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Electoral Registration and Administration Bill
[Mr Nigel Evans in the Chair]
4.23 pm
Mr Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab): I beg to move amendment 2, page 2, line 8, at end add
‘if the Electoral Commission believes that the new electoral system is operating effectively’.
The First Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means (Mr Nigel Evans): With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
Amendment 30, in clause 25, page 14, line 17, at end insert—
‘(1A) Before making an order under subsection 1, the Secretary of State must seek the views of the Electoral Commission as to whether the establishment of an electoral register made up solely of electors who have registered individually would help or hinder the achievement of the registration objectives.
(1B) For these purposes the registration objectives are to secure, so far as is reasonably practicable—
(a) that persons who are entitled to be registered in a register are registered in it,
(b) that persons who are not entitled to be registered in a register are not registered in it, and
(c) that none of the information relating to a registered person that appears in a register or other record kept by a registration officer is false.
(1C) The Commission must submit its assessment, with a recommendation, in a report to the Secretary of State, which must be laid before Parliament as soon as possible by the Secretary of State.
(a) the recommendation in the Electoral Commission’s report is that the establishment of an electoral register made up solely of electors who have registered individually would help the achievement of the registration objectives, and
(b) the recommendation is approved by a resolution of each House of Parliament,
the Secretary of State may make an order bringing Parts 1 and 2 of this Act into force.
(1E) The Secretary of State may not make such an order if those conditions are not met.
(a) the Electoral Commission’s report does not contain a recommendation to proceed to establish an electoral register made up solely of electors who have registered individually, or
(b) the report does contain such a recommendation, but it is not approved by a resolution of each House of Parliament,
within 12 months after the day on which the report is submitted by the Electoral Commission (in the case mentioned in paragraph (a)) or disapproved in Parliament (in the case
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mentioned in paragraph (b)), the Secretary of State must require the Commission to submit, by a specified date, a further report under this section containing the terms mentioned in subsection (1A).
(1G) For the purposes of subsection (1F)—
(a) a report is disapproved in Parliament when either House decided against resolving to approve the report (or, if both Houses so decide on different days, when the first of them so decides);
(b) the date specified by the Secretary of State must be at least one year, but no more than two years, after the day on which the requirement under that subsection is imposed.’.
Amendment 31, page 14, line 17, at end insert
‘with the exception of Schedule 5, Part 2, which shall come into force by order only once—
(a) the data matching pilots for pre-verification purposes established by the Electoral Registration Data Schemes Order 2012 have been completed,
(b) the Electoral Commission has reported on these schemes as under the terms of that Order, and
(c) the Electoral Commission believes that the completeness of the register will not be negatively affected.’.
Mr David: Labour Members support the principle of individual electoral registration, as we indicated on Second Reading; indeed, we legislated for it in the last Parliament. We believe that it is desirable to have a complete and accurate electoral register. We also believe that IER is a system that is compatible with modern society, and we recognise that it is outdated to rely on the head of the household. However, we have genuine concerns, and the amendments we have tabled reflect them.
Clause 1 will amend the Representation of the People Act 1983 to enable local registration officers to add individuals to the electoral register under the new system. Let me make it clear that we accept the need for clear guidance to be given during the early stages of the new system’s implementation, but we are extremely concerned about the huge power that the Bill will give to Ministers. It would be better for the Secretary of State to issue guidance, under section 52 of that Act, and for action to be taken following a recommendation from the Electoral Commission to follow certain guidance. We fully accept that that would not involve parliamentary scrutiny, but it would take us beyond the five years stipulated in the clause.
The mention of five years brings me to my next point. The Bill’s explanatory notes state in relation to clause 1(5):
“Subsection (5) provides that the requirement for registration officers to have regard to guidance about determining applications to register will cease 5 years after coming into force. This provision is included because after five years the new registration system, and the process for determining applications, is likely to have reached a steady state and guidance will no longer be necessary.”
I want to emphasise the word “likely” in that second sentence; there is no certainty about this. It involves a possibility, or perhaps a probability. This is “likely” to happen. Furthermore, the explanatory notes use the term “steady state”. I recall the captain of the Costa Concordia suggesting that his ship was in a steady state as it lurched on to its side before being beached. Is that similar to the state of this legislation? In view of the lack of clarity in the explanatory notes, we feel that it would be far better if the Electoral Commission were to determine whether the system was working effectively.
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David Wright (Telford) (Lab): Has my hon. Friend had any indication from the Government that they would be willing to consider a system in which the Electoral Commission could step in, and perhaps use a traffic light system to determine whether each area could proceed effectively under the terms of the Bill? Surely that would be better than having a five-year cut-off, which is likely to leave some authorities’ registration processes behind?
Mr David: My hon. Friend makes a good point. One of our general concerns about the Government’s approach to this legislation involves the way in which the Electoral Commission’s role has been undermined. The commission is an apolitical statutory body, operating outside the political system, with responsibility for electoral matters, and, as our amendments suggest, we believe that it would be far better if the commission were allowed to reach objective decisions on many of these issues.
Gordon Banks (Ochil and South Perthshire) (Lab): There seems to be quite a lot of concern about the role of the Electoral Commission, in relation to the Westminster Government and the Holyrood Government. Does my hon. Friend know of any reason why those Governments should not encourage the involvement of the commission in discussions and debates on these matters, as such involvement would only strengthen the legislation introduced in either place and make it better?
Mr David: I can think of no good reason for the Governments here and in Holyrood not to set much greater store by the use of the expert advice and guidance provided by the Electoral Commission. Perhaps the Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office, the hon. Member for Forest of Dean (Mr Harper) will answer that question later.
4.30 pm
Amendments 30 and 31 to clause 25 also relate, as my hon. Friend the Member for Ochil and South Perthshire (Gordon Banks) has, in a sense, already suggested, to the role of the Electoral Commission. Amendment 30 makes it clear that we believe that it would be a good idea if the Electoral Commission were to make an objective assessment
“as to whether the establishment of an electoral register made up solely of electors who have registered individually would help or hinder the achievement of the registration objectives”
set out by the Government, with which we concur. This quite long amendment also states:
“The Commission must submit its assessment”
of the progress of the recommendation
“in a report to the Secretary of State, which must be laid before Parliament as soon as possible by the Secretary of State.”
That is important for the recognition of the Electoral Commission’s role, as well as of the close relationship that should exist between the Secretary of State and the commission. Critically, too, it recognises that Parliament should have a crucial role in monitoring the progress or otherwise that we make on the new system.
Mrs Eleanor Laing (Epping Forest) (Con):
For the sake of clarity, how, under amendment 30, could the Electoral Commission make a report about whether the new registration system had achieved its objectives or not
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before the Act came into force? I do not understand the timing. The hon. Gentleman seems to suggest in the amendment that before the Act comes into force, the Electoral Commission has to make a report about whether the effects of the Act have achieved the goals or not. How could that happen when the Act, and therefore the new system, has not come into force?
Mr David: We are, of course, talking about a transition period, which is catered for in the Bill. As the Government have correctly argued, the new system is not going to be introduced on a big bang basis, but on an incremental one. As our deliberations on the Bill continue, the hon. Lady will see that we have tabled a number of other amendments that intervene progressively on the transition arrangements. This amendment essentially reinforces, as I said, the role of the Electoral Commission, the relationship between it and the Secretary of State, and the involvement of Parliament as we move as quickly as possible towards a complete electoral register. The amendment goes on to say that the recommendation should be approved
“by a resolution of each House of Parliament”.
That is very important because at the end of the day we are talking about a fundamental change in our democratic process—arguably the most important change since the achievement of the universal franchise. We believe therefore that it is essential that Parliament is fully involved at every step of the way as we move towards the new and path-breaking system.
Amendment 31 relates to the important issue of data matching. Let me provide a little background. In 2011, the Government introduced 22 pilot projects in a range of local authorities in England and Scotland. These pilots were based on a range of national datasets and the Electoral Commission carried out a statutory evaluation of the pilots to assess the extent to which such schemes could help electoral registration officers improve the completeness and accuracy of their registers.
The Government, and particularly the Minister, have said on a number of occasions that these projects went very well indeed, and that the pilot schemes showed that 60% of the current electors should be carried forward. However, in contradistinction, the Electoral Commission is quite scathing in its assessment of the schemes. According to the key findings and conclusions of the Electoral Commission’s evaluation report,
“Our main conclusion is that these pilot schemes do not provide sufficient evidence to judge the effectiveness of data matching as a method for improving the accuracy and completeness of the electoral registers.”
That is a pretty damning indictment of pilot schemes which were intended to point the way to a fundamentally important revision of our electoral process, and it contrasts sharply with what the Government have said—rather complacently, in my view.
Because of that criticism, the Government agreed to conduct further data- matching exercises, and a delegated legislation Committee will meet tomorrow morning to discuss a statutory instrument to introduce the second tranche of data-matching pilots. Obviously we do not know what those further pilots will show, but they may reveal the likelihood of a problem with the new electoral register in the short term. The Government’s own
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assessments indicate, or at least hint at, that distinct possibility. According to the impact assessment which the Minister himself signed on 8 May this year,
“It is not yet certain what the short term impact on the accuracy of the electoral register will be because there is no clear evidence on the accuracy of electors that are placed on the 2014/15 electoral roll through data-matching. The government is running a second round of pilots to understand the precise impact on completeness”.
That is certainly delicately worded, but even our fantastic civil servants are unable to help the Government much. What they are basically saying is “No evidence is available. The pilot projects that we have organised so far have not shown that the evidence is there. We will organise more pilot projects, but we do not know exactly what they will show. We will proceed on a wing and a prayer.”
Gordon Banks: Would my hon. Friend be concerned about any register that was compiled with the use of this data transfer information, especially if this was used in a decision on whether Scotland should become an independent nation?
Mr David: My hon. Friend is encouraging me to go way beyond my brief, as you probably agree, Mr Evans, so with all due deference to his incisive comment, I had better return to my original text.
Given the uncertainty that exists, it would surely be sensible to wait for the results of the second pilots, but, for reasons best known to themselves, the Government are intent on introducing a new individual electoral-registration-based register by December 2015. That date may be of significance to some Members. Coincidentally, some would say, it is when the next boundary review will take place. It could be a coincidence, of course: who am I to say otherwise? I am sure that the Minister will give a clear explanation, and that he will give it without smiling. No doubt he will tell us that there is a specific reason, which everyone except him has missed, for the fact that the pilot projects must be assessed after the legislation has reached the statute book.
I want the legislation to succeed—as I have said, we are in favour of individual electoral registration in principle—so it would be common sense and far better if we waited a few months for the certainty provided by the evidence from the second set of pilot schemes. That would also give the Government an opportunity to propose new measures if the schemes raise questions. At the end of the day, what all of us, as democrats, want is as many people who are entitled to be on the register to be on it. That is our objective, and we must ensure that everything possible is done to make that happen. It disturbs me slightly that the suggestion—made not just by Opposition Members, but by the Electoral Commission and many others—that the sensible thing to do would be to wait a few more months to ensure that as many people as possible are on our electoral register has not been taken up.
Dan Rogerson (North Cornwall) (LD): The hon. Gentleman is right to set out an aspiration on behalf of us all that everyone who is entitled to be on the register should be on it. Does he also agree that those who are not entitled to be on the register should not be on it?
Mr David:
Yes, absolutely, and we will discuss that in more detail later. I am happy to say that people who are not entitled to be on the electoral register should not be
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on it, but I am very concerned that many people who are entitled to be on the electoral register might not be on it.
I am glad that the Government have moved away from their original, outrageous position of saying that the decision about whether to be on the electoral register will be a lifestyle choice, and that they have recognised that that is, after all, a civic duty and civic responsibility. The crucial point, however, is that being on the register is not an end in itself; it gives people in a democracy the chance to exercise, whether they want to or not, their right to vote. That is why it is so important that everybody has the opportunity to be on the register so that they can make the choice, when the time is right, whether or not to exercise their vote.
Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab): I recently met the chair of the Electoral Commission to discuss the under-representation of black and Asian people on the electoral register. Does my hon. Friend believe that the proposed measure would enable that very important issue to be looked at? My fear is that, unless we get this right, there will be gross under-representation on the register.
