Brexit: Green Paper

Debate between Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town and Lord Taylor of Holbeach

Monday 9th January 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)]

My Lords—

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach (Con)]

My Lords, I think that it is the turn of the Labour Benches.

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town]

My Lords, the Minister needs to offer two things to the House. The first is perhaps that he will no longer do what some of his colleagues do. The Secretary of State, Liz Truss, refused to appear before the Joint Committee on Human Rights looking at Brexit, a refusal that the committee described as unacceptable. I hope that the Minister will come to the House with not just the final vote that will happen when Article 50 is triggered, but the detail of what the Government are seeking to achieve out of negotiations when we leave the European Union.

Electoral Registration and Administration Bill

Debate between Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town and Lord Taylor of Holbeach

Monday 14th January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town]

My Lords, it is very hard to imagine that the Government will say anything but yes to the amendment—no, I do not think that I am quite getting that message back.

I am sorry about that. I hope that between now and Report, the Government will think about the amendment seriously. The numbers here may not be as full as they were earlier, but it is clear that it is pretty widely supported. We on all these Benches fully support it. As we have heard, so does the Electoral Commission. The noble Lord, Lord Tyler, suggested that it has been left up to individual assistant returning officers. It is not fair to put it on to their shoulders, particularly if there is a TV camera looking over them at that point, whether they decide to be sensible or not; whether the queue is inside or outside; or whether, if there is more than one ballot paper because we have a multiple election, as we often do, and people have one in their hand but not the other, they are to deny them that vote. It is not fair for the decision to be on the person in charge of that polling station.

I also do not think that it is fair that if you turn up at 10 o’clock in a nice, quiet area you can wander in—as sometimes one does in the Lobby here when there are not many on our side—but if you as an elector happen to turn up in a busy area, you will be discriminated against because other people will also have turned up late.

I had not heard of the government advice to turn up early. That is the reverse of what we had when I was young: it was called drinking-up time. We used to be allowed 10 minutes that way. That suggests that the Government want us all to be there at 10 minutes to the hour. We do risk assessments elsewhere, where we look at likelihood and impact. I think that the Government are right that the likelihood of this is low. Returning officers have realised that there are cameras and that they should not do that again. The likelihood may be low, but the impact will be high both on those going to the polling station—it is serious that they cannot vote—and on those watching on television people who have turned out to vote but who are not allowed to. We do not want that. I hope that the Government will think again about this.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Home Office (Lord Taylor of Holbeach)]

My Lords, I thought that I had had enough excitement for today, but this is an interesting debate. At first sight, everyone was positively affronted by the fact that people intending to vote found themselves in a queue and were unable to do so. At the previous election it was a disgrace. If I remember the press reports right, one of the queues was well over 100 people long. It was clearly a huge error on the part of the people responsible for organising the polling stations. Contrary to what has been implied, these were not people turning up at the last minute. The queues had formed during the day and existed for quite a lot of the evening. Those of us involved in elections will know that the peak time for voting tends to be between 5 pm and about 8 pm. If a queue has formed then—it can happen; I think that most of us will have seen that—one would hope it is not big enough to disadvantage voters who come along later. However, the size of the queues at the previous election—which were reported during the day—clearly impaired the ability of people to vote, and that is not a good thing.

I am going to disappoint noble Lords, particularly those on the Constitution Committee, because I know that my honourable friend Chloe Smith talked to them last Wednesday. The answers she gave them are very similar to the answers I am going to give. I hope that the House will forgive me. It may be that those answers are right. We have to think through a change of this nature and think of the consequences. The Constitution Committee, as the noble Lords, Lord Pannick and Lord Lexden, and the noble Baroness, Lady Jay, said, also supported this aim and obviously has given this matter a great deal of thought. It takes the view that this would give greater clarity. We need to write the discretion of the polling station clerk into law so that they can do that. I appreciate the sentiment behind the amendment, but we are not entirely sure that it would help to clarify the present arrangements.

While it might seem initially like a sensible response to the queueing at 9.40 pm, there is a real danger of creating unintended consequences and reducing the clarity and certainty of the law. As it stands, the law is very clear—a ballot paper cannot be issued after 10 pm. Elections are quite precise affairs. Votes are a matter of quite fine delineation and that is particularly true in local government elections. Although queues in local government elections are relatively rare, they were referred to in the Scottish local government elections. Returning officers, polling station clerks and voters know where they stand because it is enshrined in law. The present certainty around the time of close of poll and what close of poll actually means—no issuing of the ballot paper—also facilitates other aspects, for example, the requirement that exit polls cannot be published until the polls have closed. If the polls have not closed somewhere because there is a queue this makes it much more difficult for those responsible for public exit polls to be sure that anything they say may not influence a potential voter. It may sound pedantic but we are talking about something which requires precision. What would be the impact of this on the timing of results if a significant number of electors queued up? I do not think it is beyond the wit of certain people to have a bit of fun with this and to form a queue. It can be done and it might occur. There is also the risk that some people might use this as an opportunity to make a public statement about elections, particularly in areas where tensions exist.

It has been remarked that controlling and delineating a queue is quite difficult. Where is a queue? What is a queue? Most of us think that we know one when we see one, but not many of us would like to take responsibility for actually harnessing a queue, particularly without the power of a police officer. After all, the police officer is not acting under the instructions of the returning officer. A police officer would not wish to interfere with what constituted a queue, while those administering the election might be better off issuing ballot papers rather than trying to organise a queue. I am suggesting that there are factors of people control and definition that are important.

Public Bodies: Reform

Debate between Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town and Lord Taylor of Holbeach

Thursday 14th October 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach]

I thank my noble friend for his comments. Widespread concern has been expressed in the press about the Equality and Human Rights Commission and its role. We are proposing to retain it, precisely because we believe that a regulator is needed to help to enforce the laws governing equality and anti-discrimination. But we believe that the EHRC’s remit is too wide and that it has not always been well managed. That is why we are proposing substantially to reform it.

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town]

I declare an interest as the chair of the Legal Services Consumer Panel. We had no advance notice of this; there was an e-mail at 9.36 this morning to one of my staff—not to me—alerting us, not in the published list but in the question and answers that Ministers were given as their brief, that the Government were minded to merge the panel in with Citizens Advice. Is that the normal courtesy that you would have for an organisation that you wish to merge?

On the issue itself, the Legal Services Consumer Panel was set up with the complete support of this House as part of the Legal Services Act. It is, of course, funded by lawyers—and I thank the many lawyers here for the funding. It is accountable to the users of legal services and is wholly different from Citizens Advice. It advises the regulator on behalf of the users of legal services on how best to regulate, which is an utterly different role from that of Citizens Advice. Was there any logical thinking in putting this measure not in the published list but in the attachment, then not telling us, as well as the unusual history with Citizens Advice?

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach]

I think I can explain. As the noble Baroness said, the Government are minded but have not made a decision. There is no doubt that she will have plenty of opportunity to consult the Government and the body will be able to discuss the matter with the Government. So there is no specific proposal, but the Government are minded to merge.