Electoral Registration Data Schemes Order 2012

Lord Rennard Excerpts

Monday 25th June 2012 Grand Committee

With regard to the order before us today, I hope that Committee Members see the merits of this second trial and the benefits that it will have for strengthening our electoral registration system and ensuring that it is complete as well as accurate. I hope that the Committee will approve the order.

[Lord Rennard]

My Lords, I wonder at the outset whether the Minister might be prepared to make a short statement of principle about the purpose behind the orders. What I want to hear particularly is that the underlying purpose is at least as much about the completeness of the electoral register as it is its accuracy. That will be crucial in approving the direction in which the Government are travelling.

Perhaps I may ask him specifically about the decision not to provide a full regulatory impact assessment of the orders. The Government state that there should be no impact on the private sector, but potentially reducing significantly the completeness of the electoral register could have a big impact there. I know that the credit reference agencies have made a number of representations to the Government on this issue. We think nowadays about the way in which many businesses do business. They do it online over the internet; they provide goods and services to people to addresses that people fill in online. If they are unable to check the accuracy of those addresses, as they generally do on the electoral register, there could be a detrimental impact on business if we fail on the key issue of completeness of the electoral register.

It seems to me that the success of the transition to individual electoral registration will be hugely important for elections post the general election due in May 2015. It will be less important for the election of May 2015 because of the carry-forward provisions, but will be hugely important for elections in future. It will be hugely important to the boundary review process for future boundary reviews—not the present one, based on the current registration process—but for those due to begin on 1 December 2015. Will the Minister confirm that it is crucial to have independent verification of the success of the move towards independent electoral registration, of which these instruments are a part, before it is considered safe to proceed either with elections under the new system or with future boundary reviews?

I have a question on a detail that emerged from the previous pilots which the Minister now suggests will be addressed in future pilots. It was discovered in the initial pilots that quite a few people were eligible to be on the electoral register. The DWP database showed clearly beyond any reasonable doubt that these people were entitled to be on the electoral register, but they were not on it. I understand from the order that in future pilots, if people are entitled to be on the electoral register and it is clear beyond the shadow of a doubt that they should be on it, they will be chased to get them on to it. That would seem to be commendable, but if we know beyond a shadow of a doubt that someone should be on the register, why should we chase them to get them on to it?

I can see that if we followed models that I have advocated in the past that require a signature as part of the registration process, you could chase these people for a signature. However, if the DWP database has their national insurance number, name and address, and all satisfactory methods show that they should be on the electoral register, why chase them? If they are to be chased, how do we know that they will be chased effectively and consistently? It would be a great shame if, in chasing these people, some individual electoral registration officers sent a very cursory letter and left it at that, while others used best practice and perhaps sent a series of repeat letters or e-mails pointing out the likely future sanctions if people failed to comply with what will be a legal requirement. In making sure that this works effectively, there will probably be a requirement for ring-fenced funding for local authorities to make sure that they do their job in relation to this. I very much look forward to the Government’s and the Electoral Commission’s evaluation of these pilots.