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David Cairns: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for allowing us to probe these matters a little further, although we shall revisit how such things should be done at the various stages of consultation that will follow the steps that I outlined earlier. We are giving the Electoral Commission the power to set guidance, which will be issued in due course. We will take part in the consultation that will lead to the guidance. The guidance will then be laid before the House. At that stage, it will have the full authority of Parliament. We are at the beginning of the process. My answer to the amendments is that we should not tie ourselves down too early, but I will do the hon. Gentleman the service of replying in detail.
Clause 63 gives local election officers the power to encourage participation in the electoral process by taking such steps as they think appropriate. Amendment No. 65 would remove the discretion of electoral officers to take steps to encourage participation without prior notification from the Electoral Commission of what actions they should take. In other words, we want national standards. We want the commission to raise the bar for everyone, but we do not want people to have to wait until they have the explicit permission of the Electoral Commission so to do. We want a thousand flowers to bloom. However, it is important that such things are monitored, and we need a framework against which we can measure whether something has been successful.
Clause 63 is designed to allow local election officers to run campaigns to encourage participation that are tailored to the local area. It is intended to complement the work of the Electoral Commission and not be a mere extension of it. Election officers might want to design initiatives and campaigns more appropriate to the needs of the local area. We do not want to prevent them from doing that. The clause already states that
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election officers should take into account any guidance issued by the commission. We feel that that is sufficient to make the amendment unnecessary.
Amendment No. 66 would change clause 63 so that a local election officer must take steps that are considered reasonable rather than take steps that he thinks are appropriate to encourage participation. Imposing a standard of reasonableness is often difficult, and sometimes not appropriate. We believe that election officers should have the discretion to take any actions they feel are necessary to encourage participation in the local area.
As the hon. Member for North-West Norfolk said, the amendment would change that discretion by implying that those actions would be scrutinised by another party. That is unnecessary. Local election officers have to take account of existing guidance from the Electoral Commission; they will also have to take account of guidance issued under the clause. We should not imagine that there is no guidance at present and that the national framework standards are bringing in something new. Guidance already exists, and election officers have to work within it. Given that overall envelope, we do not want to fetter them unduly by making them an extension or local branch of the commission. We want to encourage them to have some degree of flexibility. With that assurance, and with my initial response that we are at the beginning of a long discussion, I hope that the hon. Gentleman will withdraw the amendment.
Mr. Bellingham: I am grateful to the Minister for his generous and constructive response to my probing amendments. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 63 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 64 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 65
Restriction on powers of arrest by
persons other than constables
Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
3.30 pm
Mr. Heath: Mr. Conway, I seek the Minister's guidance on this clause. I was slightly puzzled by it when I read it. It would appear to remove the power of citizen's arrest for those who are committing, or suspected of committing, an offence of personation in a polling station. I understand that much; that would appear to be the purport of the clause. However, I made, perhaps, the mistake of reading the explanatory notes, which take us into much deeper water. Can the Minister explain to us what they mean? It starts:
''This clause maintains the current position that the power of arrest without warrant of a person suspected of committing personation inside a polling station rests with a police constable only.''
That is consonant with what I had understood. However, it goes on to say:
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''Without this provision, the amendments made by the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005 to sections 24 and 24A of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 would allow any person who has reasonable grounds for suspecting another person of being guilty of the offence inside a polling station to make an arrest.''
I understand that, although I am not sure necessarily that I do not want people to be detained if they are committing an act of personation in a polling station when there is no police constable around, but let us set that aside for the moment. The next sentence says:
''For personation outside a polling station or fraudulent applications for absent votes, the provisions of section 24 and 24A of the 1984 Act will, however, automatically apply because of the seriousness of the offence and the level of the penalty.''
