Electoral System (Electoral Registration and Administration Act 2013 Committee Report)
Baroness Suttie Excerpts(2 years, 1 month ago)
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Baroness Suttie
That this House takes note of the Report from the Electoral Registration and Administration Act 2013 Committee An electoral system fit for today? More to be done (Session 2019–21, HL Paper 83).
Baroness Suttie (LD)
My Lords, it should have been Lord Shutt of Greetland standing here today. As noble Lords will know, my noble friend, David Shutt, very sadly died in October 2020. As the other Liberal Democrat member of the Electoral Registration Act 2013 post-legislative scrutiny committee, I have been asked to present the findings of our committee to your Lordships’ House today. I know Lord Shutt would have wanted me to begin by warmly thanking the committee staff: Simon Keal, Katie Barraclough and Breda Twomey, as well as the specialist advisers, Professor Maria Sobolewska and Professor Stuart Wilks-Heeg, for all their hard work and dedication during the inquiry and in drawing up report.
Simon Keal, the committee clerk, told me:
“Lord Shutt was exceptionally good to work with. An extremely dedicated and professional Chair, with a real commitment and passion for the subject matter and determination for the Committee to make a difference.”
In looking again at the various obituaries for Lord Shutt in preparing for today’s debate, I was struck by the frequent use of “straight talking” and “decent” to describe him. But he also had a wonderful twinkle in his eye. He liked to tell it as it was. He enjoyed a bit of gossip over a cup of tea but was always extremely kind.
As director and later chairman of the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust, Lord Shutt was able to promote political reform and help community projects, particularly for young people. It is telling that his very last political act in Parliament was to promote the rights of young people to vote, and indeed he won the support of your Lordships’ House, through an amendment on automatically adding young attainers, 16 and 17 year-olds, to the electoral register. This was a subject that he felt extremely strongly about and which he was able to explore in more depth during the work on this committee inquiry.
As I am sure the other noble Lords present today who were members of the committee will testify, Lord Shutt chaired the committee in his own inimitable style, allowing people to have their say but, as ever, telling it as he saw it as he summed up a discussion. He continues to be very greatly missed.
The timing of this committee inquiry against the backdrop of the Covid pandemic, the 2019 general election and the early—and ultimately reversed—Prorogation was deeply challenging in terms of planning and continuity of the committee work for staff and Members alike. The committee inquiry ran from May 2019 to July 2020, held 16 evidence sessions and received a total of 42 written-evidence submissions. The committee also held seminars with electoral registration officers, including in the aftermath of the 2019 election, and visited the London Borough of Tower Hamlets to speak to election officials and politicians regarding the operation of the registration system there. As well as looking at the Act itself and its implementation, we took the opportunity to assess wider issues around electoral administration, including measures to tackle fraud.
Some of the committee’s recommendations have now been passed by events in the 20 months since it was published, not least as a result of the Elections Bill, but today I shall highlight a few issues raised by the report that I believe are still highly relevant. The first is the question of resources. Implementing electoral reforms requires administrators to be properly trained and resourced. We heard during the course of the inquiry that when it comes to resourcing this is certainly not always the case.
Our report found that intolerable burdens are often placed on administrators during times of multiple elections, such as we saw from 2015 to 2019, with three general elections and the EU referendum in fairly rapid succession. We believed that the Government should consider a scheme of financial support or compensation for election-related registration activity because of the very high volume of online applications to go on the register being received in the run-up to those elections. These applications were on a scale that the 2011 reforms did not really anticipate. In their response, the Government stated that the Cabinet Office has “launched a project” to identify and put in place measures to mitigate impacts on electoral administrators. Can the Minister say a little more today about how that project is going?
The second area of particular concern raised during the inquiry was the completeness and accuracy of the registers. This was an area of particular concern to Lord Shutt. The committee was keen to explore ways of improving the registration levels of underrepresented groups and to study best international practice on these matters. Canada was seen as a particularly positive example in this regard. I believe that there has been no further general study of accuracy and completeness of registers since the committee published its report. What action have the Government taken since the publication of this report to improve the completeness and accuracy of the registers? What evidence do they have, if any, that completeness and accuracy are improving?
