Examination of Witnesses (Questions 103
- 115)
WEDNESDAY 8 SEPTEMBER 2004
MS PAMELA
GORDON, MR
ROGER CREEDON
AND MR
ARCHIE GALL
Q103 Chairman: Can I welcome you
to the Committee and ask you to identify yourselves for the record
please.
Ms Gordon: Thank you. I am Pamela
Gordon. I am a member of the Electoral Commission and I also chair
the Boundary Committee for England. On my extreme left is Mr Roger
Creedon, who is the Chief Executive of the Electoral Commission.
On my immediate left is Mr Archie Gall, who is the Director of
the Boundary Committee for England.
Q104 Chairman: Thank you very much.
Do you want to say anything by way of introduction?
Ms Gordon: Very little. I think
primarily we should be answering your questions. I would just
like to take the opportunity to draw attention to one issue which
you may want to question on further and that is the fact that
if there is a yes vote and the Government decide to go ahead with
the creation of a regional assembly in the North East, the Electoral
Commission will be directed to review the electoral arrangements
for the new regional assembly and the Boundary Committee will
be carrying out the detailed work on that. And that work needs
very much to be informed by what is in the Regional Assemblies
Bill as regards the powers and duties of the assemblies and raises
some interesting issues that you might have views on, which is
in informing the constituencies within the regional assembly we
should be paying regard to the role of the regional assembly,
for which obviously we have a London parallel that is different
from some of the considerations that we take into account when
we are looking at local authorities given the strategic nature
of the assembly. What I am thinking of here in particular is that
we are very familiar with arguments in the context of community
identity and interests, the distinction between rural interests,
urban interests and more specific ones, but our understanding
is—and there will be guidance from ODPM to the Commission
and we would be expecting that that guidance will cover this issue—given
the strategic role of the authorities, there might well be an
argument for looking in the creation of the constituencies to
provide a basis so that individual members of the assembly would
need to take account of a wide range of different constituent
interests. To some extent that is inevitable because the size
of the constituencies will be rather large but it is an interesting
point that gives a different dimension to the review work and
I thought I would just share that—thank you for the opportunity—with
the Committee.
Chairman: Thank you very much. Clive
Betts?
Q105 Mr Betts: As far as I can see,
the Electoral Commission will not have the same statutory duty
to report on ERA elections as it does for other regional elections
around the UK. Is there any reason for that?
Ms Gordon: The statute that set
up the Electoral Commission prescribes the elections on which
we are required to report, and they are the national-wide elections
and the devolved parliament and assemblies. It does not specify
either the London Assembly or any future regional assemblies.
Q106 Mr Betts: Should it?
Ms Gordon: I think that is a judgment
for others to make. We are not required to report on local government
elections in any part of the UK, but the Scottish Parliament did
ask us to report on the Scottish local government elections last
year because they were held combined with the Scottish Parliament
elections, so we have had a request to go beyond our strict remit
and we could receive further requests.
Q107 Mr Betts: Just to pick up on
a couple of issues. I heard what you said about the boundaries
for the new constituencies for regional assembly elections. Is
there not a problem there with quite a severe constraint on the
size of the regional assemblies in terms of number of members,
the fact that a significant number of those presumably will have
to come on a regional wide basis as part of the additional member
system so you are left with very, very few constituency members
and therefore very large constituencies particularly in regional
assemblies in places like Yorkshire. Does that not mean constituencies
cannot have the sort of integrity and consistency of interest
that you were referring to?
Ms Gordon: I think one has to
view that in the context of what the regional assembly members
would do. We would not expect they will have such a day-to-day
workload of representational issues, although of course constituents
will contact them and the regional assemblies as proposed will
have some service delivery interests—the fire and rescue
authorities for example—and no doubt there will be wider
issues raised, but we would not have thought that the constituency
workload would be the most prominent aspect of things that they
would be dealing with whereas the strategic aspects of overview
within the region will rank very large, and there is obviously
some benefit if the constituency members as well as the region
wide members have an understanding of a wide variety of concerns,
whether it is rural or urban regeneration, or fisheries, or a
whole range of things, that will fall to them to take a view of,
particularly in the context of economic and social regeneration.
Q108 Mr Betts: Just on all-postal
ballots because that has been in the news obviously in the last
few weeks, as I understand it, in your report you have indicated
that, by and large, future elections should not be conducted on
an all-postal ballot basis. Indeed I think you said that if the
referendum in Yorkshire and the North West were to be reactivated
they would be on the traditional voting system until you developed
your new proposals and that if the North East one were to be postponed
for any reason that that should be on the traditional voting system.
