Electoral Registration and Administration Bill

Debate between Lord Wills and Lord Falconer of Thoroton

Monday 14th January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wills]

My Lords—

[Lord Falconer of Thoroton]

My Lords—

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Falconer of Thoroton]

He withdrew his amendment at the end of the debate, making it absolutely clear that there was no support for the idea that solicitors should become High Court judges. That was the reason he withdrew it. However, as I understand it, the Leader of the House and the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, have said that there is some convention that you should not move the amendment. The approach of the Leader of the House in urging my noble friend Lord Hart to withdraw his amendment, and as I understand it the approach of the noble Lord, Lord True, is that the right thing here is that the advice of the clerks, which I greatly respect, is not advice but a definitive ruling against which there is no appeal.

I have referred to the fact that amendments relating to registration were allowed to the boundary changes Bill. The obvious reason for that is that, in relation to a Bill about boundaries, it was accepted that registration is a vital building block in how to fix the boundaries. It is important, when applying the rules of admissibility, to show both common sense and consistency. The thing that really matters in relation to the new—

[Lord Wills]

Very briefly on this point of relevance, perhaps I may draw the attention of my noble and learned friend to Clause 16 of this Bill which, like this amendment, deals with electoral boundaries. It deals with the reviewing of boundaries, as does this amendment. Both Clause 16 and the amendment deal with the timing of the reviews, not their outcome. Does my noble and learned friend agree that that makes the amendment admissible in the context of this Bill?

[Lord Falconer of Thoroton]

I do not know if your Lordships have noticed, but it is my personal view that this is an admissible amendment because it is relevant. If you fundamentally change the system of registration—the Government have described the effect of this Bill as being the most important change to registration for 100 years—that is bound to have a very significant effect on the boundaries that are to be fixed for individual constituencies. The best analogy I can think of is this. Let us suppose there was a Bill to double the length of sentence for anyone given a sentence of imprisonment. Would the clerks or this House take the view that you could not have an amendment which said, “Before you introduce these longer sentences, make sure that you have enough prison places”? Would it be argued that because the subject matter of the Bill was sentencing, you could not deal with the issue of prison places? That is the closest analogy.

This is a situation where constituency boundaries are determined by the numbers of registered voters. If you are going to change the registration system, that is bound to have an effect on the boundary changes. What is the effect of the amendment? It would delay the boundary changes by five years, which does not mean that they must be changed in five years’ time, but that they must be “not before” a period of five years. The consequence of such an amendment would be an opportunity to look at the effect of individual registration. As has been pointed out by my noble friend Lord Hart, we already have pilots which suggest that there is a low rate of striking in relation to the new individual registration. That is what you would expect. Currently, household registration allows the head of the household to register everyone. The effect of individual registration, coupled with the need to prove that you are the person you say you are, inevitably makes the process more cumbersome. There are considerable benefits, but the effect inevitably will be to reduce the coverage of the electoral register.

In addition to those arguments, it is plain that we are in a situation of limbo because it is not clear upon what basis, in terms of constituencies, the election that is bound to take place by May 2015 will take effect. This is an admissible amendment. This is a relevant amendment. It is an amendment that this House can rule on. There are very strong arguments for delaying the introduction of the new method of registration because if you do not, you will end up with a substantial group of people, mostly the dispossessed, who are not registered and will thus take no part whatever in our democracy. I strongly advise the House to feel able to vote on this amendment and I strongly advise noble Lords to support it.

Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Debate between Lord Wills and Lord Falconer of Thoroton

Tuesday 8th February 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Renton of Mount Harry]

I confess that I was not proposing to speak to this amendment, but I have just listened to the noble Lord, Lord Wills, who I believe was Minister for Constitutional Affairs in another place, and I have to say to him that, frankly, I have rarely read a paragraph that horrified me as much as the one on his committee of inquiry. It seems to me that he is going down absolutely the wrong route by proposing a committee of inquiry composed of,

“a High Court judge … members of both Houses of Parliament … representatives of the principal political parties in the House of Commons as well as individuals with no party attachment, and others”.

That is a joke. The inquiry would go on for ever and would not reach sensible conclusions. We in this House and the other House are expert in what is required here.

[Lord Falconer of Thoroton]

As the noble Lord, Lord Renton, will know, my noble friend Lord Wills’ provision states that they have to produce a report within three years. So it will not go on for ever.

[Lord Wills]

I am very grateful to my noble friend Lord Falconer for pointing that out. Perhaps I may also say to the noble Lord, Lord Renton, that this committee is based on what used to be known as a royal commission. I was told by the powers in this House that I could not refer to it as a royal commission, but the royal commission, as he ought to know, has a very long and distinguished provenance. If he has read my remarks in the earlier debate on this amendment he will have seen that the period of time provided by the amendment is pretty much the average time given to the last 12 royal commissions that have reported.

Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Debate between Lord Wills and Lord Falconer of Thoroton

Monday 17th January 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wills]

To that very point, I have been trying to get in to speak to contribute something new to the debate, which is something of which the noble Lord will not be aware. That was my experience of dealing specifically with these issues and the process for dealing with them when I was the Minister responsible for them. He will not have known this, because obviously, it is a convention that the previous Government’s dealings are not passed to the new Government, so this would be new. I wonder whether he would allow me to share that information with the House before he commences his remarks.

[Lord Falconer of Thoroton]

I think that there the sense that we should go on for a bit. Some noble Lords opposite are shaking their heads; there is a very strong sense from behind me that we should go on—the norm should be followed.

[Lord Strathclyde]

Perhaps I should not have given way to the noble Lord, Lord Wills.

This has been a great debate. I can tell the House—

[Lord Wills]

My Lords—

[Lord Falconer of Thoroton]

My Lords—