Electoral Registration and Administration Act 2013 (Transitional Provisions) Order 2015

Lord Garel-Jones Excerpts

Tuesday 27th October 2015 Lords Chamber

The second excuse is even more ludicrous. Ministers claim that some or many or most of those 1.9 million entries on the electoral register may be false and potentially fraudulent—what? This is the register on which the general election was fought. Are Ministers really now saying that the whole election could have been based on a wildly inaccurate, potentially fraudulent register? What is the evidence for that? Why have the commission or the Government not demanded an inquiry? Are Ministers now challenging the outcome of the election on those grounds? Anyone can see that claiming now that the electoral register used this year is somehow so defunct as to be an instrument of fraud is a pretty thin veil over the real reasons for this blatant gerrymander.

[Lord Garel-Jones (Con)]

Is it not the case, for example, that the Council of Europe has made it very clear that household registration is an open door to corruption?

[Lord Tyler]

That is precisely why we are moving towards IER, which my party and I personally have warmly supported and, during the coalition Government, sought to make sure was being effectively implemented at the local level.

I turn to the propriety of this Motion. There was much talk yesterday of what this House can and cannot do and what it should and should not do. This Motion is our one chance to do our duty to the voters. There is no middle way of delay or prevarication.

In any case, this Motion is quite distinctly different from any of those we debated yesterday. First, both Houses agreed primary legislation in 2013 which insisted that any order made to end the transitional period early might be, must be or could be annulled by either House of Parliament. This specific protection was built into the legislation precisely to withhold from the Executive an unfettered right to tamper with the electoral register. Secondly, of course, there is a precedent for the Lords voting down secondary legislation on matters of election law. Indeed, Conservative and Liberal Democrat Peers voted together to defeat such an order in 2000 when the then Government attempted to deny candidates for the Greater London Authority the chance to mail electors. Thirdly, in opposition Conservative Peers moved several other Motions to kill off similar secondary legislation. As is also apparent, the Conservatives made absolutely no mention of this change in their manifesto.

Parliament has a special responsibility to listen to the Electoral Commission—by law. It reminds us that we have not just a right but a duty to oppose this order. Ministers should be ashamed of this unilateral attempt to undermine the IER transition process, to skew the boundary review and, in so doing, to challenge the authority and integrity of the statutory independent commission set up precisely to advise us all on these issues. They hoped they would get away with it unnoticed. But they have been found out and now we in this House must, on behalf of voters, do our duty. I beg to move.

Amendment to the Motion