A third area examined during our inquiry was the simplification of the registration process. Anecdotally, I should mention that it was only because of my membership of this committee that I learned that making an application online, just to be sure that I am correctly registered, actually results in staff having to check online applications for duplicate entries and therefore takes up a considerable amount of staff time that could be usefully used elsewhere. That is why the report calls on the Government to explore the options for an online checking tool, which I believe could save time and money in the long run, even though there would initially be cost implications. I believe that this is a very important recommendation of our report. An online checking tool would also make it easier for electoral administrators to identify whether people were registered in two different locations—sometimes legitimately, sometimes not—and make it easier to transfer an elector from one district or constituency to another if they move house.
In their response, the Government stated that they are
“sympathetic to the potential benefits”
of an online registration checking tool but stated that issues around security, cost and implementation
“would need to be analysed”.
They indicated that they were “prioritising other interventions” to modernise the system that they believe will be more useful and other interventions to reduce the burden of duplicate applications. I would be grateful if the Minister could expand a little on these “other interventions” in his response.
The Government noted in their response the long-term nature of the process for consolidating and simplifying electoral law. However, as the House of Lords Constitution Committee, of which I am currently a member, noted in its report on the Elections Bill:
“The consolidation of electoral law is necessary and overdue, but it would be a significant undertaking. We recommend that the Government takes steps to consolidate electoral law before the next general election.”
In reality, the Elections Bill is yet another Bill containing a range of miscellaneous election provisions.
I will not say much about the issue of voter ID, as I am sure that issue will be much debated in the Elections Bill in the weeks to come, but our report called for voter ID not to be first introduced at a general election, instead suggesting that it should be rolled out first at a local election and a full evaluation conducted afterwards.
I have two final points in conclusion. First, our committee was set up in particular to assess the implementation of IER, which faced a multitude of electoral tests shortly after its introduction. While the implementation of IER proceeded successfully, thanks in no small part to the dedication of the administrators, it has not resolved some of the wider concerns relating to the electoral registration system. There remain particular concerns regarding the completeness and accuracy of registers, and about multiple registrations and the rules surrounding these. There also remain concerns about the negative impacts of this Act on, for example, student and attainer registration as well as those from other underrepresented groups. To date, the Government have not yet indicated that they are minded to tackle any of these issues as a matter of priority.
Secondly, I stress the importance of post-legislative scrutiny itself. I have had the privilege of working in many developing parliaments throughout the world, including four years ago in the Verkhovna Rada in Kyiv. In that work, we have regularly promoted the use of effective post-legislative scrutiny. It is a very positive feature of the Westminster model that we use post-legislative scrutiny to examine the impact of legislation in reality through speaking to experts and practitioners on the ground several years after the legislation has been passed. However, for post-legislative scrutiny to be truly effective it requires the Government to listen. It also requires them to acknowledge the findings of inquiries like ours and be prepared to make changes. I beg to move.
Baroness Suttie (LD)
My Lords, I thank the Minister for his extremely detailed response and his kind words about my noble friend, the late Lord Shutt. However, I urge him to think again about several points in the report, not least the merits of an online checking tool. Although incurring an expense in the short term, it would save money in the medium and longer term.
I thank all noble Lords and noble friends who have contributed to this short but none the less important debate. It may seem like a highly technical subject, but making sure that our processes for electoral registration work effectively and that the register is as complete and accurate as possible is an extremely important element of our democracy. I am sure that many of the issues raised today will be returned to in the course of the Elections Bill.
Finally, I thank all noble Lords and noble friends for their warm words of tribute to Lord Shutt. Working with my colleague Humphrey Amos in the Liberal Democrat Whips’ Office, we shall make sure that Lord Shutt’s family is informed about the tributes made during the debate.
Northern Ireland: Supply of Medicines
Baroness Suttie Excerpts(2 years, 4 months ago)
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Lord Frost (Con)
My Lords, the grace period formally expires at the end of this year, but we are also in a standstill agreed between the two sides in July that keeps current arrangements running. It is our expectation that the current grace period arrangements will continue beyond the end of the year as long as we are in constructive discussions with the EU. The existence of the grace period has meant that some of the supply difficulties that we had earlier in the year have changed, but obviously we need to find a permanent solution to this problem.
Baroness Suttie (LD)
My Lords, surely it is vital to give certainty to the people of Northern Ireland on healthcare. Does the Minister agree that, in taking his decision tomorrow during the negotiations, now is the time to put pragmatism before ideology?