Mr David: I agree that there is concern that many groups in our society—so-called hard-to-reach groups, for example—might be excluded from the electoral register. A more reasonable time scale for the completion of the new electoral register would certainly give opportunities to many of the people mentioned by my right hon. Friend to be included on the register. One of the noticeable aspects during the long, pre-legislative consultation—I pay tribute to the Government for that—is that a high proportion of those who have participated and made concrete suggestions and proposals are from the groups mentioned by my right hon. Friend. It is vital that their voices are listened to carefully during this crucial stage of the Bill’s passage.
Mr Andrew Love (Edmonton) (Lab/Co-op): Is not the real concern that, while we used to think that 2 million people were missing from the register, recent research by the Electoral Commission shows that the figure is almost certainly double that? Moreover, if we consider the Northern Ireland example, it would appear that a further 15% of people may fall off the register. How far will we allow registration to drop before action is taken?
Mr David: My hon. Friend is correct. It is vital that various steps are taken to ensure that as many people as possible are on the register. I would not belabour the comparison with Northern Ireland, which is very different. However, individual electoral registration was introduced there and the evidence shows, as has been confirmed again by the Government, that when the new register was introduced a lamentably low number of the potential electors—the entitled electors—were actually on it. That reinforces our concern about what the situation will be in December 2015 if we proceed according to the time scale indicated in the Bill. That is why we have tabled the amendments. We hope that the Minister will feel able to respond positively to our concerns.
4.45 pm
Jonathan Edwards (Carmarthen East and Dinefwr) (PC):
I shall speak briefly on this group of amendments, which we broadly support, on the role of the Electoral
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Commission. The Electoral Commission is, of course, strongly in favour of individual electoral registration as a means of fighting electoral fraud, and I commend it for taking that position. However, the commission’s role needs to be used as a safeguard to ensure that IER will work as intended—this should be prior to its introduction —and for continued monitoring afterwards.
Amendment 30 particularly interests me because of the proposal for registration objectives in the Bill. As hon. Members will know from my contributions to the Opposition day debate on this subject and on Second Reading, my primary concern is for the inclusion of as many eligible registrations as possible on the electoral roll. I am sure that that aim is shared by all hon. Members. The Electoral Commission’s most recent estimate was that about 6 million eligible adults were missing and that registers were between 85% and 87% complete. Therefore, these changes, which we can expect will further diminish the completeness of the electoral register, and which as we saw when IER was introduced in Northern Ireland, may well be counter-productive in terms of including people on the electoral register.
I would like to see a duty on the Electoral Commission and on individual electoral registration officers for their principal aim to be that registers are as complete as possible and that there is a presumption in favour of inclusion on the roll, rather than deletion. As we have discussed previously, there is the opportunity for electoral fraud, but the number of convictions for that offence has been small. That is not to say that there is not a problem, but I believe it is more important that we get people on to the electoral register and entitled to vote. That is especially the case now, given the equalisation of constituency electoral rolls being introduced for Westminster elections and the new proposals from the Secretary of State for Wales for boundary reforms for elections to the National Assembly for Wales. No change is not an option now in terms of the National Assembly for Wales; even if we retain the 40:20 split, there will be new, equal-sized constituencies for the 40 seats.
Parts 1 and 2 of the Bill should clearly not be brought into force until IER has been trialled, and until the Electoral Commission is convinced that any adverse impacts will be as limited as they can be and that the completeness of the register will not be affected.
The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office (Mr Mark Harper): I should say at the beginning that I was slightly surprised that the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr David) said that the Opposition were in favour of individual registration, as I could have sworn that on Second Reading they not only tabled a reasoned amendment, but voted against the Second Reading of the Bill. That was strange; it is difficult to see how they are in support of it. If they had only voted for the reasoned amendment, I could have accepted it as a principle, but it seems to me that they are opposed to our fundamental position.
I wish to make one or two points that I hope are helpful to the Committee. The hon. Gentleman drew attention to the lengthy period of pre-legislative scrutiny we have had. Not only did we have that, but, as I think he has acknowledged, we made a number of significant changes to our approach as a result. All I say to the Committee is that I hope the progress of the Bill reflects that considerable pre-legislative scrutiny. It is probably also worth saying that, as the Committee may have
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noticed, we deliberately decided not to use knives in the programme motion for the first two days of debate in order to enable it to focus on points that hon. Members thought were important. I hope that the flexibility that that gives the Committee is used properly and that we make reasonable progress that focuses on where the Committee thinks the important issues are.
I pay tribute to my hon. Friends the Members for The Cotswolds (Geoffrey Clifton-Brown) and for Epping Forest (Mrs Laing) for the amendments that they have led on. They have participated very well in the experiment that the Procedure Committee has asked us to undertake. This Bill is an example of it, because all hon. Members tabling amendments were asked to include explanatory statements to enable hon. Members to understand better the nature of the amendments. I am pleased that they have done so, as it is very helpful to the House. It is just a shame that the official Opposition appear to have ignored the fact that we are conducting that experiment and have not taken that opportunity. I am sure that the Procedure Committee will draw the appropriate conclusion.
Mrs Laing: I thank the Minister for expressing his gratitude. Does it occur to him that the official Opposition might not have wished to publish explanatory statements to support their amendments as they do not want to explain their effects because they are trying to have their cake and eat it by opposing the Bill while saying that they do not oppose it? The more smoke and mirrors that are involved and the less clarity there is about their amendments, the better it is for their purpose.
Mr Harper: I could not have put it better.
Mr David: I am more than happy to provide an explanation. Resources are extremely limited for Opposition Members and the Minister will have noticed how many amendments we have tabled. That shows our concern about the fine detail of the Bill. However, we thought it was far better to follow the time-honoured practice of tabling amendments and using the facility of being at the Dispatch Box to explain our points and that is precisely what we are doing.
Mr Harper: I am sure that the Committee will thank the hon. Gentleman for that point. I simply observe that my hon. Friends the Members for Epping Forest and for The Cotswolds do not have the benefit of £6 million or so of Short money to provide resources, but they seem to have been able to draft very good explanatory statements for the benefit of the House.
I said on Second Reading that I intended to publish secondary legislation in draft for the House to consider. I was criticised by Opposition Members—indeed, I think that it was in their reasoned amendment—for the fact that we had not done so by Second Reading. I said that we would do so while the Bill was in Committee and I drew the House’s attention to the fact that the Opposition were responsible in government for two similar Bills, but they published no draft secondary legislation before those Bills received Royal Assent. I can confirm that I have placed in the Library of the House the first tranche of draft secondary legislation, which will be available on the Cabinet Office website
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tomorrow morning, for Members to consider while the Bill is in Committee. We have published the first tranche of documentation and will publish it all while the Bill is still going through Parliament and by the time the House returns in the autumn. I hope that that is helpful and it is a useful example of something that the Opposition did not do at any point when they were in government.
Mr Harper: Of course I will give way, so that the hon. Gentleman can explain.
Mr David: I hope that the Minister will explain—after all, that is the Government’s job. If there is to be full and proper scrutiny, there is no point in publishing some of the draft legislation—we do not know which pieces—in the middle of our consideration in Committee. I raised this matter as long ago as last November and surely it would have been better for secondary legislation to have been prepared so that we could have proper parliamentary scrutiny in Committee; the Electoral Commission made the same point. It is no good producing part of the secondary legislation halfway through when we do not even know which legislation it is.
Mr Harper: The first tranche was published before we started our consideration this afternoon—on day one, not halfway through. As I said, with two similar pieces of legislation, both of which delegated significant powers to Ministers, the Labour party published no draft secondary legislation at any point during the passage of either Bill through either House of Parliament. It was all published after the Bill had received Royal Assent. I accept that this Government might not be perfect, but on this issue we have made enormous progress compared with the Labour party.
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (The Cotswolds) (Con): Is it not a bit rich for the Front-Bench spokesman of the Labour party to make a fuss about this issue? When the Opposition were in government, I remember spending hours and hours in the House while they virtually rewrote entire Bills, not only by rafts of amendments as late as Report stage, but sometimes by secondary legislation after Report? I congratulate my hon. Friend on attempting to improve the procedures of the House.
Mr Harper: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for drawing that point to the attention of the Committee. As I said, I think we made a useful step forward with pre-legislative scrutiny. We have been publishing the secondary legislation in draft so that people can read it and look at the Bill in the light of it, and I think that is a step forward. We may not be perfect yet, but we are getting there. We are getting an awful lot better.
Mr Love: Prior to the general election, when my right hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw) moved his legislation introducing individual electoral registration, he made every effort to achieve cross-party agreement. That does not seem to be the case with the present Government.
Mr Harper:
I am sorry, but that is a rewriting of history. If I get any details wrong, I am sure my hon. Friend the Member for Epping Forest will correct me.
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When that Bill was introduced in the House, it did not contain any provisions about individual registration, which is why we tabled a reasoned amendment and voted against the Bill. Those clauses were not in the Bill when it left the House. They were added in the other place under enormous pressure from the Conservative Members there, so this House did not even get a chance to debate them until we considered Lords amendments. I am afraid that Bill was not an example of good parliamentary practice.
Mrs Laing: I agree with my hon. Friend’s recollection of the history of a couple of years ago. The Bill to which he refers was massively changed and we had very little time in this Chamber to discuss the provisions. They were ill thought out and it is fortunate that this Minister has managed to make sense of the previous provisions introduced by the Labour Government.
Mr Harper: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that point.
Before I come to the amendments, let me say something about the tone adopted by the hon. Member for Caerphilly, a point to which my hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall (Dan Rogerson) drew attention. One of the things that I have been very clear about all the way through is that the Government are as focused on completeness as they are on accuracy, but both of those—getting on to the register everyone entitled to be on the register, and also making sure that no one is on the register who is not entitled to be on the register—are equally important. One is not more important than the other. The hon. Gentleman’s amendments, in this grouping and elsewhere, all seem to be focused on completeness, with no sense that accuracy is equally important.
The hon. Member for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr (Jonathan Edwards) went further than that and explicitly said that he was not particularly bothered about accuracy; it was all about getting people on to the register. Getting people on to the register who are not entitled to be there is a problem. That is why 36% of the public think there is a problem with electoral fraud. It is also why, when the groups from the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe come and inspect British elections, they say that if we have low levels of electoral fraud, it is not because of our electoral system, but in spite of it. That is not good enough, and it is why we need to fix the system. My hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall is right: we should be as focused on completeness as on accuracy. That has informed the proposals that the Government have put forward, and that is why they were well received during pre-legislative scrutiny and why we made the changes that we have.
The hon. Member for Edmonton (Mr Love) asked when it would be right to take steps if the number of people on the register fell precipitously. We do not think that that would be the effect of our proposals. I will set out a little more about our proposal for confirmation and say why we think we can successfully move two thirds of electors over to a new register. I say gently to the hon. Gentleman that it was under the previous Government that 3 million people ceased to be on the electoral register, and we know that from the research that this Government commissioned. The previous Government were unaware of that fact because they commissioned no research and did not know what was
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going on. As a result, they took no action at all. So Government Members will not be lectured about large numbers of people falling off the electoral register, because it happened under the previous Government and no action was taken in response.
Mr Love: To return to the previous point on accuracy, amendment 30 suggests that the Electoral Commission’s report, if it was drawn up,
“would help the achievement of the registration objectives”,
one of which is accuracy, so the amendment would take care of that point.
5 pm
Mr Harper: The hon. Gentleman is quite right in one respect. There are two objectives: one is to get everyone on the register who is entitled to be on it; and the other is to ensure that no one is on it who should not be. Both are central to, and inform, everything we are doing. That is partly why we put the carry-forward proposals in place. If anything, they do a little of what the hon. Member for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr suggested, which is to ensure that for the 2015 general election—the first for which the new register will be used—people do not inadvertently fall off the register and become unable to vote. I think that that is a sensible proposal.
Amendment 2, tabled by the hon. Member for Caerphilly, proposes that we should not be able to commence with these provisions if the Electoral Commission does not say that the new electoral system is operating effectively. It relates to the guidance issued by the Secretary of State. The reason we thought it appropriate to have guidance issued by the Secretary of State is that there will be important operational details that registration officers will have to think about, particularly on how the new IT service for verifying applications will operate. We therefore thought that the transitional period should effectively switch off after five years.
The hon. Member for Caerphilly tried to make a big hoo-ha about the use of the word “likely” and the choice of five years. It seemed to me to be a sensible period of time. I could have written “certain”, but then he would have criticised by arguing that I could not possibly know the future. It is a sensible set of proposals. We are working closely with the Electoral Commission on all these matters, and it is represented on the programme board. We worked closely with it during pre-legislative scrutiny and listened carefully to its advice, but I am clear that, ultimately, Ministers are responsible for the implementation of the system—they have the advantage of being accountable to Parliament—which I think is right.