The only exception being if the North East goes ahead as planned
it should be on an all-postal basis and you would not object to
that. Does that not stick out as a slightly difficult argument
to follow given your general comments that there should not be
all-postal ballots in the future?
Ms Gordon: There is a degree of
pragmatism about it but one of the main concerns, and there are
a range of concerns about the all-postal pilots, was the shortness
of time which there was to put the arrangements into hand. That
affected the printing and the delivery of election material. Therefore
there is a strong argument, as we see it, given that we are so
far down the road in the arrangements for the referendum for the
North East, not to change those arrangements at very short notice.
We would risk causing as much confusion as we had encountered
before. So we think that that is a strong reason. There are subsidiary
reasons. The concerns that we report about the all-postal pilots
have not ranked as such major issues in the North East. There
have been less allegations and less concern about possible fraud
or intimidation reported in the North East, and the public opinion
research that was undertaken for us showed a greater degree of
confidence among voters in all-postal voting in the North East,
so those are subsidiary but supportive reasons to say that in
the special circumstances, given the timing, we think it is safe
enough to go ahead with the arrangements already put in hand but
on any occasion where there is longer time to plan, which would
include any delay and starting again with the arrangements, then
we would advise against any all-postal voting arrangements.
Q109 Mr Clelland: But is it reasonable
to advise against all-postal arrangements on the basis of what
I think the Chairman of the Commission said was the reporting
of alleged fraud when actually no fraud was found?
Ms Gordon: It is not simply about
fraud and intimidation although that is a major issue, and we
believe that there are measures, particularly the individual registration
of voters, which need to be in place before we move forward more
widely on that. That would provide a means of a very considerable
check on fraud.
Q110 Mr Clelland: Sorry, so you are
suggesting that the Commission may review this decision and there
could be a recommendation for all-postal ballots in the future
given certain circumstances?
Ms Gordon: No, the other main
reason why we are revising our own view on all-postal voting is
the very considerable response we have had from something like
a third of people across the board. In the research that was done
for us there are over 50% of people who are comfortable with all-postal
voting and most of those would go for postal voting on demand
in a different situation. They are very comfortable, they are
very satisfied. However, there is a very significant minority
of something like a third across the board which is very uncomfortable.
It is not solely nervousness about fraud and intimidation, it
is also about not being compelled to use postal voting, they want
choice, they like traditional ballot boxes, they see it as a civic
duty which is represented by going to the polling station. There
is a range of views. We concluded from this that the right way
forward would be to provide a system that does build in choice
for the voter. We do see a very considerable future for postal
voting on demand. The safeguards that we have talked about (individual
registration in particular) are absolutely essential for an extension
of postal voting on demand, the same considerations in that sense
as for all-postal voting, but there are many people who want alternative
ways and of course in due course we would expect various e-technology
to be brought in, whether it is texting or using computers or
televisions or a range of things. So we are proposing to work
with other colleagues on the development of what we have called,
for want of a better term, a foundation model of voting, which
will be able to build in these options.
Q111 Mr Clelland: We know that postal
voting is very popular. If postal voting on demand resulted in,
say, 75 or 80% of the electorate voting by post, is it therefore
reasonable in terms of the cost involved to provide ballot boxes
all over the place for those 20% who want to vote in the ballot
box?
Ms Gordon: Clearly the situation
would have to be kept under review. There would be concerns about
costing. I think there are two sides to that. There is a very
strong argument that we have traditionally had our democracy on
the cheap as regards to elections and for the number of safeguards
and improvements that we are recommending there would be an increased
cost which we believe, when it is costed out, would be justified
to improve and modernise the system. However, I accept that in
due course, if there were a major move, there might have to be
an adjustment of the proportions of different provision but hopefully
that would come along at the sort of time that other means of
e-technology and so on were coming on stream and it might not
be so great an issue. I think one of the difficulties is that
we are really in a period of transition and trying to move too
abruptly to a different system has been responsible for some of
the difficulties, certainly some of the public perception difficulties,
and one of the major concerns that we have is that the traditional
consensus and trust in the electoral system has been broken by
what has happened and we need to rebuild that and we think a more
gradual transition therefore would be better. Maybe in due course
it would move back but it would be in a more honest and more secure
foundation.
Q112 Chairman: Can we take you on
to this question about how we sort out the question of whether
we should move to two-tier government and how far the process
that you have just been through in devising boundaries on two-tier
authorities within the areas that were going to have assemblies
worked well?