Lord Frost (Con)
My Lords, we would love to find an agreement if one were available. We think that the proposal that we made to take medicines out of the protocol entirely would be the simplest way of solving this problem, but we continue to look at the proposals that the EU has put on the table. At the moment, we do not have the necessary detail or understanding of the texts to enable us to accept these proposals, but we continue to talk.
Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland: EU Negotiations
Baroness Suttie Excerpts(2 years, 5 months ago)
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Lord Frost (Con)
My Lords, we have always said that there will need to be a treaty arrangement between this country and the European Union to deal with the special features of Northern Ireland and to protect the Belfast/Good Friday agreement. I think it is common ground that there will need to be some such special arrangements. That is not the same as saying that Northern Ireland should remain some sort of shadow member of the European Union for certain purposes. In some ways, that is the situation that we have in certain aspects of policy, and that is what we need to change. But it is of course important to respect the balance, and that is why we talk about trying to find a new balance—the right balance—between all the different interests in Northern Ireland.
Baroness Suttie (LD)
My Lords, can the Minister say whether a possible decision to invoke Article 16 is more likely to be influenced by an analysis of changes to trade flows resulting from the Northern Ireland protocol or by political factors? Will he undertake to inform this House of the criteria used to take any such decision?
Lord Frost (Con)
My Lords, the noble Baroness is right that there are a number of conditions referred to in Article 16 for its use—economic and social disruption, trade diversion and so on—and, although they are conceptually separate, they all sort of feed into each other and create the conditions that might require the use of safeguards. I repeat what I said earlier: obviously we will be transparent and clear and set out our approach to Article 16 and the justification, if and when it comes to that point.
Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland: Impact on UK Internal Market
Baroness Suttie Excerpts(2 years, 5 months ago)
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Lord Frost (Con)
My Lords, to be honest, what I have just said cannot be described as equivocating. I have tried to make my position 100% clear on these negotiations and on Article 16, and it has not changed. It is that if we can find a negotiated solution, that is better. If we cannot find one, then the safeguards are legitimate.
Baroness Suttie (LD)
My Lords, Belfast Queen’s University’s most recent survey found that 52% of those who responded think that on balance, the Northern Ireland protocol is a good thing. Does the Minister agree that, rather than threatening to invoke Article 16, 52% is a sufficient mandate to get these practical changes done and to make the protocol work for the people and businesses of Northern Ireland?
Lord Frost (Con)
My Lords, I have indeed looked at the polling conducted by Queen’s University, where I had a good meeting yesterday, by the way. There is a lot of other polling around on this subject, and the conclusion I draw from it is that there is significant and stark division of opinion in Northern Ireland. Different polls have slightly different numbers but there is a clear division about the benefits of the protocol or its difficulties. In those circumstances, it is difficult to implement and that is why we are in the situation in which we find ourselves.
Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland: Power-sharing
Baroness Suttie Excerpts(2 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Frost (Con)
The noble Lord is correct, of course, that the issue of involving political opinion and institutions in Northern Ireland is for the UK Government. We do that, and the Northern Ireland Executive attend the joint committee when the Irish Government attend on the EU side, which is always the case. I think the EU should exercise caution in suggesting that Northern Ireland parties or political opinion should take part in the EU’s own institutions and decision-making procedures in this area: I do not think that would be consistent with the sort of arrangement we want in the future. The protocol is a treaty between two parties, the UK and the EU, and supporting arrangements need to be consistent with that.
Baroness Suttie (LD)
My Lords, further to the question of the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, does the Minister now regret signing up to the Northern Ireland protocol without prior consultation of the political parties in Northern Ireland?
Lord Frost (Con)
My Lords, as I think is well known, there was at the time in 2019 quite a degree of consultation as we developed our negotiating position but, unfortunately, the outcome of that process and the positions taken by different parties are well known. We did the right thing for the country in putting in place an agreement that delivered a full and fair Brexit but, unfortunately, that agreement has not been implemented in the way we hoped it would, and that is why it needs to change.
Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland (EUC Report)
Baroness Suttie Excerpts(2 years, 7 months ago)
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Baroness Suttie (LD)
My Lords, I too congratulate both the European Union Committee and the new Sub-Committee on the Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland on producing two excellent, balanced and detailed reports. I also add my thanks to the staff, not least Christopher Johnson and Stuart Stoner, for the work they continually do on these committees.