Amendment 30, which the hon. Member for Edmonton spoke to earlier, would ask the Electoral Commission to pronounce on the state of the register or the proposal. My first point on that is that the chair of the Electoral Commission, Jenny Watson, has welcomed our move and, indeed, the timetable. She said:
“The Electoral Commission wants to see our registration system tightened up and it’s good that the Government plans to introduce new laws to do this which will apply to any of us who want to vote by post before the 2015 General Election.”
I see no great value in the commission producing a report on the basis set out in the amendment. It refers to
“an electoral register made up solely of electors who have registered individually”,
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but one of the things we have learned from the experience in Northern Ireland, to which the hon. Member for Caerphilly referred, is that the register used for the 2015 general election will not entirely consist of people who have registered individually because we have a carry-forward proposal to ensure that those who are on the previous register and failed to register individually do not drop off the register and miss out on their opportunity to vote. That is an important safeguard, and one that we inserted, having learned from the experience in Northern Ireland, and it has been generally welcomed outside the House. When Northern Ireland Members have commented on that, they have also welcomed the fact that we have learned from it. I do not think that amendment 30 is justified by the evidence.
Finally, let me turn to amendment 31. It appears implicitly to support the Electoral Registration Data Schemes Order and the pilots it will set up, so I look forward to the support of the hon. Member for Caerphilly for the order tomorrow in Committee. Again, I think that the use of that order is very sensible. When we did our first set of pilots, more than 2 million records were matched against Department for Work and Pensions data. That showed us that we could check the accuracy of the information against the DWP database and, therefore, be confident that those people really existed and lived at those addresses. Therefore, that is a good way for moving two thirds of the electors on to the new register, thereby reducing the risk and enabling electoral registration officers to focus on the remaining third of electors. The Electoral Commission said that because we had drawn those conclusions from pilots where that had not been the intention of the pilots—they had been about using data matching to look at increasing the number of people on the register and at people who had not previously been registered—it felt that we should run a further set of pilots with that specific objective in order to be absolutely certain that confirmation would work.
We are very confident that confirmation will work, and we think that what the Electoral Commission said was very sensible, which is why the order we will be debating tomorrow will enable us to run that set of pilots. That will do two things: first, it will confirm to our satisfaction and that of the Electoral Commission that confirmation will work; and secondly, it will enable us to refine the process so that we make the process as efficient as possible for electoral registration officers. I think that is very sensible.
David Wright: When does the Minister expect the process to be complete? Will the Government assess whether the process has been effective, and what happens if it is not? Will we have to go through a further phase of piloting, or will the Government proceed anyway?
Mr Harper: The hon. Gentleman asks some very good questions. The pilots will run this year and then be assessed not just by the Government—we will of course assess them—but by the Electoral Commission, as the previous set of pilots was. We will then publish our assessment, and the commission will publish its assessment, so we will be very transparent about the process and Members will be able to see what has happened.
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Based on the pilots that we have already run, we are pretty confident—I am not going to say “certain”, because that would be complacent—that the process will work and that confirmation will enable us to move a significant number of electors on to the new register in a way that is much less risky, increases confidence and, very importantly, enables EROs not only to focus their efforts on the electors they cannot confirm, but to do some work with electors who may not be on the register—people who perhaps move more frequently. That is important, and that is how we have set up the funding mechanism. We have been very transparent about the process, which will be published, and it will enable us to take sensible decisions.
The Bill strikes the right balance between completeness and accuracy, both of which are very important, but the amendments would tilt that balance in an unhelpful direction.
Mr Love: The Government seem in something of a rush to bring all that in by December 2015, so I ask the question that was asked earlier: why the rush? Is there not room for flexibility should it prove not to be as easy to register people as the Government currently presume?
Mr Harper: I am not really sure that there is an enormous rush. The Electoral Commission likes to point out that it has been calling for individual registration since 2003—nine years ago. We made it very clear that, as the hon. Gentleman now knows from what I and my hon. Friend the Member for Epping Forest said, when his Government were legislating for individual registration, having been forced to do so because of pressure from, among others, my hon. Friend, we said that we thought they were going incredibly slowly and we could speed them up. Indeed, it was a commitment in our manifesto.
We have not suddenly speeded up the process. We said from the beginning—in the previous Parliament—that we thought it could be done much more quickly. That is important, because—[Interruption.] The hon. Gentleman says from a sedentary position that we did not object, but actually we did. When the proposal was finally included in the Bill in the other House, my hon. Friend the Member for Epping Forest gracefully accepted that the Government had moved, and it would have been a bit churlish if, having got the stuff on the statute book, she had then started cavilling about it.
We made it very clear at the outset, however, that the proposal should have been in the Bill from the beginning, but it was not, which is why we voted against the Bill by way of a reasoned amendment. The proposal was inserted in the other place only at the eleventh hour. We have been very consistent; we think that the provision should have been introduced some time ago, and the Electoral Commission has been calling for it for the best part of a decade. No one can really accuse us of going at break-neck speed.
Mrs Laing: With all due respect, the hon. Member for Edmonton (Mr Love) is wrong about what my party did in opposition. I happened to be speaking for the Opposition on this issue, so I know what we did. What the Minister has said is absolutely correct.
We accepted the last Government’s proposals because they were better than nothing, but we always said that the matter should be dealt with more quickly and that
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the relevant measures could be implemented more quickly than the last Government wanted. We always said that we would have a view not only to the accuracy but to the comprehensiveness of the register, and that we would proceed at the right pace. The fact that this Government are very much more efficient than the last one in implementing a necessary policy is a matter on which to congratulate the Government and the Minister in particular, not criticise them.
Mr Harper: I am grateful to my hon. Friend.
Angela Smith (Penistone and Stocksbridge) (Lab) rose—
Mr Harper: I have not yet finished answering my hon. Friend the Member for Epping Forest, but of course I will give way before I ask the Opposition to withdraw their amendments.
On pace, I should say that we have hardly rushed this matter. In September 2010, I made an announcement at this Dispatch Box about our proposals. We then published draft legislation. We have conducted pre-legislative scrutiny, which I think even the hon. Member for Caerphilly admitted has gone at a reasonably leisurely pace. We have hardly been bounding through. Unlike the previous Government, we have not at the drop of a hat introduced Bills that no one had ever seen and then rammed them through the House. We have conducted ourselves in a thoughtful way, and we have hardly been rushing.
Angela Smith: In 2009, the hon. Member for Epping Forest (Mrs Laing) said:
“That is one of the reasons why we will not oppose the timetable the Minister has suggested this evening…the Electoral Commission…and others who will be involved in the implementation of the Government’s current plans are concerned that this should not be rushed, but taken step by step to ensure that the integrity of the system is protected—and not only protected, but seen to be protected”—[Official Report, 13 July 2009; Vol. 496, c. 108.]
Will the Minister explain the change in point of view?
Mr Harper: There has not been a change in point of view. I did not want to bother the Committee with this again, but I am going to have to now. On Second Reading of the previous legislation in 2009, my right hon. Friend the Member for Horsham (Mr Maude) made it clear that we approved of the decision to proceed with individual registration, but we thought that it could be accomplished earlier. We said at the time that it could be done earlier, and on page 47 of our 2010 manifesto we made a commitment to implement it swiftly. This is not new news.
As I said, when the Bill for which the Labour party was responsible left the House, it contained no provisions about individual electoral registration; they were inserted in the other place. When the Bill came back, it seemed to me that, having got the Government at least to move on that issue, it would have been churlish to have started cavilling about it.
Mr Harper: On that point, I shall allow my hon. Friend to put the record straight.
18 Jun 2012 : Column 640
Mrs Laing: I thank the Minister for allowing me to intervene once again.
I do not understand why the hon. Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Angela Smith) thinks she is making a clever point by quoting what I said three years ago from where she is now sitting. My position has not changed; I have been perfectly consistent. The fact is that the last Government put obstacles in the way of bringing this important legislation into practice. The current Government have rightly concluded that it can be accomplished more quickly than the last Government said—they were saying that they would do it, but looking for every reason to delay doing it. That is the point. There is no point in the hon. Lady’s trying to assert that I have changed my position or said anything wrong. I have been perfectly consistent; it is her Government who were wrong.
The Second Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means (Dawn Primarolo): I gave the hon. Lady a lot of latitude to correct the record, but she needs to do that only once.
Mr Harper: My hon. Friend has corrected the record and put the matter straight. I heard the hon. Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Angela Smith) talking from a sedentary position, so let me say that we are working very closely with the Electoral Commission on this matter. It is represented on the programme board, as are the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives and the Association of Electoral Administrators.
Mr Love: Will the Minister give way?
Mr Harper: No, I will not. I have given way to the hon. Gentleman several times, and I am concluding my remarks.
The Government are responsible for delivering this proposal. It is better that such things be the responsibility of Ministers, who are accountable to Parliament and to Members of Parliament, than to give the responsibility to bodies that, yes, are statutory, but are not really accountable to this House in that way. I urge the hon. Member for Caerphilly to withdraw his amendment and to support clause 1 standing part of the Bill.
5.15 pm
Mr David: I have listened with great care to what the Minister has said, and I have to say that I am not reassured. Much of the discussion that we have had during the past 10 minutes concerned the past; I am concerned about the future. We can all argue about what the previous Labour Government did or did not do and who said or did not say certain things, but what is important is that the Minister has totally failed to come forward with any justification or explanation or reason why the Government have adopted the timetable that they have.
Our starting point is that we support individual elector registration because we want as many people legitimately on the electoral register as possible and to see a modern, streamlined system. We believe that all the evidence from the experience of Northern Ireland and from what may happen with the pilot schemes indicates that there may well be a difficulty when the new system starts properly in December 2015. We therefore respectfully suggest that, in all common sense, we should have a
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more effective timetable that would ensure the probability of more people being on the electoral register than is the case at the moment.
I am therefore unable to withdraw the amendment. I understand that there will be votes later on amendments 30 and 31, but we would like to press amendment 2 to a vote.
Question put, That the amendment be made.
The Committee divided:
Ayes 209, Noes 291.
[5.17 pm
AYES
Abbott, Ms Diane
Abrahams, Debbie
Ainsworth, rh Mr Bob
Alexander, rh Mr Douglas
Alexander, Heidi
Ali, Rushanara
Allen, Mr Graham
Bailey, Mr Adrian
Bain, Mr William
Balls, rh Ed
Banks, Gordon
Beckett, rh Margaret
Bell, Sir Stuart
Benn, rh Hilary
Benton, Mr Joe
Berger, Luciana
Betts, Mr Clive
Blackman-Woods, Roberta
Blears, rh Hazel
Blomfield, Paul
Blunkett, rh Mr David
Bradshaw, rh Mr Ben
Brennan, Kevin
Brown, Lyn
Brown, rh Mr Nicholas
Brown, Mr Russell
Bryant, Chris
Buck, Ms Karen
Burden, Richard
Burnham, rh Andy
Byrne, rh Mr Liam
Campbell, Mr Alan
Campbell, Mr Ronnie
Caton, Martin
Chapman, Mrs Jenny
Clarke, rh Mr Tom
Clwyd, rh Ann
Coaker, Vernon
Coffey, Ann
Connarty, Michael
Cooper, Rosie
Cooper, rh Yvette
Corbyn, Jeremy
Crausby, Mr David
Creagh, Mary
Cruddas, Jon
Cryer, John
Cunningham, Alex
Cunningham, Mr Jim
Dakin, Nic
Danczuk, Simon
David, Mr Wayne
Davidson, Mr Ian
Davies, Geraint
Denham, rh Mr John
Dobbin, Jim
Dobson, rh Frank
Docherty, Thomas
Donohoe, Mr Brian H.
