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

Debate between Lord Purvis of Tweed and Lord Empey

Tuesday 27th October 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Empey]

I say to the noble Lord, Lord Tyler, that people can be on the register in a particular constituency, but that does not mean that they are not on the register in a different constituency. That is the point that I made in the student example. We found that people registered in their place of residence at home registered again when they came up to the university area. When they had to produce a national insurance number we could tell that people were registered in two different places and they got knocked off in one place but were still on the register in another. That practice is widespread and well known.

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

Does the noble Lord acknowledge that the Electoral Commission report which has been cited has taken all that into consideration? It did a very good and nuanced report that looked at the risks and benefits. It concluded, as my noble friend Lord Tyler indicated, that given the five weeks’ notice and potentially the 250,000 people affected by this in Scotland alone, it was not right to bring forward the closure of the transition period. The more targeted approach that he is asking for is best conducted over the normal timeframe which the Electoral Commission and the EROs have operated under existing processes.

[Lord Empey]

First, I do not accept that the scale of the problem is as large as the noble Lord suggests. As to the five weeks, our experience is that this process has been going on for quite some time—it is not as if it has come from nowhere. We are talking about the opportunity at least to bring it to a conclusion. However, the period after 1 December is not a period in which nothing can happen. People can continue to register. I hope the Minister has listened seriously to what the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, has said. It has been done before and it works if it is targeted. If we are drawing up new boundaries in parallel, the best thing to do is get on with it, draw the line, bring it to a head and provide the resources to target the groups that are traditionally underrepresented. If the effort is made we will end up with a very accurate register. However, the Government should go further. The noble Lord, Lord Wills, made a fair point when he mentioned ID. I do not understand why people should not be asked for their identity when they go to a polling station. It is a very basic thing to do. The postal voting system is mad. There is a lot of work to do and the problem with this process is that the Government are not going far enough.