I had the privilege of serving on the EU Committee for four years with the noble Lord, Lord Jay, and the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, and, indeed, went on an excellent fact-finding visit to Dublin, Belfast and Derry/Londonderry shortly after the referendum. The European Affairs Committee and its sub-committees do an extremely important job and have produced some excellent and highly detailed reports since Brexit. It is perhaps a shame that the Government do not always pay quite as much attention to their findings as I believe they should. It is also testimony to the finely tuned diplomatic skills of the noble Lord, Lord Jay, that he has managed to produce such a balanced report from what we might call a diverse membership with such a wide cross-section of views.
Back in December 2016, the House of Lords European Union Committee published a report on UK-Irish relations following Brexit, highlighting the potential issues that would be faced politically and economically by the people on both sides of the border on the island of Ireland. That report also regretted that there was not a more honest debate about these issues during the referendum campaign.
In debating the current post-Brexit situation in Northern Ireland, it is hard not to repeat the simple fact that the Government promised three fundamentally incompatible things: no north-south border, no east-west border and their insistence on their red line that we had to leave both the single market and the customs union. It is also worth recalling that the Northern Ireland protocol we are debating today is the Government’s own policy and that it was their choice to sign up to it in order to “get Brexit done”. However, to coin a phrase, we are where we are. It is equally important to try to find a way to move the debate forward.
As other noble Lords have already indicated, quite a lot has happened since both the committee reports we are debating today were published—not least the publication in July of the Government’s own Command Paper on the protocol. At the end of last week, we also had Commission Vice-President Šefčovič’s visit to Northern Ireland, where there were some very welcome changes of tone.
I will concentrate my remarks this afternoon on three areas raised by the sub-committee’s introductory report. The first point is the very urgent need to reach agreement on a UK-EU SPS/veterinary agreement. As paragraph 246 of the introductory report states,
“an SPS/veterinary agreement of any form is manifestly in the interests of Northern Ireland”.
Does the Minister agree with the report that not to reach such an agreement, when it would make such a positive difference to the lives of people in Northern Ireland, would indicate that the Government consider regulatory sovereignty a higher priority than political and economic stability in Northern Ireland? Can he further say whether there are areas he may be willing to compromise on to reach such an agreement?
The second theme that I would like to highlight from the report—already raised by the noble Lord, Lord Jay—is trust. Paragraphs 317 and 318 highlight the importance of the dialogue and political leadership over several Governments and many years that helped bring about the Good Friday/Belfast agreement. That dialogue, trust and constructive leadership have sadly been lacking in the last five years since Brexit.
There was a welcome change of tone, as I have referred to already, from the European Commission Vice-President last week, when Mr Šefčovič ended his visit by saying that the EU was not looking for a political victory in Northern Ireland. I hope that the Government will adopt a similar tone. The business community and the majority of the wider community in Northern Ireland want certainty and solutions rather than dialled-up rhetoric. For there to be trust, there has to be a level of openness and transparency that has been very much lacking up until now.
In an extremely thoughtful article in response to the publication of the Government’s Command Paper in July, Professor Katy Hayward from Queen’s University highlighted some of the political consequences in the months ahead—in particular, that the protocol will inevitably feature heavily in next year’s Assembly elections. In their dialogue and negotiations over the next few months, I hope the Government will factor in the potential impact of these negotiations, as well as their tone, on the forthcoming Assembly elections. The Government’s July Command Paper highlights that the lack of unionist and loyalist buy-in has brought tension into the Executive and Assembly, but the Government never publicly acknowledge that there is a parallel lack of buy-in to the whole Brexit process from the majority of Northern Ireland voters.
My third and final point follows on from this: that is, the need for enhanced political dialogue and inclusion at all levels. As paragraph 205 rightly states:
“There is a widespread perception that the Protocol was imposed on Northern Ireland without meaningful engagement with its communities, and without a full and transparent explanation of the impact it would have.”
There has also been extremely little done to sell the potential positive benefits of the protocol for Northern Ireland, with its unique access to both EU and British markets. Can the Minister say whether the Government intend to provide an information campaign on these potential benefits and how they plan to improve dialogue with all sectors in Northern Ireland, including civil society? As we approach the next stages of negotiations ahead of the end of the various grace periods in the weeks and months ahead, will the Minister give very serious consideration to the proposals contained in paragraph 269, which sets down some very constructive suggestions for strengthening Northern Ireland’s influence within both the UK and the EU?