Dowd, Jim
Doyle, Gemma
Dromey, Jack
Dugher, Michael
Durkan, Mark
Eagle, Maria
Edwards, Jonathan
Efford, Clive
Elliott, Julie
Ellman, Mrs Louise
Esterson, Bill
Evans, Chris
Farrelly, Paul
Field, rh Mr Frank
Fitzpatrick, Jim
Flello, Robert
Flint, rh Caroline
Flynn, Paul
Fovargue, Yvonne
Francis, Dr Hywel
Gilmore, Sheila
Glass, Pat
Glindon, Mrs Mary
Godsiff, Mr Roger
Goggins, rh Paul
Goodman, Helen
Greatrex, Tom
Green, Kate
Greenwood, Lilian
Griffith, Nia
Gwynne, Andrew
Hain, rh Mr Peter
Hamilton, Mr David
Hanson, rh Mr David
Harman, rh Ms Harriet
Harris, Mr Tom
Havard, Mr Dai
Hendrick, Mark
Hepburn, Mr Stephen
Heyes, David
Hilling, Julie
Hodgson, Mrs Sharon
Hoey, Kate
Hopkins, Kelvin
Hosie, Stewart
Howarth, rh Mr George
Hunt, Tristram
Irranca-Davies, Huw
Jackson, Glenda
Jamieson, Cathy
Jarvis, Dan
Jones, Graham
Jones, Helen
Kaufman, rh Sir Gerald
Keeley, Barbara
Kendall, Liz
Khan, rh Sadiq
Lammy, rh Mr David
Lavery, Ian
Leslie, Chris
Lewis, Mr Ivan
Llwyd, rh Mr Elfyn
Love, Mr Andrew
Lucas, Caroline
Lucas, Ian
MacNeil, Mr Angus Brendan
MacShane, rh Mr Denis
Mahmood, Shabana
Malhotra, Seema
Mann, John
Marsden, Mr Gordon
McCarthy, Kerry
McClymont, Gregg
McDonagh, Siobhain
McFadden, rh Mr Pat
McKechin, Ann
McKenzie, Mr Iain
McKinnell, Catherine
Meacher, rh Mr Michael
Meale, Sir Alan
Michael, rh Alun
Miliband, rh David
Miller, Andrew
Moon, Mrs Madeleine
Morden, Jessica
Morrice, Graeme
(Livingston)
Morris, Grahame M.
(Easington)
Mudie, Mr George
Munn, Meg
Murphy, rh Paul
Murray, Ian
Nandy, Lisa
Nash, Pamela
O'Donnell, Fiona
Onwurah, Chi
Osborne, Sandra
Owen, Albert
Perkins, Toby
Phillipson, Bridget
Pound, Stephen
Raynsford, rh Mr Nick
Reeves, Rachel
Reynolds, Emma
Reynolds, Jonathan
Riordan, Mrs Linda
Robertson, Angus
Robertson, John
Robinson, Mr Geoffrey
Rotheram, Steve
Roy, Mr Frank
Ruane, Chris
Ruddock, rh Dame Joan
Seabeck, Alison
Sharma, Mr Virendra
Sheerman, Mr Barry
Shuker, Gavin
Skinner, Mr Dennis
Slaughter, Mr Andy
Smith, rh Mr Andrew
Smith, Angela
Smith, Owen
Spellar, rh Mr John
Stringer, Graham
Stuart, Ms Gisela
Sutcliffe, Mr Gerry
Tami, Mark
Thomas, Mr Gareth
Thornberry, Emily
Timms, rh Stephen
Trickett, Jon
Twigg, Derek
Twigg, Stephen
Umunna, Mr Chuka
Vaz, rh Keith
Vaz, Valerie
Watson, Mr Tom
Watts, Mr Dave
Weir, Mr Mike
Whiteford, Dr Eilidh
Whitehead, Dr Alan
Williams, Hywel
Williamson, Chris
Wilson, Phil
Winnick, Mr David
Winterton, rh Ms Rosie
Wishart, Pete
Wood, Mike
Woodcock, John
Wright, David
Wright, Mr Iain
Tellers for the Ayes:
Tom Blenkinsop and
Jonathan Ashworth
NOES
Afriyie, Adam
Alexander, rh Danny
Andrew, Stuart
Arbuthnot, rh Mr James
Baker, Norman
Baker, Steve
Baldwin, Harriett
Barclay, Stephen
Barker, Gregory
Barwell, Gavin
Bebb, Guto
Beith, rh Sir Alan
Benyon, Richard
Berry, Jake
Bingham, Andrew
Binley, Mr Brian
Blackman, Bob
Blackwood, Nicola
Boles, Nick
Bone, Mr Peter
Bottomley, Sir Peter
Bradley, Karen
Brady, Mr Graham
Brake, rh Tom
Bray, Angie
Brazier, Mr Julian
Bridgen, Andrew
Brine, Steve
Brokenshire, James
Brooke, Annette
Browne, Mr Jeremy
Bruce, Fiona
Buckland, Mr Robert
Burley, Mr Aidan
Burns, Conor
Burrowes, Mr David
Burstow, Paul
Burt, Alistair
Burt, Lorely
Byles, Dan
Cable, rh Vince
Cairns, Alun
Campbell, rh Sir Menzies
Carmichael, rh Mr Alistair
Carmichael, Neil
Carswell, Mr Douglas
Cash, Mr William
Clappison, Mr James
Clark, rh Greg
Clarke, rh Mr Kenneth
Clegg, rh Mr Nick
Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey
Coffey, Dr Thérèse
Collins, Damian
Colvile, Oliver
Cox, Mr Geoffrey
Crabb, Stephen
Crockart, Mike
Crouch, Tracey
Davey, rh Mr Edward
Davies, David T. C.
(Monmouth)
Davies, Glyn
Davies, Philip
Davis, rh Mr David
de Bois, Nick
Dinenage, Caroline
Djanogly, Mr Jonathan
Doyle-Price, Jackie
Drax, Richard
Duddridge, James
Duncan Smith, rh Mr Iain
Dunne, Mr Philip
Ellis, Michael
Ellison, Jane
Ellwood, Mr Tobias
Elphicke, Charlie
Eustice, George
Evans, Jonathan
Evennett, Mr David
Fabricant, Michael
Fallon, Michael
Farron, Tim
Featherstone, Lynne
Field, Mark
Foster, rh Mr Don
Francois, rh Mr Mark
Freer, Mike
Fuller, Richard
Gale, Sir Roger
Garnier, Mr Edward
Garnier, Mark
Gauke, Mr David
George, Andrew
Gibb, Mr Nick
Gilbert, Stephen
Glen, John
Goldsmith, Zac
Goodwill, Mr Robert
Gove, rh Michael
Graham, Richard
Grayling, rh Chris
Green, Damian
Grieve, rh Mr Dominic
Griffiths, Andrew
Halfon, Robert
Hames, Duncan
Hammond, rh Mr Philip
Hammond, Stephen
Hancock, Matthew
Harper, Mr Mark
Harrington, Richard
Harris, Rebecca
Hart, Simon
Harvey, Nick
Haselhurst, rh Sir Alan
Hayes, Mr John
Heald, Oliver
Heath, Mr David
Heaton-Harris, Chris
Hemming, John
Henderson, Gordon
Herbert, rh Nick
Hinds, Damian
Hoban, Mr Mark
Hollingbery, George
Hollobone, Mr Philip
Hopkins, Kris
Horwood, Martin
Howarth, Mr Gerald
Howell, John
Hughes, rh Simon
Huppert, Dr Julian
James, Margot
Javid, Sajid
Jenkin, Mr Bernard
Johnson, Gareth
Johnson, Joseph
Jones, Andrew
Jones, Mr Marcus
Kawczynski, Daniel
Kelly, Chris
Kirby, Simon
Knight, rh Mr Greg
Kwarteng, Kwasi
Laing, Mrs Eleanor
Lamb, Norman
Lancaster, Mark
Lansley, rh Mr Andrew
Leadsom, Andrea
Lee, Jessica
Lee, Dr Phillip
Leech, Mr John
Leslie, Charlotte
Letwin, rh Mr Oliver
Lewis, Brandon
Lewis, Dr Julian
Liddell-Grainger, Mr Ian
Lidington, rh Mr David
Lilley, rh Mr Peter
Lloyd, Stephen
Lopresti, Jack
Loughton, Tim
Luff, Peter
Lumley, Karen
Macleod, Mary
Maude, rh Mr Francis
May, rh Mrs Theresa
Maynard, Paul
McCartney, Jason
McCartney, Karl
McCrea, Dr William
McIntosh, Miss Anne
McLoughlin, rh Mr Patrick
McPartland, Stephen
Mensch, Louise
Menzies, Mark
Mercer, Patrick
Metcalfe, Stephen
Miller, Maria
Mills, Nigel
Milton, Anne
Moore, rh Michael
Mordaunt, Penny
Morgan, Nicky
Morris, Anne Marie
Morris, David
Morris, James
Mosley, Stephen
Mowat, David
Mulholland, Greg
Munt, Tessa
Murray, Sheryll
Murrison, Dr Andrew
Neill, Robert
Newmark, Mr Brooks
Nokes, Caroline
Norman, Jesse
Nuttall, Mr David
Offord, Dr Matthew
Ollerenshaw, Eric
Opperman, Guy
Ottaway, Richard
Parish, Neil
Patel, Priti
Pawsey, Mark
Penning, Mike
Percy, Andrew
Phillips, Stephen
Pickles, rh Mr Eric
Pincher, Christopher
Poulter, Dr Daniel
Pugh, John
Raab, Mr Dominic
Reckless, Mark
Redwood, rh Mr John
Rees-Mogg, Jacob
Reid, Mr Alan
Robathan, rh Mr Andrew
Robertson, Mr Laurence
Rogerson, Dan
Rosindell, Andrew
Rudd, Amber
Ruffley, Mr David
Rutley, David
Sanders, Mr Adrian
Sandys, Laura
Scott, Mr Lee
Selous, Andrew
Shapps, rh Grant
Sharma, Alok
Shelbrooke, Alec
Shepherd, Mr Richard
Simmonds, Mark
Simpson, David
Simpson, Mr Keith
Skidmore, Chris
Smith, Miss Chloe
Smith, Henry
Smith, Julian
Smith, Sir Robert
Soames, rh Nicholas
Soubry, Anna
Spencer, Mr Mark
Stanley, rh Sir John
Stephenson, Andrew
Stevenson, John
Stewart, Bob
Stewart, Iain
Stewart, Rory
Streeter, Mr Gary
Stride, Mel
Stunell, Andrew
Sturdy, Julian
Swales, Ian
Swayne, rh Mr Desmond
Swinson, Jo
Syms, Mr Robert
Tapsell, rh Sir Peter
Teather, Sarah
Thurso, John
Timpson, Mr Edward
Tomlinson, Justin
Truss, Elizabeth
Tyrie, Mr Andrew
Uppal, Paul
Vaizey, Mr Edward
Vara, Mr Shailesh
Vickers, Martin
Villiers, rh Mrs Theresa
Walker, Mr Charles
Walker, Mr Robin
Wallace, Mr Ben
Walter, Mr Robert
Ward, Mr David
Watkinson, Angela
Webb, Steve
Wharton, James
Wheeler, Heather
Whittaker, Craig
Whittingdale, Mr John
Wiggin, Bill
Williams, Mr Mark
Williams, Stephen
Williamson, Gavin
Wilson, Mr Rob
Wollaston, Dr Sarah
Wright, Jeremy
Wright, Simon
Yeo, Mr Tim
Young, rh Sir George
Zahawi, Nadhim
Tellers for the Noes:
Greg Hands and
Mark Hunter
Question accordingly negatived.
18 Jun 2012 : Column 642
18 Jun 2012 : Column 643
18 Jun 2012 : Column 644
Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown:
I am grateful for the opportunity to raise an aspect of overseas voter registration. I also draw the Committee’s attention to the fact that I have tabled new clause 3 on an associated matter—to eliminate the cut-off for overseas voting. On this matter, I urge the Minister to bring forward secondary legislation, under clause 1(3), relating to regulations to introduce
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improvements to the registration system, which could result in a far higher number of participants in our elections at a time when the number of registered voters is falling.
At present, some 5.6 million British subjects live abroad, of which it is estimated that some 4.3 million are of voting age. But in December 2011 a mere 23,388 overseas voters were registered to vote, according to the Office for National Statistics.
Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con): Will my hon. Friend give those figures again? Did he say 23,000 out of 4 million?
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown: My hon. Friend heard me correctly, but for the sake of clarity and emphasis, I shall repeat the figures: there are estimated to be about 4.3 million overseas citizens of voting age, a mere 23,388 of whom, in December 2011, were registered to vote, according to the ONS electoral statistics.
Mr Robert Syms (Poole) (Con): What a contrast that is with the French, who have created a parliamentary constituency covering London and northern Europe because of all the thousands of French voters in London. They can now vote for a Member of the French Assembly.
