European Union Referendum: Young Voters

Lord Bridges of Headley Excerpts

Thursday 26th May 2016 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office (Lord Bridges of Headley) (Con)]

My Lords, I also begin by congratulating the noble Lord, Lord Roberts, on securing this debate. I, like so many other Lords, wholeheartedly applaud the work that he and Bite the Ballot, of which he is president, have done and are doing to encourage voter registration. I am also grateful to all of your Lordships who have taken time to attend and contribute to this important debate.

I start by taking a step back. As the noble Lord said, to vote in an election or a referendum and to express one’s personal view on how you want your community or country to be run and the direction it should take is obviously a precious, priceless act. Going into a polling booth, picking up that stubby little pencil and putting a cross in the box of one’s choice: thousands of people have died to win and protect that power—a power on which our democracy rests. Whatever the faults of our electoral system, people around the world still look at it with envy. As a number of noble Lords have said, our challenge is to ensure that everyone who is eligible to vote is encouraged to register to do so.

Doing this is clearly in all our interests. It should not be a matter of partisan politics. A vibrant democracy rests on an engaged electorate. That level of engagement is a measure of people’s trust and faith in the political system. As we approach the referendum—a momentous day in our democracy’s history—the need for that engagement is greater than ever. We want all people from all backgrounds, whatever their age, race or religion, to vote on 23 June.

But today’s debate is obviously specifically about young people. The challenge we face here, as has been pointed out, is quite stark. Young people are more than five times as likely not to be registered to vote as older people. As the noble Lord, Lord Roberts, said, at the last election turnout among young people was a third less than the population as a whole. However, I am pleased to report that while we should absolutely not be complacent, there has been some progress. The introduction of online registration made it easier to register to vote and to track progress, enabling us to answer some of the questions that my noble friend Lord Lexden raised. Since the start of 2016, there have been 4.1 million applications to register to vote. Of these, 950,000 applications were made by 16-24 year-olds, with more than 85% of these applications made online. More recently, the average daily rate for May was 43,935 applications per day, with 95% made online. More than 30 people on average applied to vote each minute this month. The average daily rate in May for applications from 16-24 year-olds is 9,528.

As I said, despite all this the Government are not complacent. For example, as was pointed out there is an issue with students. A poll carried out by Universities UK revealed that just 56% of students who are only registered at their term-time address say they are likely to be at this address when the referendum takes place. We are now working with Universities UK to address this, supporting last week’s student action week to ensure students were aware of the date of the referendum itself, the registration deadline and—more importantly—the need to register to vote at the address they will be at on 23 June so that they can have their say. As was said, Ministers also wrote to universities, further education and sixth-form colleges to encourage them to promote registration among their students ahead of the referendum.

The Government also support and amplify the Electoral Commission’s campaign, such as making sure that its posters are more readily available throughout the public sector and government network, for example in job centres, agriculture centres and transport hubs. On top of that, while the Electoral Commission has worked with Glastonbury organisers to ensure festival-goers are aware of the options for proxy and postal voting, the Prime Minister urged the country via Facebook to register to vote before 7 June to have a say in the referendum. While the Government cannot meet the requests set out in the letter of the noble Lord, Lord Roberts, to the Prime Minister to do more between now and 7 June as this would contravene the rules of purdah which kick in tomorrow, they have been doing their bit, as has the Electoral Commission.

I will write to the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, on her questions about what more the Electoral Commission is doing between now and 7 June, and on the point that the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, made about Facebook. Both those points were well made. I applaud the points made by the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, on national insurance numbers, which I will look into immediately I leave this Chamber. I can assure her that mystery shopping takes place across the government network but I completely take her point, which was very well made. If she looks at the satisfaction levels on GOV.UK, they appear to be high. Again, that is not to say that there is not action that needs to be taken—and soon.

On top of all this, we are looking beyond the referendum to keep up the momentum. We will enable local authorities to pilot more innovative approaches to maintaining their registers in 2016 and 2017, working with civil society organisations and others to develop new ways to reach underregistered groups. For example, we will create a registration academy so that local registration teams can understand, learn from and emulate the best results from successful projects around the country. To respond to the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, who knows so much about this issue, the Government are working with a range of organisations—the British Youth Council, UpRising and Mencap to name just some of them—to ratchet up registration among underrepresented groups and improve engagement. On meeting groups keen to increase registration, my honourable friend John Penrose, the Minister responsible for these issues, met and continues to meet regularly with such groups.

I will now address the question asked by my noble friend Lord Lexden, which he has asked a number of times before and does so with tenacity. Why do the Government not follow the successful example of the Northern Ireland school initiative and give guidance to electoral registration officers to go into schools? EROs are already free to work with local schools and colleges in their area and many already do. Local authorities are well placed to understand local differences and target their voter registration activity as they see fit. More than 140,000 16 and 17 year-olds have applied to register to vote since the start of this year. We should not assume that the initiative in Northern Ireland would work in the rest of the UK as there are differences with the electoral system and the structures in Northern Ireland. Therefore, the Government see no reason to legislate for such an initiative.

We are certainly not complacent on this matter. We are doing all we can to ensure that those who are eligible to vote, and to register to vote, do so. I hope we can all agree that we will continue to discuss how we can work together to ensure that every eligible citizen can have their say at the ballot box in years to come.