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Lord Rooker: My Lords, the misunderstanding has probably arisen because of my inadequate explanation. The counting of the European elections, which this year take place on Thursday 10 May, has always been held back in this country until late on Sunday evening when all the polls have closed in the rest of Europe. It will now be open to the returning officer, if he wishes, to start counting before the close of polls across Europe which could be on the Friday, the Saturday or early on the Sunday. It would not happen before the close of polls in this country.

Baroness Hanham: My Lords, I thank the Minister for that explanation. I was wondering how all the ballot boxes were going to be opened before the close of polls. If I had given it a moment's thought I might have realised, but thank you for that explanation.

I refer briefly to the electronic counting of votes in Greater London. It was not an unalloyed success in 2000 and I hope that a review has been undertaken of what happened. I remember it well because my chief executive at that stage was the chief returning officer and I had a dramatically different chief executive the following day from the one I had the previous day. Some of the votes were munched up, which caused the most terrible problems. Has what happened been reviewed and has the system been dealt with to try to ensure that that does not happen again?

I know that one can listen and talk at the same time—I have come across that in several Bills. I understand that.

On the European Parliamentary Elections Regulations 2004, it is plain that that concerns the regions that will not be part of the European pilot, except that in the regulations it is not plain that that is the situation. Nowhere do the regulations say that that does not refer to areas that are in the European pilot. It is a general directive on European elections. There will be considerable differences in the regulations for the areas not in the pilots from those that are in the pilots as a result of the extensive discussions that we have had on the European Union Parliamentary and Local Elections (Pilots) Bill.

One of those pilots is on the interesting aspect of the requirement for a witness signature on postal votes. To get that matter secured for the electoral pilots we had

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to divide the House and it has now been agreed that there should be a witness signature. It is commonplace within the other areas. I wonder out loud—I do not think that the Minister can answer this question—why we had such a tussle in our discussions on the pilots Bill to secure what is plain and straightforward and which is, we always realised, part of normal practice.

The second matter over which we had a tussle, and on which we have now had to abandon ship, is the question of why the regulations for the European pilot Bill are not coming to the House on affirmative resolution. I have here the regulations for the European regions. They are not a matter of the most enormous quantity of information; they are full of useful information. I cannot believe that the regulations on the pilots Bill will come to any more than these do. I simply place on record the fact that I cannot understand why there has been such resistance—it is from the department dealing with the pilots Bill, not from the Minister's department—to bringing this provision to the House for affirmative resolution, except for the fact that the time is very late.

None the less, it is important how these elections are conducted. I speak only because I have the opportunity to do so, and I know the Minister has no hand in the matter. I think it is extremely unfortunate that we shall not have the opportunity to see the same detail as there is in these regulations because there are very interesting differences between the regulations for the two.

I think those are the only points that I need to make on this issue. I thank the Minister again for his presentation.

Lord Rennard: My Lords, I too thank the Minister for his very good precis, if I may call it that, of these regulations and the reasons behind them. I ask him to address a number of points about them. First, in relation to the principle of the combined elections, the Minister referred to the widespread consent that it would not make sense to have local elections on the first Thursday in May followed by European elections on 10 June, five weeks later. That is not perhaps a view which is shared by those on the Conservative Benches, but generally that was the view of most local authorities and, indeed, that of the Local Government Association.

Is the Minister aware, however, that the view of most local authorities and indeed the Local Government Association was explicitly contingent on the assumption that the experiment of combining the two elections in June was based on there being no all-postal votes in any of those elections in June? The local authorities which consented to the postponement of their elections, at some inconvenience to themselves in holding elections in June, did so on the basis that they understood there would be no postal voting pilots in those elections in June.

Secondly, in relation to the principle of the combined elections, I would kindly suggest to the Minister that it is now the second time in four years that we have postponed the May local elections to June in order to coincide with other elections. I happen to

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think that is very sensible. I think I was one of the first and strongest advocates for doing that this year, because it seems quite wrong to expect people to have to vote twice in five weeks. There is fatigue among the parties; the party bank balances empty to pay for the May elections, but we have to try and fight an election again in June; and the media get bored by a very long election period. So it does make sense in my view to combine them.

We now have the European elections fixed every five years on the second Thursday in June or in association with that weekend. Rather than having an order suggesting that we combine them now, would it not make sense that they should be combined every five years, or should all dates for voting in local elections perhaps now be switched to June? Perhaps the weather would be better for campaigning, for canvassing and delivering leaflets; and we would have some certainty in the timescale each year. It is hard for local authorities not to know when their elections will be in knowing when they should plan their annual meetings. It might be sensible to suggest that June in general would be a better time for holding them.

I follow the points made by the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, about the declaration of identity by briefly saying that Schedule 3 to the third statutory instrument explains in considerable detail the regulations over postal voting and the declaration of identity. As we go into such detail as saying that we have this declaration of identity, I should be grateful if the Minister could explain why the Government think it so important that these regulations should have this declaration of identity.

Thirdly, I ask the Minister to confirm my understanding in relation to the UK parliamentary election regulations. I cannot find anything within them that is in any way contingent upon the pilots Bill. I think that is our collective understanding. I cannot see anything within it that would be affected one way or the other by the passage or not of the pilots Bill.

Perhaps I may ask the Minister further about the recount process within these regulations. I have thought for some time that the counting for the European elections, if held on the same day as the local elections, would have to be done by local authority area rather than by parliamentary constituency, as in 1999. It does not seem to me that it could be done any other way.

However, in relation to the recounts I am a little puzzled as to how you can put into regulations a call for a recount. The Minister with his great experience of parliamentary elections will know that normally in such a count if the result is very close one or other of the party agents will call for a recount because it is very close. I cannot understand how you will have the counting process confined to the local authority area. How would you know across the whole of your European region whether or not the result is very close? You are, it seems to me, expected under these regulations—and indeed under those of 1999—to try to make a judgment as to whether, for example, in the city of Leicester you accept the result as declared for

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that city, but you have to do it in complete ignorance of the votes cast in Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire, Lincolnshire and elsewhere. It is hard to say that the result is close and it is hard to accept the result when you do not know whether it may be close in other places. Perhaps the Minister could help me with that.

Finally, on the issue of election petitions, it seems to me that there is still a problem within the system. We know that sometimes mistakes are made by the returning officer. Sometimes that is a very obvious flaw, something that everyone knows—every party, agent and returning officer knows that there has been an error within the system. Sometimes that can make a difference between someone being elected or not being elected. But it is incumbent entirely upon one of the parties or another individual to launch an election petition at great expense, great risk and great difficulty to perhaps see that it should be a different result returned. Would it not be sensible to allow the returning officer to be able to initiate such legal action if in his opinion and that of his staff a mistake has been made that may have resulted in a wrong result being declared? Perhaps the Minister might help me with those few points on the Order.

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