for people to get in and out of. I have been in some where the ballot box has been brought to the door because people could not get in. That cannot be right. The problem continues, so we still have much to do.
As we have stated, clause 11 is dangerous. I would have liked primary legislation to be used for a nationwide change, but I accept what the Minister said.
All in all, the Bill is a step in the right direction. We should support anything that encourages and allows more people to get the opportunity to vote, but the one thing that we should not forget is that any change in democracy is expensive. There will be a price. I hope that people do not back away from initiatives that are contained in the Bill because of the price that accompanies them. The point that was made by Northern Ireland colleagues is valid. For the life of me, I cannot understand why there should be such a wide disparity in what it costs to register someone. Perhaps we have to look at that matter.
It being four hours after the start of proceedings on the Allocation of Time motion, Mr. Deputy Speaker put the Question already proposed from the Chair, pursuant to Order [this day].
Question put and agreed to.
Bill accordingly read the Third time, and passed.
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.--[Mr. Kirkwood.]
Mr. Archy Kirkwood (on behalf of the House of Commons Commission):
It falls to me as the member of the House of Commons Commission who speaks for the Commission on the Floor of the House to introduce what is an important debate, where we will seek to review the management and service processes that are applicable to the House of Commons.
I am grateful to the Leader of the House for finding time for the debate. I know how difficult it is to find precious Floor time to discuss such matters. I am also grateful that we are able to have this debate on the Adjournment, allowing the broadest possible debate, so that the Commission may have the advantage of the broadest possible canvass of hon. Members' views.
I realise that we are subject to time constraints, and I hope that hon. Members who have taken the trouble to attend the debate will be prepared to wait and see it through to its logical conclusion.
Whatever else may be in doubt, it is difficult to take the view that this debate is premature. It is now 10 years since the House last examined these important matters, and, in this day and age of perpetual modernisation and exponential change, surely it is right for us to take stock of how we run the House of Commons for ourselves, for our constituents and for the wider British public.
It is also true that few hon. Members come to Parliament intent on making any great career out of stock control systems for the Refreshment Department. However, many hon. Members freely give their time to assist in the efficient management of the House, and we are very grateful to them for all the work that they do.
The House of Commons is a unique institution in more ways than one, and it has its own very real structural difficulties and environmental constraints. The fact that it works as well as it does is testimony to the dedication and commitment of the staff who serve us at all levels within the precincts of the Palace and the House of Commons.
I do not wish to detain the House, but should like to make one or two introductory remarks that set the context of the debate.
On 26 October 1998, on a recommendation from the Clerk of the House, the House of Commons Commission appointed Mr. Michael Braithwaite, formally a partner in Deloitte and Touche, to undertake the study. He was assisted, crucially, by Mr. Tony Newton--Lord Newton of Braintree, Leader of the House from 1992 to 1997--and, additionally, by three officers from different Departments of the House.
The study took eight months and cost about £77,000. The team reported to the Commission on 22 June 1999. The Commission immediately considered the report at no fewer than three meetings in the summer, and the report that we are now considering was published in full immediately thereafter.
The inquiry that the Braithwaite team undertook was much longer and much more detailed, ironically, than the Ibbs inquiry which it follows up. The team took a great deal of written evidence and interviewed no fewer than
105 people, some on two or more occasions, including current and former Ministers, Chairmen, heads of department, senior officials, and, importantly, 40 hon. Members, selected carefully to match the current composition of the House in age and length of service. The list of the interviewees is shown at annexes A and B in the report.
The team was also helpfully able to include questions of its own in the enormously detailed quality of service survey, which was conducted among all hon. Members, early last year, by Janet Levin Associates. All the results of that survey were made available to the inquiry team. In making international comparisons--which the team did--of parliamentary administration in other parts of the world, it had the help of no fewer than 14 overseas Parliaments.
It was an extremely thorough exercise, and hon. Members are most grateful to Michael Braithwaite and his team for their work, which was discharged timeously and with enthusiasm, great sensitivity and great skill. As I said, certainly the Commission is extremely grateful for the work that Mr. Braithwaite has done.
The Commission regard the report as a very professional piece of work: it is constructive and a sound basis on which we can take the debate forward. We have not, however, taken a formal view of the report's recommendations in advance of today's debate. However, after the report's publication, in the summer, we invited all hon. Members--and everyone else--to give us their views.
We received a very useful paper from the Finance and Services Committee, and one letter from a member of the public--good for him!--but nothing else from which to believe that the report has stirred up a great storm of controversy. Nevertheless, I stand to be corrected on that later in the debate.
As to the next steps, the Commission will meet again after today's debate to decide how to take matters forward. The Braithwaite team described the recommendations as a package rather than a menu, but I should like to reinforce very firmly that that does not mean that the report is a take it or leave it option. It simply means that any changes to the recommendations would need to be balanced elsewhere to ensure a consistent approach.
I shall not take the House through the report, because we do not have time, but it has a clear summary on pages 9 to 14, as well as a list of recommendations. However, I should like to set the report in context.
The Ibbs report 10 years ago considered the management of the House's services and the direction that was available from Members. It found profoundly unsatisfactory elements in the responsibilities and structures then in force and in the way operations were discharged. The so-called Ibbs settlement provided a clear way forward that separated the formulation of policy from the delivery of services and, crucially, gave the House responsibility for its accommodation and works. We tend to forget what a huge cultural change that was. The House had quickly to take responsibility for all its finances. That was a major challenge for the administration.
"By modernising electoral procedures, we shall make it easier and more convenient for people to vote to exercise their rights in a democracy."--[Official Report, 30 November 1999; Vol. 340, c. 248.]
That is all well and good, but the right hon. Gentleman had already said:
"I do not believe, and I am sure that no Member of the House believes, that the Bill will arrest and reverse the decline in turnout at all levels of election. Whatever the electoral procedures are, people will vote only if they are interested in the body being elected and feel that it is worth while to vote."--[Official Report, 30 November 1999; Vol. 340, c. 173.]
There seems to be a certain amount of muddled thinking. It appears that the Government do not believe that making the process easier will make it more likely that people will vote.
5.44 pm
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