Conclusions and recommendations
1.
We remind the Government that the onus is on it to demonstrate
a pressing social need for powers of entry and inspection that
interfere with the right to respect for private life and home.
We do not consider that the Government has shown a pressing social
need to extend an already broad power of entry and inspection,
which has never been used, and the Commission will already have
available a power to enter and search, with a warrant, where there
are reasonable grounds to suspect an offence under, or contravention
of, election law. We therefore recommend that paragraph 1(5)
of proposed new Schedule 19A to the Political Parties, Elections
and Referendums Act 2000 be deleted from the Bill because the
Government has failed to show any pressing social need for such
a wide power to interfere with the private life and homes of candidates
and their agents (Paragraph
1.9)
2. It is unacceptable
that the Government continues to delay on this issue. The judgment
of the Grand Chamber was clear that the blanket ban on prisoners
voting in our current electoral law is incompatible with the right
to participate in free elections. We call on the Government to
explore the possibility of bringing forward amendments to this
Bill, to give effect to the European Court's
judgment.
(Paragraph 1.19)
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