Voter Engagement

Debate between Emily Thornberry and John Penrose

Thursday 11th June 2015 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office (John Penrose)]

It is a pleasure to have you in charge of our proceedings this afternoon, Mr Turner. As others have, I start by congratulating the hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry) on securing this debate on a very important topic. It is a cross-party issue; every democrat surely must believe that it is vital that we maintain the integrity, balance and transparent fairness of our electoral system, to make sure that this place and other elected assemblies have the credibility that is essential for the continuing health of our democracy.

The hon. Lady’s local area has a proud tradition for her to follow. She mentioned the Chartists, who were crucial democrats, and Thomas Paine, a particularly important and well known radical. I was not quite with her on Lenin, but I appreciate that he has played an important part in the past. She also mentioned important initiatives being undertaken by her local electoral registration officer and others around the country.

The hon. Member for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield) spoke about some of the things that are happening in Sheffield in relation to university students. It is worth while pausing to note the different and, on occasion, radically divergent ways of encouraging registration around the country. There are excellent examples of tailored practices that are designed to address particular local issues. Some of those practices may have a much wider national application, despite having started out as local solutions to local problems, and could profitably and promisingly be shared more widely to drive up registration around the rest of the country. There is a great opportunity to share best practice and copy the examples of Sheffield and Islington.

I thank the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg), for his welcome and I look forward to debating with him, unless he is spirited away from us by the House’s decisions on Select Committee Chairmen. As he said, the Electoral Commission is shortly due to publish a report, which will be tremendously important for all of us in this room, because it will provide us with an authoritative analysis of what has been going on in registration over the course of the past year or so. It will show which parts of the country are ahead and which are behind. It will provide a fresh update on the hard-to-reach groups that we have heard about during this debate, some of which are particularly low registrants and some of which are particularly high. Importantly, it will shed light on whether the situation is changing and will tell us which groups are getting better and which are falling back, either because they are in different parts of the country or due to demographic trends. It will therefore equip us with vital facts on which we can base our decisions on how to go forward.

Most of us—although perhaps not the hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury—agree that individual electoral registration has been a success and has made it easier for people to register to vote online. It has become much simpler as a result of IER to register to vote. The hon. Member for Newport West (Paul Flynn) quoted some impressive figures—I have my own suite of figures, but it broadly overlaps with his—on the truly impressive rate of online registration that was achieved through IER in the run-up to the general election. The system held, and it worked. Although some may have been re-registrations or duplications, that showed that it is possible to reduce the barriers to registration and to make it simpler, particularly for younger folk, who are used to living their entire lives online, but also for the rest of the population. Registration is made a great deal more accessible by allowing us to do it online, and we are all becoming used to doing things online in other walks of life. It would be bizarre and perverse if we did not allow or encourage that to continue. The facts are emerging—we hope they will be confirmed in the Electoral Commission’s report—but it looks as though this has made a major improvement to registration and has got rid of some of the barriers in people’s way.

[Emily Thornberry]

The Minister may have misunderstood me. I have no problem with making it easier for people to register to vote, and I acknowledge that online voter registration has made it easier for a lot of people. I started from a different standpoint. It is not that we should encourage people to reach out and grasp their right to vote, but that we should ensure that they simply have the right to vote in as accurate a way as possible. It is then for them to decide whether they want to vote or not. They should not need to take two steps, although they may need to sometimes. As a general rule, we should try to have automatic registration, so that we are all going for the goal of 100% registration.

[John Penrose]

I was about to come to examples of where that has been achieved already with some success. In the case of IER, about 87% of those who were already enrolled were seamlessly moved across, without their having to do anything. They were automatically verified, and their registration was moved across straightforwardly and simply.

There is a great deal that can be done, which brings me on seamlessly to the points made by the hon. Member for Sheffield Central about other opportunities to prompt people. He used the example of students, but there are many other examples. The shadow Minister mentioned private letting agents, which provide an obvious gateway or portal. There is a prompting moment when people move house. The hon. Member for Sheffield Central talked about universities, and the example of Northern Ireland was mentioned, where work has also been done in schools and colleges.

--- Later in debate ---

[Emily Thornberry]

Will the Minister give way?

[John Penrose]

I am spoiled for choice. I will give way to the hon. Lady, as it is her debate. I am conscious of time, so I need to be quick.

[Emily Thornberry]

It would be patriarchal for a man to register his whole family and to vote on their behalf, but it is not patriarchal for someone to ensure that their whole family has the choice to vote.

[John Penrose]

I find that I am unexpectedly more sensitive to patriarchy than the hon. Lady. That is a phrase I never thought I would utter.