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown: I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s intervention, but actually it is more dramatic than that. The French gave away two Members of Parliament, in Paris of all places, who are now specifically responsible for all French overseas voters. I am not going anything like as far as that, but I want my hon. Friend the Minister to consider the regulations in the way I will set out.
It is certainly not that British people living overseas have no interest in taking part in our elections, so the figures I have now quoted twice surely suggest that the system for registering overseas voters actively deters voters from registering. Otherwise, would not more of them want to register? If I explain to the House the rather protracted process for becoming an overseas voter, perhaps my point will become clear.
To apply to become an overseas voter, a person must obtain and complete a registration form, and send it to the electoral registration office for the area in which they were last registered to vote. So they have to find out where they were last registered to vote and precisely which district council and registration officer to send their form to. To confirm that the person is a British citizen and that they are not living in the UK when they apply, the application must be witnessed by another British citizen living abroad, who can be hard to find, particularly if the person lives in a rural area.
Here, then, is the first of my sensible suggestions to the Minister: an alternative would be to use a person’s passport number as proof of identity. The current system is potentially time consuming and undoubtedly puts people off registering to vote in the United Kingdom. Instead, a simple system for overseas voters involving the help of, and co-operation with, the Home Office and Foreign Office could be implemented. All potential overseas voters hold a British passport, details of which are held by the Identity and Passport Service, which is
18 Jun 2012 : Column 646
part of the Home Office. Passports do not contain addresses, although the IPS holds a delivery address for the passport when last issued. Where these people live is immaterial, however; what counts is their known UK address before moving abroad, because that determines the constituency in which they are entitled to be registered.
Andrew Griffiths (Burton) (Con): Does my hon. Friend recognise the stark difference between the situation in the UK and that in the United States of America, where they have the principle of “forever an American and forever an interest in the country of your birth”? Both the Democrats and Republicans run successful outreach schemes that get a huge uptake in the UK and across the world.
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown: My hon. Friend anticipates me and makes a sound point. As hon. Members have mentioned, the USA, France and Germany have much better systems for their overseas voters.
The Foreign and Commonwealth Office encourages British citizens living overseas to register with its LOCATE database. Even more should be done, however. Although the database’s primary objective is to facilitate the identification of and contact with British citizens living overseas in the event of a natural, political or other disaster, LOCATE’s resources could also be used to harness the cause of overseas voter registration. One could imagine a simple, streamlined overseas voter registration system based on data-matching and functioning in the following manner: when giving a non-UK address in applying for a passport, British citizens living overseas could be asked on their application form to state whether they wish their application to be treated simultaneously as an application for overseas electoral registration and, if so, to give the address of their last UK residence. Questions could then be added to the LOCATE online questionnaire to ascertain whether applicants wish their application to be treated as an application for overseas electoral registration and, if so, to ascertain their last UK residence.
Frank Dobson (Holborn and St Pancras) (Lab): Does the hon. Gentleman think it would be a good idea to add to the form a declaration of when the person concerned last paid any United Kingdom tax?
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown: I hesitated before giving way to the right hon. Gentleman. I thought it would be a frivolous intervention, and indeed it was.
When it comes to registering to vote each year, a security- protected e-mail could be sent to each voter containing their registration forms—perhaps bar-coded—which would then be returned by post in the normal way. Were this or a similar system implemented, I have no doubt that we would significantly increase the participation of overseas voters in our elections.
According to research by the Institute for Public Policy Research, 55% of British emigrants who left the country in 2008 did so for professional reasons. Many of those who left the UK to work abroad—for British businesses, international organisations, and UK Departments and agencies—play an important and active part, bolstering the UK’s position internationally. Many others retire abroad, but nevertheless have a close interest in UK political matters.
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Nick de Bois (Enfield North) (Con): Perhaps my hon. Friend would consider adding to the list those who work for charities or churches and missionaries? Many cannot necessarily afford to retain a property back here in the UK or even have a proxy vote. They are completely disfranchised by the current system, so we must urge the Government to have a simpler registration process for them.
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown: My hon. Friend is right. Again, if there are categories of people who live abroad but do not qualify to vote in this country, they, too, should be included in the system.
In answer to the question that my hon. Friend the Member for Burton (Andrew Griffiths) asked, when people fill in their voter registration form, they should be asked whether they want their details kept on the database, thereby opting in for permanent overseas voting until they opt out of it. That is the way of dealing with the system that he mentioned.
I think we should recognise the loyalty of many of these subjects who live abroad—bearing in mind that there may be 4.3 million of them—and ensure that they are not disfranchised by the voting system, but are able to take an active part in our democratic elections. It was the complication of the system for voters in the armed forces that led to the situation in the 2010 election whereby—these figures are also startling—only 564 votes were received from British military personnel in Afghanistan, even though nearly 10,000 were able to vote. Many people regard that as a national scandal. These brave people risk their lives on a daily basis in Afghanistan and elsewhere to protect this country’s interest and the international norms of behaviour. Surely the least we can do in this Parliament is ensure that they are able to participate in our elections in the United Kingdom.
Mrs Laing: Is my hon. Friend aware that many of us asked the last Government over and over again whether they would take steps to ensure that our armed forces, especially those serving in Afghanistan, could be given the opportunity to vote in the 2010 election? However, the last Government took no action until late 2009, by which time it was too late. Indeed, the figures that he has just quoted prove that they let down our armed forces in a very serious way.
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I do not want to alienate Opposition Members, because I want their support on this matter, but she raises a serious issue. Indeed, it is, I would say, frankly a moral issue that we should do something to amend the system, so that what I have described can never happen again. I know that the Minister is aware of this issue, and, in light of what I have said today, I hope that he will consider bringing forward regulations under proposed new section 10ZC(3) of the 1983 Act to improve the system of registering overseas voters. There was method in my madness when I intervened on the Minister, in response to an intervention from the Opposition spokesman, to urge him to bring forward regulations and to praise him for doing so swiftly under this Bill. I know that my hon. Friend perspicaciously knew what I was going to say today, so I will close by urging him to publish the secondary legislation as soon as possible.
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5.45 pm
Dan Rogerson: I have been prompted by the hon. Member for The Cotswolds (Geoffrey Clifton-Brown) to speak briefly in the debate. I understand his aspiration to encourage participation in political life by those who are temporarily abroad for good reasons. A couple of points have occurred to me, which I am sure the Minister will have considered. Our first-past-the-post system— which we seem likely to retain for some time, and of which the Conservative party is a great supporter—is based on electorates in individual constituencies. It is therefore important for the individual voter to have a relationship and an affinity with the geographical location concerned, and the communities within it—boundary changes notwithstanding. If an overseas voter is voting in a US presidential election, for example—or perhaps in congressional elections, which are closer to our parliamentary ones—they are voting on issues that affect the whole of their country. Their ties with a particular small locality might be less important in those circumstances.
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown: My hon. Friend is right. Our whole system is predicated on the basis of the voter having a connection with the place in which they last registered. I would point out to him that, although parliamentary boundaries are changing, those for district and municipal councils—where the electoral registration officers sit—will probably not do so.
Dan Rogerson: That is probably true, but I am thinking about the relationship that Members of Parliament would have with their overseas constituents. If they are electors, they are in a sense also constituents. I question how the relationship would work in relation to overseas voters, especially if there were a large number of them compared with the local electors who have a more traditional relationship with their Member of Parliament.
The other point that occurred to me is that, given the importance of encouraging all candidates at every election to engage with the people in their voter base, it is much harder to do that if those voters are overseas. We cannot go and knock on their doors, and we sometimes do not even know where they are. We need to resolve that issue if this proposal is to be introduced. We will need information to tell all the candidates seeking election exactly where those electors are. That does not always happen at the moment.
Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con): Perhaps we could learn something from Australia, which operates a constituency-based system. I believe that Australia House in London is the largest single Australian polling station, and anyone who goes along there on polling day will see a plethora of candidate information being given out.
Dan Rogerson: I would argue that, in an election campaign, one would hope to have more engagement with the voters before polling day. If we are to have a more meaningful discussion with the electorate, the candidates will need to know where their electors are, so that they can send them literature or perhaps telephone them.
Mark Field (Cities of London and Westminster) (Con):
Is the thrust of the hon. Gentleman’s argument that he is happy for the system of overseas voting to remain
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intact when only a relatively small number of overseas electors is involved, but that if that number became so large that it could make a profound difference to particular results, he would be more concerned about the proposal put forward by my hon. Friend the Member for The Cotswolds (Geoffrey Clifton-Brown)?
Dan Rogerson: I can see why the hon. Gentleman might think that, but no—this has been a source of frustration to me when I have been a candidate at local and national elections and it has not been easy to engage the overseas electors. It would be even more of a problem if their numbers were much greater. This is more about the principle than the number, however, although in some constituencies—and certainly in some local council elections—the majority involved could be very small indeed. Those numbers could affect the outcome in those circumstances. I hope that we can find a process whereby those voters’ addresses could be provided, if the proposal is adopted.
The proposal could also affect electoral spending limits. For example, the hon. Gentleman’s constituency might well contain many people who are involved in finance and travel all over the world. Similarly, the military garrison town represented by my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Sir Bob Russell) will contain much greater numbers of overseas voters. That might need to be taken into account when the limit on election spending is being set.
Mark Field: The issue in my constituency is not so much one of overseas electors, although there is the potential for that; it is more one of the electors having second homes, many of which might be in North Cornwall.
Dan Rogerson: The hon. Gentleman is tempting me to speak to the amendments to clause 2; the lead amendment, which I have tabled, covers that very subject.
Andrew Griffiths: Has my hon. Friend had any thoughts about the role of the internet? He talks about getting information to the elector, and all candidates now have web pages, Facebook pages and Twitter accounts, so it is much easier to communicate with people overseas now than it was a few years ago.
Dan Rogerson: The hon. Gentleman makes a good point. If that sort of information were provided to candidates, it might help to overcome the situation. In the recent past, another group of people emigrating, shall we say later on in their years, would have been less likely to have access to those facilities. Nowadays, however, with grandchildren and great grandchildren wanting to contact them through Skype or whatever, they will be encouraged to make contact in that way.
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown:
May I say two things to the hon. Gentleman? First, on changes to the number of overseas voters, in view of the opt-in I mentioned, making people fairly permanently registered as overseas voters—depending on the cut-off time that may or not be negotiated through the Bill—there would not be the churn problem. Secondly, people would be registered at the beginning of each calendar year, so there would be plenty of time before an election to get hold of them by
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electronic means or even by postal means. The difference between overseas voters and postal voters is that the former are more permanently registered.
Dan Rogerson: My question to the Minister is: if such a process is to be extended and codified in a new way, can we ensure that we provide information to candidates about how to contact those electors through whatever means is appropriate? It is important to examine the question of how a constituency MP or even a local councillor is to represent people in this category who have elected them. It is not just a question of the election alone, as the role of representing such individual people is also important.
Mr Syms: I rise to support my hon. Friend the Member for The Cotswolds (Geoffrey Clifton-Brown). We all know the history—that the first Thatcher Government implemented legislation, which was then watered down in the wash-up, as a result of which overseas voting has never really taken off. For the reasons already set out, it has seemed to be too difficult and too complicated. Given that there are a potential 4.3 million people abroad who could vote, yet only 23,000 are registered, we ought to be ashamed of the fact that we are not engaging with so many of our citizens.
We live in a global economy. Our future lies in exports and in our companies going abroad. We all know that in getting and undertaking export contracts, we have people in the middle east and elsewhere working for British interests sometimes for years. It is totally wrong if people without a home in the UK who are nevertheless working for British interests abroad do not have the opportunity to vote. Let us not forget that even those who retire to the Costa Blanca or other areas in Spain will have spent a lifetime in the UK working and paying taxes. They will often have family in the UK and still take an interest in what goes on here. Many get British pensions and some in the Costa Blanca even get winter fuel allowance. We seem to be able to pay benefits to retired people abroad, but we have not given enough priority to making a few simple changes in order to empower them by giving them the right to vote.
My hon. Friend argued powerfully about overseas voters registering their last address in the UK, but I am rather attracted to the French system of putting them all into one category and perhaps having an MP at large to represent certain areas abroad. That would make life somewhat easier than the hon. Member for North Cornwall (Dan Rogerson) having to e-mail 25 people in Alicante. It is better if the MP represented these people’s concerns, as it might be necessary for the MP to make representations to Spanish local government about what it is doing to the health service.
