Elections Bill

Debate between Baroness Hayman of Ullock and Lord Pickles

Lords Hansard - Part 1 & Report stage
Wednesday 6th April 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Pickles (Con)]

My Lords, I stand briefly to speak on this and to apologise to my noble friend for missing the entire Committee due to contracting Covid. I have been away at a public inquiry today, but it was great to arrive at the point to hear my noble friend Lord Holmes making these very sensible suggestions. I raised this issue at Second Reading and I am immensely grateful to my noble friend the Minister for accepting these amendments and making these changes, which will bring enormous dignity to the voting process. Again, I congratulate my noble friend, Lord Holmes.

[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

My Lords, we very much welcome and support the amendments put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Holmes, and thank him for so clearly laying out their importance in his introduction. I also congratulate him and my noble friend Lord Blunkett on their continued work and persistence on this matter.

We welcome that these amendments will mean that, for the first time, the Electoral Commission would be tasked by law to create specific guidance to address the needs of blind and partially sighted and other disabled voters at the ballot box. This is long overdue. We strongly urge the Minister to accept these amendments and hope that he will look on them favourably.

However, as other noble Lords have mentioned, the RNIB has raised concerns with some of us, so I would be grateful if the Minister could provide clarification and reassurance on some issues that have not been raised so far. The first question it asks is this: how do the Government anticipate

“such equipment as it is reasonable to provide for the purposes of enabling, or making it easier for, relevant persons to vote”

independently being interpreted? How do they see the interpretation of that phrase? The noble Lord, Lord Kerslake, mentioned that the RNIB is concerned that we must not go backwards. Its concern on this is that “making it easier” to vote is still weaker than the right to vote “without any assistance”, as in the current wording.

It would also be helpful if the Minister could look at how this would be managed going forward, including availability and the cost of the provision of equipment for returning officers and how that would be supported at local government level. It would be helpful if the Minister could confirm the body that he anticipates will fund individual items of equipment provided in polling stations. I am not sure whether the Government currently provide the funding for the tactile template—I am sure other noble Lords know. Again, it would be helpful to know if that is currently the case. Obviously, we need to have certainty in these areas, because the last thing we want to see is a legal challenge if the expected equipment is not provided.

In summary, we welcome these amendments and urge the Minister to accept them. We thank all noble Lords for an important debate and, again, thank the noble Lord, Lord Holmes, for pushing this and bringing it to this stage.