National Insurance Numbers: Electoral Register
Baroness Suttie Excerpts(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord True (Con) [V]
My Lords, the Government do not support automatic registration, but we certainly wish to see everyone register and exercise the right to vote, for which so many people have made sacrifices for so long. Our Register to Vote website is used by many young people, with almost 10.8 million online applications having been submitted by 16 to 24 year-olds since the service was introduced. I remind noble Lords that the number of people who have voted in recent elections has continued to grow, and that is hugely welcome.
Baroness Suttie (LD)
My Lords, the Select Committee on the Electoral Registration and Administration Act 2013, which was excellently chaired by my noble friend and much missed colleague, the late Lord Shutt of Greetland, called for the piloting of automatic registration for attainers. Further to his previous answer, would the Minister consider having such a pilot? Does he further acknowledge that removing barriers to registration would be a positive step forward in encouraging more young people to vote?
Lord True (Con) [V]
My Lords, we have spoken often about the great service of the late Lord Shutt. We are determined to see people exercise their right to vote, but there are numerous important practical reasons to oppose automatic registration, and that is the position of the Government. Automatic registration would likely require a single national electoral register and/or a centralised database, and the Government have no plans to move in that direction.
Ireland/Northern Ireland Protocol
Baroness Suttie Excerpts(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord Frost (Con)
My Lords, I learned a good deal of what I know of negotiation at the feet of the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, so wherever we have got to is at least in part thanks to his tutelage over the years. On the issue of the parliamentary partnership assembly and the Partnership Council, the parliamentary assembly is, of course, a matter for Parliament. We are in close touch with those involved as to how it should work but its composition is not a matter for the Government, although we obviously strongly support its work. On the institutions created by the withdrawal agreement and the TCA, we seek to ensure that all the devolved Administrations, including Northern Ireland, can participate in the most appropriate way.
Baroness Suttie (LD) [V]
My Lords, as the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, has just said, it is a peculiarity of our times that the Opposition Benches are left to defend the imperfect protocol that the Minister himself negotiated. Does the Minister agree with Julian Smith, who said in May this year that Northern Ireland is in a
“unique position … compared to other parts of the UK to maximise two major markets, Britain and the EU”?
Do the Government have an action plan to promote these opportunities for businesses in Northern Ireland?
Lord Frost (Con)
My Lords, I obviously have the highest respect for my right honourable friend Mr Smith but the problem with that analysis comes back to the point made earlier that Northern Ireland’s economic links are overwhelmingly with the rest of the UK. A bargain in which there is greater access to a smaller part of the trade in return for difficulties with the larger part is obviously not a bargain that totally stacks up.
Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland
Baroness Suttie Excerpts(2 years, 11 months ago)
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Lord Frost (Con)
My Lords, the noble Lord is right to observe that we are not particularly happy with the way that the protocol is being implemented. Our hope is that we can find solutions to this with the European Union. I speak frequently to my EU colleague, Maroš Šefčovič, and our teams are in regular touch. Talks are going on semi-continuously on these questions and we hope to have made progress in dealing with some of the most difficult issues by the time of the joint committee, but obviously it takes two sides to move forward and find pragmatic solutions. Progress is limited at the moment but we keep working at it.
Baroness Suttie (LD) [V]
What progress, if any, has been made towards achieving an EU-UK veterinary agreement?
Ireland/Northern Ireland Protocol
Baroness Suttie Excerpts(2 years, 12 months ago)
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Lord Frost (Con)
My Lords, this is indeed an important and urgent matter. Our ambassadors and embassies are talking to member states to establish the facts around what kinds of visas and processes are required and, importantly, to get them to improve their guidance on how to apply. We are also trying to improve our own signposting to that guidance. Our rules for touring professionals are comparatively generous, of course. We hope that, out of these discussions, some member states will signal a wish to change their rules so that they look more like ours and enable this great touring activity to continue.
Baroness Suttie (LD) [V]
My Lords, given that the grace period has been extended, will the Government carry out their own full impact assessment on the Northern Ireland protocol? If not, why not?
Lord Frost (Con)
My Lords, the extension of the grace period is central to managing our practical discussions with the Commission on solving the current protocol arrangements. We have published and discussed a good deal of information about the impact of the protocol. We are leading these discussions in an attempt to mitigate its impact and ensure that it is implemented in a pragmatic and proportionate way.