Mark Field: Does my hon. Friend agree that if all 4.3 million overseas electors were to be registered, it would be a matter of some concern that some 7,000 electors would be added to each and every constituency in the UK? Going down the route of designated MPs might well be the right model, as there will be a trigger point somewhere between the current 23,000 and the 4.3 million.
Mr Syms:
Absolutely, but we would be winning even if got a few hundred thousand registered to vote. What we need from the Government are assurances that they
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will not only look at the law, but have a long-term campaign to keep those leaving registered and to re-register those abroad. People abroad buy British newspapers, watch Sky television and take an interest in what goes on. I believe that they still have beliefs in what is right for their country. We could argue about modern democracy, electoral reform and proportional representation, but it ill behoves a party that has argued for PR to deny 4.3 million people abroad their vote.
Sir Peter Bottomley: I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for The Cotswolds (Geoffrey Clifton-Brown) on leading this debate. To have 10,000 service personnel in Afghanistan who were either not registered or unable to cast their vote at the last election was a disgrace—one for which we should all apologise. Rather than wait for this Bill to pass and for the regulations to be laid, we should ask Defence Ministers to make it the responsibility of adjutants in every unit to ensure that people are registered and to make arrangements so that voting papers get to them in time.
I am on record as saying that the move to individual registration is not necessarily such a brilliant idea. We know from Northern Ireland that it helped to reduce the inflation on the electoral roll, but we do not know how many of those who should have registered did not do so under the new system—but I do not want to go into that now, as it requires separate legislation.
The last time I spoke on voting I said that we have a responsibility to ensure that people in prison are registered to vote, but whether or not they can will depend on future decisions in the House. However, I would be interested to hear whether, if the law is changed, the Bill will allow for the registration of people in prison. If so, would that be done through individual registration, or would there be a responsibility on the Prison Service or the Ministry of Justice to make the arrangements?
The major group of people referred to by my hon. Friend are the more than 4 million people abroad who are not registered but should be. We must make sure not only that they can be, but that they are, registered to vote. That brings up another of my campaigns—that we need to get rid of the anomaly whereby half of our overseas pensioners do not get increases in their state pension while the other half do. The ones who do not receive it are probably the ones who need it most. We need to understand the effect of registering overseas people to vote, and it is right to ensure that people are not excluded.
One of the newer democracies is Tunisia—I have been there twice, first for its constituent elections and then to help with training for parliamentary activities. Tunisia has overseas voters and Members of Parliament representing Tunisians overseas. Whether we choose to follow that approach or to get people to vote in their existing UK constituencies is a matter for debate and decision. What is certainly not a matter of debate and decision is the fact that if we leave 4 million people—roughly 10% of those who should be eligible to vote—off our voting list, we will have failed. It does not bother me whether people are abroad because they have retired, because they are working there or simply for enjoyment. The fact is that they should be entitled to vote; it is our job to make sure that they can be registered. Having done that, it is then our responsibility to make sure that they use their registration and cast their votes.
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Frank Dobson: I entirely agree with what the hon. Member for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley) said. It seems to me—and, I think, to him—that it requires no change in the law for the Army or the Ministry of Defence to take the necessary administrative steps to make sure that our troops serving abroad get on the electoral register. No change in the law is needed; it just needs some action by those in a position to do something about the problem.
One further complication might arise. I strongly support the view that anyone registered abroad should be registered in a particular constituency. Because of the youth of a large number of men and women serving in the services abroad, some will not have previously been registered anywhere, as they would not have been old enough to do so. If we need a change in the law to help with service registration, it would be on that sort of issue. Generally speaking, however, certain people taking electoral registration for servicemen and women seriously ought to be enough to sort it out without Parliament being required to do anything.
6 pm
Mr Harper: The right hon. Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson) and a number of others raised a point about service personnel. About 75% of our service personnel are registered to vote. I will not be quite as harsh to Labour Members as one or two of my hon. Friends were, because, admittedly, their Government made some progress, on that as on many other issues involved in the Bill. Some of my hon. Friends took every opportunity to harry Labour Members, but they did make progress, although, as was pointed out by my hon. Friend the Member for Epping Forest (Mrs Laing), who has now left the Chamber, they did so only at the last possible moment. At the time of the most recent general election, they made specific arrangements to enable our service personnel stationed in Afghanistan to vote.
One of the problems involves the electoral timetable, which, for general elections, is quite tight. I will not go into that in detail now, because we will deal with it when we reach clause 13, but one of our reasons for wanting to extend the timetable is our wish to ensure that overseas voters, both service personnel and others, have a much more realistic chance of casting a vote themselves, by post, rather than having to rely on appointing a proxy. I think that if they could vote by post and had an opportunity to make their votes count, more of them would feel incentivised to do so. When our troops are deployed overseas in significant locations, we will repeat the exercise that the Labour Government organised for the general election and we organised for the referendum on the alternative vote, and take specific steps to enable our service personnel to participate. Like my hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall (Dan Rogerson), I am very pleased that we are retaining the first-past-the-post system for the foreseeable future.
Mr Syms: Is not one of the good by-products of five-year fixed Parliaments the fact that everyone will know the most likely date of a general election well in advance? That will make electoral registration for central and local government, and the build-up to it, much easier to deal with.
Mr Harper:
Yes, that will make a difference. My hon. Friend the Member for The Cotswolds (Geoffrey Clifton-Brown) gave some statistics. In the December 2010
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register, which followed the most recent general election, 32,000 electors were registered to vote overseas—which, admittedly, is not a huge number in comparison with the 4.3 million cited by my hon. Friend—but by the following year, the figure had fallen to 23,000. It appears that the incentive of the general election is a spur to registration, as it is for domestically residing voters. I think that knowing when an election will take place will help both registration officers and people living overseas.
My hon. Friend referred to the attestation requirements involved in the registration process. I know that they can pose difficulties, especially in countries where there are not many other British citizens. We are trying to establish whether there is anything that we could do. If we need to alter the requirements, we can do so by changing secondary legislation. We are also considering a trial of online registration, which I think could help not just voters living in the United Kingdom, but those living overseas.
That brings me to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall about communication. The Government are currently trialling—without universal approbation from Members on both sides of the House—a website featuring statements from all the candidates for the police and crime commissioner elections, which will then be promoted by the Electoral Commission and in the material that goes to voters. We may consider a similar procedure for a general election, with an eye on overseas voters.
I should also say to my hon. Friend that overseas voters can vote only in parliamentary elections. That makes their relationship with their local councillors slightly less consequential, but it also means that their votes are not just about who their Member of Parliament will be but about what flows from that, namely who will govern their country—and they are, of course interested in that.
My hon. Friend the Member for The Cotswolds made the important point that most British citizens overseas are working there, winning orders for Britain and working for British companies that bring wealth into this country. It is important for them to have an opportunity to contribute to the decision on who will govern the country.
Mark Menzies: The Minister is absolutely right. I have several hundred BAE Systems constituents who are out in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and I want to ensure that they are not disfranchised.
Mr Harper: That is a good point. One of the ways in which we can grow our economy is to win orders abroad. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary spoke of those who work hard for many of our companies overseas. That means basing British citizens abroad, sometimes temporarily but often permanently, so that they can work with companies to win orders and install and support equipment, and it is very important for them not to be disfranchised.
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown:
My hon. Friend has heard the fairly strong opinions held by, at least, Conservative Members. He has said, adeptly, that the attestation requirements could be changed by means of secondary
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legislation, but he has not said whether they would be changed by that means. Will he give us some idea of the action that he will take following the debate?
Mr Harper: My hon. Friend has anticipated my closing remark. As he knows, we have been considering the matter. Along with my officials, I am continuing to think about ways in which we could replace the attestation process with a process involving appropriate levels of security—my hon. Friend’s thoughtful proposals touched on that—and also making it much easier for people to register. I will add my hon. Friend’s well thought through model to my current thinking. I have listened carefully to the thoughts that have been expressed in the House. If we decide to make changes, which I hope to be able to do, the House will have to vote on them in the usual way. I hope that that reassures him.
Clause 1 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Mr David: I beg to move amendment 3, page 16, line 20, at end insert—
‘(6A) The Minister must ensure that a formal appeals process is in place for any person in respect of whose registration a determination has been made under subsection (1).’.
The Second Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means (Dawn Primarolo): With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
Amendment 20, page 27, line 44, schedule 5, leave out ‘second’ and insert ‘third’.
Amendment 18, page 31, line 6, leave out ‘first’ and insert ‘second’.
Amendment 19, page 31, line 19, leave out ‘first’ and insert ‘second’.
Mr David: Schedule 1 deals with the number of electors on the register, and amendment 3 relates to an appeals process. I should like some clarification from the Minister. Section 10A(3) of the Representation of the People Act 1983 and regulations made in 2001 set out a clear appeals process for those who are not included in the register and think that they should be. We believe that people who are excluded under the new system should have a legitimate right to appeal against the decision made by the electoral registration officer.
We are also concerned about the implications for human rights. The ability to cast a vote is a fundamental human right: it is important not just in the context of domestic legislation, but in the context of the European convention on human rights. We are not convinced that the Bill in its current form will provide adequate recourse for those who feel aggrieved. I should like to hear what appeals process exists—if, indeed, there is any such process—for individuals who feel that they have not been dealt with properly.
Frank Dobson: Will that not be particularly important if the House opts for individual rather than household registration? Is it not likely that, at least at the outset, a disproportionate number of applications will be turned down?
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Mr David: Yes. It is important to put this amendment and the point that I am making in that context. As things stand, there is a clear appeals process. It is possible that a significant number of people—not too many, we hope—will be excluded from the electoral register and that some of them will feel aggrieved by the process to which they have been subjected. It is right, therefore, to consider the issue, because there are bound at least to be teething problems with such complex proposed legislation, especially when its introduction is based on pilot projects that have not been fully evaluated. There are bound to be problems and difficulties, and individuals must be reassured that the Government will be able to consider and address their concerns.
Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab): On a point of clarification, is it my hon. Friend’s intention to maintain the current protections and ensure that they are not lost as a result of the change, or does he want to enhance protections?
Mr David: We are asking for a formal appeals process. The relevant legislative base is sufficient for the current system, but we are looking to the future and would like things to be spelled out crystal clearly so that the Bill explains the Government’s desired process.
Amendment 20 highlights our concern about the carry-over arrangements, to which we have already referred. The amendment would maintain the carry-over arrangements that the Government proposed initially and would delay the introduction of the fully fledged new register beyond December 2015. That is important because, as has been mentioned, we are concerned about the impact that a depleted register would have on the parliamentary boundary review. We are all aware of the legislation that resulted in the current boundary review, that a boundary review will take place every five years, and that the 2015 review will be conducted on the basis of the new electoral register.
The Opposition and many others, including a number of academics, have expressed concerns. Moreover, the Electoral Reform Society recently circulated a briefing expressing concern to all Members. It is very important from a democratic point of view that the parliamentary boundaries have the greatest possible support among all sections of the electorate. That can happen only if those boundaries are based on the largest possible number of electors being on the register so that the process is entirely legitimate. It would be nothing short of a negation of democracy if boundary reviews were conducted and boundaries redrawn when significant numbers of individuals who thought that they were entitled to vote were kept off the electoral register. Various estimates have been made of how that might affect the political geography of the country. On the basis of all the evidence provided, we could well see a shift towards more parliamentary representation for rural areas at the expense of inner-city areas. It is important that a simple principle is maintained.
Mr Mark Williams (Ceredigion) (LD): Does the hon. Gentleman agree that certain sections of the community, such as the student community, are relevant in this regard? I think we will discuss them in relation to later amendments. I represent a constituency with up to 12,000 students and it is essential that we get the arrangements right.
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6.15 pm
Mr David: I absolutely agree with the hon. Gentleman. He is right that we will come on to discuss provisions for students in detail. It is important to follow the principle with which both he and I agree, namely that everyone who is entitled to be on the electoral register should be on it. We should have in place means to make sure that that principle is upheld. Legitimacy and accuracy are important, but so is completeness. One of my overarching concerns about the Bill as drafted is that it does not make it easy for people to be on the electoral register. In fact, all too often it provides hurdle after hurdle, which I am sure will have a detrimental effect on those who are on the electoral register, particularly those who will be on it at the end of 2015 under the new system of individual electoral registration. Amendment 20 would, therefore, ensure carry-over arrangements and a greater chance for a complete register under the new system, which would be introduced at a slighter later date.