Ms Gordon: What we had not expected
when we started the review was to find, as we did, that thinking
within local government had moved on so considerably over the
last decade as regards the value of having unitary local authorities.
We all remember from the early 1990s there was a lot of opposition
to what was undertaken then in some quarters. What we found this
time is there is still very close identification and support for
existing local authorities but there is also a very wide understanding
within both elected members and officers that there are disadvantages
in operating particularly small districts under the current situation
because the world has changed. They are now working under a different
set of requirements, there are new political management arrangements,
and there is a very considerable inspectorate regime with the
various performance assessments that they have to meet. There
is also the requirement to work extensively in partnership with
external bodies. All these things we are being told are making
it more difficult for many small authorities to feel that they
can meet all the requirements adequately. I think it is for that
reason that there is much greater interest and much greater support,
and what was interesting was that it started coming up outside
the areas of our view. Authorities outside said, "When can
we move to become a unitary authority?" Of course it is not
universal but there has been a sea change in attitude.
Q113 Chairman: So you think that
perhaps within London and Wales having unitary authorities has
been an advantage?
Ms Gordon: This is not a matter
that the Commission or the Boundary Committee have a formal view
on but certainly it is represented to us by many people working
in unitary authorities that this is the most effective way of
getting co-ordination of services, of being able to relate to
the multitude of partners that they need to, and of course there
are issues of boundaries of health authorities and trusts and
so on as well, but that on the whole unitary authorities are better
placed to work effectively in the current world.
Q114 Mr Betts: Just to come on to
the issue of regional boundaries. It is very strange that in going
for a system of elected regional assemblies we have just taken
the government boundaries as given and that you have not as an
organisation been asked to do a review of the regional boundaries
which seems to me to be a basic building block of the whole operation.
Were you surprised by that?
Ms Gordon: I think I can understand
why government chose not to raise that particular hare because
in certain areas of the country, and it may not have been so true
of the northern regions that we looked at although there would
be some issues there, it would be very controversial. There would
be very big issues that would come up that really would have needed
to have been cleared out of the way before we got into the reviews
of local government, and those issues seemed to be less prominent
in the northern regions although they were issues that were raised
as we went round. There are different opinions about Cheshire's
position. There are different opinions even about Cumbria's relationship
to the North East but these were not major issues that came up,
whereas if one looks at some other parts of the country it is
quite difficult to see how reviews could be conducted without
having looked first at the boundaries because it would be such
a controversial issue. So the Bill which you are considering does
provide a range of measures that would enable boundaries to be
looked at at some point in the future in certain specified situations
and I think, if the regional agenda proceeds, my own view would
be that it would probably be necessary to look at some of those
boundaries.
Q115 Mr Betts: Is it your understanding
that what is in the draft Bill—I think it is clause 144,
where the Secretary of State has powers to ask you to look at
which regions, particular local authority areas could be included
after 2012—that really it is a bit of a tidying up the edges
exercise and would almost preclude any significant change, say,
to the creating of city regions which were talked about by previous
witnesses?
Ms Gordon: Yes, I do not think
city regions have been envisaged at all in the arrangements, although
Mr Gall can certainly give you more detail on that.
Mr Gall: The Bill sets out effectively
three scenarios for alteration to regional boundaries. The first
one is a straightforward—I say straightforward—issue.
It deals with situations where there should be alterations to
regions which do not have elected regional assemblies. In those
circumstances the Secretary of State would have the power, without
reference to the Electoral Commission or the Boundary Committee,
to alter the regional development boundaries between the regions.
So it would be under the Regional Development Act those changes
would take place. It is entirely a matter for the Secretary of
State. The second scenario is in circumstances where the Secretary
of State has asked the Electoral Commission to conduct a review
of a local authority's administrative boundaries, that is the
external boundaries of the local authority, and if those potential
changes were to impact on a boundary with a region which is an
elected regional assembly, the Commission would be required to
propose changes to the electoral arrangements of the elected regional
assembly. The third scenario is the one that you have pointed
out under section 144 which talks about the Secretary of State
asking the Electoral Commission to advise him on whether or not
local authority areas should be moved between regions. The section
provides that the Secretary of State can ask about county areas
and unitary authority areas. There would be no question of the
Commission being asked to look at whether a particular two-tier
district should be moved between one region and the other. So
I say there are three scenarios—one where there are no elected
regional assemblies and two where there are. In the third scenario,
of course, the Government has said that local government under
any elected regional assembly will be unitary. That means that
any local authority area brought into an area already covered
by an elected regional assembly will also have to be unitarily
locally governed.
Chairman: Right, on that note, can I
thank you very much for your evidence.
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