I understand that that means that citizen's arrest is available for someone who is filling in an application form in their kitchen, and doing so fraudulently by claiming to be somebody else. Somebody could walk into that kitchen and make a citizen's arrest, but they could not do it if somebody walks into a polling station and says that if they are somebody whom they are not. I do not understand that differentiation. The notes go on further:
''The effect of this clause, and provisions in the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005, is to implement the recommendation by the Electoral Commission that the existing provisions relating to personation should be extended to give the police the power of arrest at any location, not just at polling stations.''
However, it does not do that; the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005—I served on the Standing Committee for that Bill, and participated in all it stages—gives the powers of arrest to a constable for any offence under any circumstances, so the police have the power of arrest for this offence wherever it occurs. The clause cannot possibly extend the police's power of arrest because even a cursory reading of the clause suggests that it is a restriction of the powers of arrest of persons other than constables. I am completely at a loss as to what the explanatory notes are explaining; I do not understand how the power of a constable is extended, because that is not the case.
I can see that the clause confirms the power of a constable, which the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005 already does, to make an arrest in a polling station. I can see that it prevents a citizen's arrest happening within a polling station, but it says that it could happen at any other place; so a concerned citizen can make an arrest when the person has left the polling station if they suspect them of having committed an offence but cannot do so while they are in the polling station. That makes no sense at all.
There must be some answer to that conundrum that I cannot fathom at the moment. I hope that the Minister will be able to help me; it may simply be that the explanatory notes bear scant resemblance to the clause. That is the easiest consequence to understand in some ways, but if it is not that, can the Minister please explain to me what the clause does and how it accomplishes what the explanatory notes suggest that it does?
David Cairns: I am tempted to say that this is neither the time nor the place to get involved in such a discussion, but I shall attempt to address the hon. Gentleman's points; no doubt not to his satisfaction,
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nor in terms of his reinterpretation of what I say when he comes to sum up. However, I shall leave that to his discretion.
The purpose of the clause is to maintain the position that the power of arrest without warrant of a person suspected of committing personation inside a polling station rests with a police constable only. It might help the Committee if I explained what is meant by personation. That is the offence committed by somebody who votes in person or by post as some other person, without that person's consent, in order to use his or her vote. If proven, it can result in imprisonment for up to two years or a fine or both.
At present, only a police officer may arrest a person who is inside a polling station and is suspected of personation. The Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005, on which I served as a Back Bencher, will alter the law from 1 January 2006 to provide that any person who has reasonable grounds for suspecting another person of being guilty of an offence may make an arrest if it is not reasonably practicable for a constable to make the arrest himself. The power has been limited to serious indictable offences, which will include personation. In relation to electoral law, that means that if the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005 were not amended, inside a polling station it would be possible for any person, not just a police officer, to make an arrest for suspected personation.
That is the point at which there has to be a judgment call. We do not think that that would be desirable; it could be a recipe for confusion and disorder in polling stations if citizens' arrests were being attempted while others continued the important and vital process of voting. However, I can understand why that might seem a puzzling distinction to make. The judgment of the greater good is that what should continue should be the process of people voting on a particular day in the few hours that are set aside for that purpose.
We think that we should maintain the current position that only police officers may make arrests inside a polling station. However, outside a polling station—I think that this is the discrepancy that the hon. Gentleman was highlighting; it is certainly a difference—we think that the changes made by the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005 should apply. That will provide a useful weapon to address personation and fraud also in relation to postal voting, which will inevitably take place away from the polling station. As has been said, it is unlikely that a police officer will be on hand to make an arrest should it be thought that an offence is being committed in somebody's kitchen.
We do not want presiding officers and poll clerks to arrest people which, without the introduction of these provisions, they could do. I accept that we are making a distinction between what goes on inside a polling station and what goes on outside it. That is to do with making a judgment about not wishing to cause undue—I am trying to think of the parliamentary word for kerfuffle—inside a polling station while people are going about, if I may now be hi-falutin', the sacred task of casting their votes. I hope that I have shed a bit of light on our position on the clause.
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