Amendments 18 and 19 relate to postal and proxy votes, on which the Bill is far from clear. We have concerns—again, they are shared by many—that the justification for what is essentially a byzantine arrangement is very shallow indeed. Judging by the Minister’s remarks on Second Reading, and certainly judging by the remarks of many a Government Back Bencher, the primary reason for having this different system for postal and proxy votes relates to concern about fraud. Let me be clear: we stand full-square on the need to take the greatest possible measures to ensure that no individual is on the electoral register if they should not be, and, most definitely, that no individual should cast a vote in a parliamentary or other election if they are not entitled to do so. It is also important, however, to keep the issue of fraud in perspective.
Following the contributions made by several Members on Second Reading, I asked the House of Commons Library to prepare some information for me, outlining objectively how big a problem fraudulent action is. The Library provided, in its usual efficient way, a comprehensive summary of recent electoral offences in this country. The paper refers in particular to the report by the Electoral Commission and the Association of Chief Police Officers, published in March 2012. I have to say that even I, who originally thought that some Members had somewhat exaggerated the situation, was surprised to see in black and white just how small scale is the issue of electoral fraud.
The 2012 report notes that, in the majority of reported cases in 2011, the allegation of fraud had not been substantiated. Moreover, although there was an increase in the number of cases involving offences during electoral campaigns in 2011, they related, by and large, to the conduct of elections, not to how votes had been cast. Indeed, the report mentions specifically that there has been
“a decrease in the proportion of alleged voting offences”,
and that such alleged offences accounted for 16%— 35 cases—of all reported cases in 2011, compared with 38% in 2010 and 40% in 2009. It is important that we see the facts for what they are. Although electoral fraud is, of course, absolutely wrong and should be rooted out, we should not blow the situation out of all proportion and use it as a spurious justification for taking other measures when a far stronger case for them should be
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put forward—if, indeed, there is a case. The chair of the Electoral Commission, Jenny Watson, put it well:
“The evidence suggests that proven cases of electoral fraud are rare. But this is a serious issue and nobody should be complacent: more can and should be done to prevent electoral malpractice.
We welcome Government plans to introduce individual electoral registration in Great Britain. This will strengthen our electoral system and reduce the risk of fraud. We also want the Government to make progress in reviewing whether voters should provide identification at polling stations.”
That is another issue, but I will not deal with it now.
Nic Dakin: My hon. Friend is setting out his stall clearly. It is important to balance the risk of electoral fraud with the risk of losing electors by moving too quickly on these changes. Does he think the Bill balances those risks correctly?
Mr David: My hon. Friend puts it very well. This is not a question of right or wrong; this is not black and white, because it is a question of balance. I said that Jenny Watson rightly has a balanced approach towards the issue. My concern is that this legislation does not recognise the reality; the Government construct Aunt Sallies and then knock them down, without coming forward with a legitimate basis on which to make their proposals. So I think that postal votes and proxy votes are important issues.
Paul Uppal (Wolverhampton South West) (Con): The hon. Gentleman makes a specific point about knocking down arguments and Aunt Sallies. I have found from my experience as a constituency MP that many black and minority ethnic communities, particularly migrant communities, came to this country because they wanted to live in an environment in which there was a belief in a robust democracy. Although this issue of highlighted cases of electoral fraud is important, the impression is being given that there is a laxity on this issue and that there is a question about how robust the system is. By putting forward this argument, the hon. Gentleman is undermining a lot of the faith and belief that we have in the robustness of the current electoral system.
Mr David: With respect, I do not believe I am doing that. I am trying to present a case that is, above all else, accurate. I am not denying that electoral fraud takes place and that it is a problem; all I am saying is that the problem is not on the scale that many Conservative Members and elements in the Government seem to believe it is. As my hon. Friend the Member for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin) said, we have to take a balanced approach to this issue. If public perceptions are that widespread fraud is occurring in certain areas, we have a duty to tell things as they are, to spell out the truth and to respond accordingly. In a modest way, that is what I am trying to do.
Frank Dobson: Does my hon. Friend agree that what really undermines confidence is when people make smeary remarks and no prosecutions follow because the remarks turn out to have no facts behind them?
Mr David:
Indeed, and that is one of the things to which I alluded earlier, as have ACPO and the Electoral Commission. Many people make complaints, be it in the
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heat of the moment or otherwise, but are then unable to substantiate their allegations, which often fall by the wayside, completely unproven.
Paul Uppal: I remember being in a radio studio for “Beyond Westminster”, where I heard a young lady of Pakistani descent talking about the amount of courage she needed to go live on radio to discuss this issue. She said that many dozens of her relatives would like to speak about this issue and how they had been pressured on voting, but did not wish to raise it because they felt it was too controversial and doing so would cause their communities harm. I heard her give that interview on radio.
Mr David: I do not doubt what the hon. Gentleman says for a moment; all I am saying is that it is unwise to take a particular incident and extrapolate way beyond it, as hon. Members have done all too often, including on Second Reading. Speaker after speaker attempted to justify individual electoral registration and the particular procedure with regard to postal vote and proxy vote carry-overs on the basis that there was widespread electoral fraud. I simply do not think that that is a legitimate argument that can be substantiated.
Dr William McCrea (South Antrim) (DUP): Is it not also true that the Electoral Commission can deal only with the issues brought before it? The hon. Gentleman says that there is no proof, but in Northern Ireland when postal votes were being carried by post office individuals to homes, certain parties followed the postman and people never received them. Why was there no proof? Those people were too afraid to provide it.
Mr David: I have been careful to keep my remarks particular to Great Britain and not refer to Northern Ireland. [Interruption.] With all due respect, it is not covered by this Bill. I think that the situation in Northern Ireland is different. I hear what the hon. Gentleman is saying, but, again, it would be wrong to extrapolate from what is happening or what has happened in Northern Ireland to what is happening in other parts of the United Kingdom.
Paul Uppal: If what the hon. Gentleman is saying is correct, will he not concur that he has absolutely nothing to fear from the Bill, as drafted?
Mr David: I have concerns, because my objective is simple: to ensure that as many people as are entitled to be on the electoral register are on the electoral register. All hon. Members will uphold that simple democratic principle. My concern about the detail of this Bill—and we have not seen the secondary legislation yet—is that it provides all kinds of unreasonable hurdles to individuals to prevent them from exercising their legitimate decision when the time comes to vote or not to vote. That is worrying, and it is part of the motivation behind our amendments.
Let me develop my argument about postal votes. One welcome thing that we have seen in the past few years is that more people are finding it convenient to be on the register and have a postal vote. However, many people, particularly those who are elderly or disabled, are concerned about the Bill. That is why all hon. Members have received representations from a range of different
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organisations spelling out in detail their concern; for example, a circular has been distributed by organisations that have come together to speak with a collective voice. These organisations include disability charities, Scope, the Royal National Institute of Blind People, Mencap and Sense. They all expressed concerns about the transitional arrangements for postal and proxy votes because they believe that the effect will be to disfranchise many disabled people who are entitled to be on the register.
6.30 pm
Mr Mark Williams: I raised concerns about that point on Second Reading, as did the hon. Gentleman. Does he take some comfort from the fact that the same organisations he mentions—Mencap, the RNIB, Scope and Sense—have also welcomed the Government’s constructive approach to engagement on these proposals? They have recognised that the Government are talking and are listening to the concerns that I think he is about to raise.
Mr David: Earlier, I made a point of saying that I congratulated the Government and commended them, as the Minister acknowledged, on their pre-legislative consultation and on their rethink on a number of key issues. However, with all due respect to the Government, that is not enough. There are still real concerns and I hope that the Government have listened not so much to the Opposition but to the legitimate concerns expressed by people outside this place, with whom they have been engaged for some weeks and months. Those people still have concerns, which I have expressed. Let me quote specifically what they said in one of their circulars:
“The need to ensure that the requirement for absent voters to be registered under the new system does not inadvertently disenfranchise disabled voters who rely on postal voting to mitigate the inaccessibility of polling stations”.
That is from the response from Mencap, the RNIB, Scope and Sense to the publication of the draft Bill in May 2012.
Objective comments on the proposals have been made by such organisations and by outside academics, but a Select Committee of this House also gave a trenchant criticism of the Government’s proposals. The Select Committee on Political and Constitutional Reform’s report on IER states:
“We recommend that the Government look closely at applying the same carry-forward arrangements for the 2015 General Election to postal and proxy registrations as to other registrations, to avoid inadvertently disenfranchising vulnerable electors.”
That is a succinct and apt way of putting that very important point.
The Government made legitimate changes to their position—I do not like to use the word “concessions”—before the final draft Bill was published and I hope that they will listen to the cacophony of reasonable opinion expressed beyond the confines of the Palace of Westminster and change the Bill.
Sheila Gilmore (Edinburgh East) (Lab):
Does my hon. Friend agree that the problem is that many people will be on the register as it carries forward and they will have become accustomed in recent years to postal votes being sent to them every time, which they might not have been in the past? They will therefore assume that
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the same will happen the first time this provision comes into effect, which will presumably be at the next general election, only to discover that they are unable to vote.
Mr David: Yes, that is the concern, in essence. The Minister has confidently predicted that the carry-over will be 66%, but I have yet to hear on what he bases that figure. The Electoral Commission is bemused, too. I mentioned that earlier and I will be interested to hear whether he reiterates the totally unsubstantiated figure of 66% for postal and proxy votes.
Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab): I am sure that my hon. Friend has had many conversations with Government Members about the Bill. Will he enlighten us about what will happen if the figure in areas such as mine falls drastically below 66%, as I expect it will? Are the Government proposing any safety net?
Mr David: It is for the Government to speak for themselves about their proposals. The Electoral Commission has said that it is concerned about that potential problem and believes it should be tackled through the allocation of resources. We will consider the matter when we discuss the provisions that fall much later in the Bill, but I do not think that the Government are taking the question of addressing the problem at all seriously. If they were, the simplest thing would be to do what the Select Committee recommended and ensure that the same carry-over arrangements apply to proxy and postal voters as to everybody else. The case has not been made for treating postal and proxy votes differently.
Graham Jones (Hyndburn) (Lab): How will this impact on local government? We might see a significant fall in registration in certain wards, so would that lead to boundary changes? What will happen to the boundary changes at local government level that are implemented before we see individual voter registration?
Mr David: That is a big issue. One of the concerns I expressed earlier was about the impact a depleted register could have on the next boundary review in December 2015. From a democratic point of view, if many people who are entitled to be on the register are not, that will have a knock-on effect on how the new boundaries are drawn up. That will have an impact on other boundaries, too, as it will be taken into account in one way or another.
Graham Jones: So, what would the impact be when the number of people registered in a ward dropped below 66%? Does anything in the Bill or in my hon. Friend’s conversations with the Government suggest that that would have an impact?
Mr David:
The objective analysis of likely voter depletion shows that there is unlikely to be uniformity throughout the county. We are likely to see a marked contrast between the rural and urban areas, as I said earlier. If my hon. Friend wants to break it down to regions, I think that there will be a great contrast between the number of electors who will be able to vote in the north-east of England and the number in the south-east of England. That reflects the differences in movement, in demographic trends and in the social and class structure. A particular concern has been expressed about London.
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Greater London has the greatest amount of movement of individuals and is thus likely to be the area where the greatest number of people who are entitled to vote are not on the electoral register. I would contend that the greatest contrast is likely to be between Greater London and more affluent parts of the south-east of England; let us be blunt about that.
Susan Elan Jones (Clwyd South) (Lab): One thing that concerns many of us regards the fact that it is already perfectly possible for electors who wish to register for postal votes to do so for just one election. Is there not therefore a presumption that people who want the long-term postal vote for reasons of sickness, old age or working away will want it more permanently? Surely the presumption is already there, so it is bizarre that the Government are even thinking of changing it.
Mr David: That is an excellent point. The presumption among many people—indeed, dare I say it, among most people—is that once a person is on the electoral register, they are there not for one or two elections but permanently. Most people in this country will not have a clue about this profound change in the nature of the electoral registration system. We need only to consider the lack of press interest and coverage on the subject for months to see that. Given that the Bill was one of the key pieces of legislation in the Queen’s Speech, there has been virtually no press coverage of it, and it is from the press that most people get their information. There is indeed a potential problem here.
We will discuss financing in greater detail later, but when the responsibility is placed very much on the shoulders of local authorities and electoral registration officers, and the resources that are likely to be allocated will not be ring-fenced and will be pretty small anyhow, the concern is that local authorities will not have the capacity to make the superhuman effort needed to chase up those people who they manage to detect have not re-registered under the new system, even though they are entitled to be on the register. There is a host of interconnected problems before us and I thank Members for their interventions. In their different ways, they have highlighted the complexities and the potential problems that lie ahead. The way forward for postal vote carry-overs was clearly set out by the all-party Select Committee, and I very much hope the Government will have second thoughts.
Jonathan Edwards: I shall speak briefly to amendment 20, which would increase the length of time that those on the current electoral register remained on the revised register after the introduction of individual electoral registration. The current proposal from the UK Government is that existing registrations will be removed at the end of the second new canvass if people have not provided the required data for individual electoral registration. The effect will be that concerns about a cliff-edge drop in the completeness of the registers, as we saw when they dropped by 11% in Northern Ireland, will be postponed until after the 2015 Westminster general election. This means that the first elections to be held without the roll-on from the pre-IER electoral roll will be the National Assembly for Wales elections in May 2016.
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Although I recognise that one election must, at some point, be the first election to be held wholly under IER, I am concerned that the elections to the National Assembly for Wales will be the guinea pig, particularly because if the proposals in the Green Paper on electoral arrangements for the National Assembly for Wales are implemented, the electoral roll arrangements will be used as the basis for determining constituencies. I shall give my opinion on that very interesting Green Paper on another occasion.
The change-over from the current system to IER is fraught with difficulties, and the length of time for the change-over should be as long as necessary to ensure that there are no adverse effects, and certainly should not be rushed. As I say, I am particularly concerned about the possible effects on the National Assembly elections in 2016, and I hope the Government will take this opportunity to push back the final date for the removal of all pre-IER registrations to ensure that the handover is as smooth as possible, without the cliff-edge drop in registration that we fear.
Lyn Brown: The hon. Gentleman is clearly as concerned about his area and the effect on voter registration as I am about mine. Does he think that his local authority will have the resources to deal effectively with the problems that will arise and to keep on the electoral register as many people as possible who are entitled to vote?
Jonathan Edwards: That is an interesting point. On the way down on the train this morning, I was reading a report on the experience in Northern Ireland. It said that it was difficult to envisage the changes being pushed through uniformly in a short period. A longer period of introduction would therefore be better for all concerned.
Nic Dakin: I am pleased to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Clark.
I shall speak briefly, mainly to underline the importance of getting the change right. Given that there is cross-party consensus on the introduction of individual voter registration, it ought to be possible to carry it out in a way that minimises and manages risk, avoiding the negative consequences that we can foresee. The debate has made it clear that one of the foreseeable consequences of getting it wrong is that fewer people will be on the register, although they are still eligible. The change must be managed to take account of people who are not sufficiently on the ball to get their registration in place.
I do not see what the rush is. It is better to implement the change carefully and with consideration and get it right than rush it and find the numbers on the register falling off a cliff edge, as my hon. Friend the Member for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr (Jonathan Edwards) said. If we get it wrong, the number of people participating in very significant future elections will drop substantially. Any significant drop would be a travesty of our democracy. We therefore need to work together to prevent such a drop.
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I am especially concerned about the risks involved in the arrangements currently in place for dealing with absent voters by means of postal and proxy votes. The difficulties were well set out by my hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly (Mr David) from the Front Bench. It is important that we get the changes right and
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that they are handled in a way that protects people. There is a real danger that people who have been signed up as postal voters or proxy voters for some time will not be alert to the changes that are taking place and will not realise that those changes have taken place until it is too late.
In previous elections all of us have had the experience of knocking on doors and finding that people have a perception that they have a postal vote, although in fact they do not. They may have signed up for just one election. That will happen in greater volume if the proposals go ahead. There is significant risk in postal and proxy votes not being transferred for the 2015 elections. Carrying them forward would mitigate the risk considerably, although as my hon. Friend the Member for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr said, that transfers the risk to another time. The longer we have to deal with the transfer, the more able we collectively, and electoral registration officers in particular, will be to get it right. We rush at our peril.
Like my hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly, I welcome the modifications that have been made along the road by the Government. That is a good thing and there is further opportunity for modifications in order to get the change right. If the desire is to rush pell-mell, we will get things wrong. The situation of absent and proxy voters would benefit from more risk minimisation and less haste.
Frank Dobson: Although there is apparently a consensus on moving to individual electoral registration, I declare that I do not subscribe to that consensus. I think I had been in the Commons for about a month when there was a vote on which both Front-Bench teams were agreed on some principle. Bernard Braine, an old Tory MP, said to me, “Come on, let’s vote against, because when both Front Benches are in agreement, somebody is being swindled out of their rights.” There is a real danger that in implementing the general proposal, many people will be swindled out of their rights.
We should bear it in mind that estimates of the number of people currently entitled to be on the register but who are not on the register vary between 3 million and 6 million, but no one queries the fact that at least 3 million of our fellow citizens who are entitled to vote are not at present on the electoral register. We are now contemplating a change that will make it more difficult to register. Logically, it would appear that the 3 million will be added to, rather than reduced. We are also talking about the non-carry-over of many postal votes. The people who are on that list are not exclusively disabled and disadvantaged, but many of those who have a postal vote for several elections, which as far as they are concerned is indefinite, are among the most disabled and disadvantaged. It is difficult to see how we can be complacent about knocking them off the register or the list of postal voters, particularly when there are doubts about the appeal arrangements, as my hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly (Mr David) said. The Government, on behalf of the House of Commons, need to address those points, because so far that has not been done.
Another point I will make for Tory Members is that their party has always been the best, by miles, at getting people postal votes, so there is every possibility that once in a while it will be quite a lot of Tory voters who
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lose the right to a postal vote. I urge Government Members, in their own self-interest, to consider whether that is a good or a bad idea.
My hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly also talked about the application of the new arrangements to the electoral register which will be used for the next round of boundary changes. I must admit that I am opposed to the whole approach to boundaries at the moment. Members used to represent a locality, but in future they will represent an anonymous agglomeration of people and there will be little sense that they represent a particular area. Indeed, we could reasonably start talking about constituency No. 10 or constituency No. 245 rather than the place they allegedly represent, because it will no longer be a place; it will be just a group of people. I think that there is a real danger—in fact, almost a certainty—that the introduction of individual electoral registration will mean that the boundary changes that will be considered after the next general election will be mean a smaller number of voters than were on the register at the previous general election.
Apart from a very limited number of people who are paid to support what is proposed, I have yet to meet anyone who does not admit in private conversation that the likely consequence of introducing individual electoral registration is a reduction in the number of people who are registered. We need to get things in perspective. If between 3 million and 6 million people are entitled to be on the register but are not on it, knocking some people off because there might have been a limited amount of fraud seems to me to be putting the cart before the horse.
Mr Harper: I can reassure the right hon. Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson) that he can simultaneously support his party and oppose individual registration, because it says it is in favour of it but then votes against the Bill, so he can have his cake and eat it. To pick up on the central thrust of his remarks, I simply do not accept his proposition on the number of people who will be on the register. In Northern Ireland, where individual electoral registration was introduced, what went wrong—after all, it was introduced by the Government of whom he was a member—was its introduction overnight with no carry-forward process, which caused a number of people who were eligible to be registered to drop off the register. That was recognised and the carry-forward process was reinstituted. We have learned from that. If we look at the status quo, the register is more accurate in Northern Ireland than it is in Great Britain; fewer people who are not entitled to vote are on the register and it is at least as complete as it is in Great Britain. In other words, there are at least as many people who are entitled to vote on the register under individual registration. I am not going to start comparing people who live in different parts of the United Kingdom, but if in Northern Ireland they can manage to register under an individual electoral registration system and have a register that is both as complete and more accurate, it should be perfectly possible for citizens in the rest of the United Kingdom to manage that, too.
Frank Dobson: What is the Minister’s source of information on the number of people on the electoral register in England, Scotland and Wales who are not entitled to be on it?
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Mr Harper: The information comes from a very good piece of work that we commissioned the Electoral Commission to do, so that we had a clear understanding of the electoral registration system’s starting position before we introduced individual electoral registration. We mean to carry out that piece of work after we have introduced the system so that we can demonstrate that the right hon. Gentleman’s fears are groundless. As I have said, the system is working very well in one part of the United Kingdom, and without all of these problems. We have learnt from Northern Ireland’s transitional experience so that we do not repeat the mistakes—mistakes that were introduced under the Government of whom he was a member. I think that he really exaggerates the fears.
Graham Jones: Following the point made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson), in the piece of work the Minister says the Electoral Commission has done, how many people were excluded from the register or were not on it? Was it 3 million or 6 million? What was the figure?
Mr Harper: I can tell the hon. Gentleman, although I am not pleased to, that the figure was 6 million. I can confirm, therefore, that under the previous Government 3 million people disappeared from the register, so I will take no lectures from the Opposition on that. I am confident that, under the proposals we have set out, we will not see the problems that they have suggested there will be. The brutal truth is that when they were in government they commissioned no research to help them understand the position post-2000 and so they did not know what was going on. Having commissioned that work and had the Electoral Commission carry it out, we now know that the problem actually got worse and the previous Government did nothing about it. We are confident that our proposals are robust, and I will set some of them out and respond to the amendments in a moment. We know that the system works well because it works perfectly well in Northern Ireland and we have learnt from the problems that occurred during the transitional process.
Mr David: The Minister says that he is confident about his proposals, but the sure way to test whether his confidence is well placed would be to delay the introduction of the process until the second tranche of pilot schemes have been assessed. Why does he not allow that assessment to take place before deciding, because then he would see whether or not his confidence is well placed?
Mr Harper: We have hardly rushed in the way we have conducted this legislation. I announced our decision in September 2010 and we then published the legislation with the pre-legislative scrutiny. We have been doing this in a very deliberate and careful way, as I think most people would accept.
Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP):
The Minister has referred to the experience in Northern Ireland, but does he accept that the dip that took place there was not just a temporary blip after which the numbers were immediately recovered following one step, because it took some time to recover? Does he also accept that there is something qualitatively different about the current proposal because
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for the first time individual electoral registration will be used to determine a boundary review? That is an overnight use of a new system.
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Mr Harper: There are two points there. I accept that there was a problem and that it took some years to get the register back after that drop, and that is precisely why having learnt from the experience we have put the carry-forward process in place—so that we do not get the drop in the first place. That point is quite right. I will address the hon. Gentleman’s second point directly when I refer to amendments 20, 18 and 19. If he does not think that I have done so, he can come back to it.
On amendment 3, the hon. Member for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin) talked about the appeals system and asked very perceptively whether the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr David)was trying to keep in place the existing system or to put in place a new one. I think that the answer, which the hon. Gentleman obfuscated, is that he is after keeping in place the existing system, and I can confirm that sections 56 and 57 of the Representation of the People Act 1983 already make provision for appeals against the decisions of registration officers in Great Britain, including those to remove people from the register.
Paragraph 17 of schedule 4 to the Bill makes the necessary amendments to ensure that that provision continues to apply under the new system, and I refer hon. Members in particular to the proposed insertion of paragraphs (azd) and (aa) in section 56(1) of the 1983 Act, which would deal with appeals against decisions under proposed section 10ZE.
That sounds very complicated, but basically it means that the existing appeals system will continue as now but under the new system. It is quite complicated and not easy to follow because this Bill amends the 1983 Act, but I hope that, with that reassurance, at least on amendment 3 the hon. Gentleman will not feel the need to press it to a Division.
Electoral fraud came up in the debate, and I now have in front of me the quotation from the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe. Its office for democratic institutions and human rights undertook an election assessment mission report in 2010, on page 11 of which it describes the voter registration system in Great Britain as
“the weakest link of the electoral process due to the absence of safeguards against fictitious registrations.”
So there is a real problem, and about 36% of voters think that there is a real problem with electoral fraud. Indeed, the problem is with not just electoral fraud, but the use of the electoral register, which has been identified as an important stage in identity fraud and financial crime.
Nick de Bois: I remind the Minister that I have reported to the House on two occasions, last year and this year, that from a random sample of 100 people who came to my constituency and had no entitlement to vote, more than 20% were found on the electoral roll—for a number of reasons, I concede, which backs up my hon. Friend’s point.
Mr Harper: My hon. Friend makes a good point. Let me continue with my point about fraud.