Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lord Harper and Robert Syms

Monday 28th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Harper]

I have a constituency interest, as constituents of mine took advantage of the scheme. The hon. Gentleman is right—it was not abused, but it was nearing the end of its natural life this year, because it was open only to those from Bulgaria and Romania, and they will be able to come to the United Kingdom in any event after transitional controls have been withdrawn. We had to choose whether to create a new scheme, and we decided that we did not need to do so because sufficient labour was available in the European Union. However, I can assure the hon. Gentleman that we will continue to keep the matter under review, along with other Departments, to ensure that our agricultural industry is not damaged in any way.

[Mr Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

15. What plans she has to make it easier to deport foreign terrorists and criminals.

Electoral Registration and Administration Bill

Debate between Lord Harper and Robert Syms

Monday 18th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Harper]

The right hon. Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson) and a number of others raised a point about service personnel. About 75% of our service personnel are registered to vote. I will not be quite as harsh to Labour Members as one or two of my hon. Friends were, because, admittedly, their Government made some progress, on that as on many other issues involved in the Bill. Some of my hon. Friends took every opportunity to harry Labour Members, but they did make progress, although, as was pointed out by my hon. Friend the Member for Epping Forest (Mrs Laing), who has now left the Chamber, they did so only at the last possible moment. At the time of the most recent general election, they made specific arrangements to enable our service personnel stationed in Afghanistan to vote.

One of the problems involves the electoral timetable, which, for general elections, is quite tight. I will not go into that in detail now, because we will deal with it when we reach clause 13, but one of our reasons for wanting to extend the timetable is our wish to ensure that overseas voters, both service personnel and others, have a much more realistic chance of casting a vote themselves, by post, rather than having to rely on appointing a proxy. I think that if they could vote by post and had an opportunity to make their votes count, more of them would feel incentivised to do so. When our troops are deployed overseas in significant locations, we will repeat the exercise that the Labour Government organised for the general election and we organised for the referendum on the alternative vote, and take specific steps to enable our service personnel to participate. Like my hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall (Dan Rogerson), I am very pleased that we are retaining the first-past-the-post system for the foreseeable future.

[Mr Syms]

Is not one of the good by-products of five-year fixed Parliaments the fact that everyone will know the most likely date of a general election well in advance? That will make electoral registration for central and local government, and the build-up to it, much easier to deal with.

[Mr Harper]

Yes, that will make a difference. My hon. Friend the Member for The Cotswolds (Geoffrey Clifton-Brown) gave some statistics. In the December 2010 register, which followed the most recent general election, 32,000 electors were registered to vote overseas—which, admittedly, is not a huge number in comparison with the 4.3 million cited by my hon. Friend—but by the following year, the figure had fallen to 23,000. It appears that the incentive of the general election is a spur to registration, as it is for domestically residing voters. I think that knowing when an election will take place will help both registration officers and people living overseas.

My hon. Friend referred to the attestation requirements involved in the registration process. I know that they can pose difficulties, especially in countries where there are not many other British citizens. We are trying to establish whether there is anything that we could do. If we need to alter the requirements, we can do so by changing secondary legislation. We are also considering a trial of online registration, which I think could help not just voters living in the United Kingdom, but those living overseas.

That brings me to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall about communication. The Government are currently trialling—without universal approbation from Members on both sides of the House—a website featuring statements from all the candidates for the police and crime commissioner elections, which will then be promoted by the Electoral Commission and in the material that goes to voters. We may consider a similar procedure for a general election, with an eye on overseas voters.

I should also say to my hon. Friend that overseas voters can vote only in parliamentary elections. That makes their relationship with their local councillors slightly less consequential, but it also means that their votes are not just about who their Member of Parliament will be but about what flows from that, namely who will govern their country—and they are, of course interested in that.

My hon. Friend the Member for The Cotswolds made the important point that most British citizens overseas are working there, winning orders for Britain and working for British companies that bring wealth into this country. It is important for them to have an opportunity to contribute to the decision on who will govern the country.

Fixed-term Parliaments Bill

Debate between Lord Harper and Robert Syms

Wednesday 13th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Harper]

I disagree with my hon. Friend. Even if we successfully push our proposals through in their current form, and we have the first set of such elections in 2015, most Members of the other place will still be unelected. Secondly, regardless of how many Members of the other place are elected, we are talking about primacy. Effectively, the amendments would move power away from this House to the other place. Whatever one’s views about House of Lords reform, I picked up clearly from our earlier debate that most Members of this place want it to be clear that this place has primacy over their lordships’ House. The amendments, perhaps inadvertently, would lead to a different situation.

[Mr Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

Under the Bill, a large number of Members of the House must vote for a Dissolution. The person who decides whether there is a general election is, therefore, the Leader of the Opposition, because if the Government and the Opposition want a Dissolution, it happens. Under the amendments, the House of Lords would effectively be taking power away from the Leader of the Opposition, who would be in a position to provide the numbers for a Dissolution.

[Mr Harper]

I agree. The fact remains that we are taking powers away from this House and giving them to the other place. It has been clear to me from our earlier debates that that view is not widely shared in this House, and indeed, interestingly, it does not appear to be widely shared in the other place. As I observed from careful reading of the report of the debates there, many speakers were very concerned about the primacy of this House, which was good of them. They said that they did not want to damage it in any way. Plainly their support for the amendments was inadvertent; they may not have thought through the consequences fully. I therefore think it would be sensible for this House to disagree with their lordships, and to give them an opportunity to reconsider their decision and return the Bill to the form in which it left this House.

Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Debate between Lord Harper and Robert Syms

Monday 18th October 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Harper]

That is a very helpful intervention, because my hon. Friend will know that in the programme motion that I laid before the House last week we made provision for the House to sit until 11 o’clock this evening, which, notwithstanding Mr Speaker’s decision to allow an urgent question, means that the House will have more time today to debate those matters than it would have had if we had not tabled the motion. I am very keen to ensure that the House makes progress. That is not entirely in my hands—it depends on every Member ensuring that we can debate all these important matters—but I certainly want to reach that debate and will do my best from the Dispatch Box to ensure that we do.

Government amendment 262 mirrors the position for UK parliamentary and European elections and is necessary to ensure that counting officers and regional counting officers are suitably equipped to conduct the referendum poll.

Government amendment 270 provides that across the United Kingdom the polling stations allocated for the referendum will be the same as those allotted to electors for UK parliamentary elections. The amendment also provides that where special circumstances arise, the counting officer can allot different polling stations.

The Government have tabled amendments 168 and 169 at the request of the Electoral Commission. Paragraph 5 of the schedule gives the chief counting officer a power to direct regional counting officers and counting officers in the discharge of their functions at the referendum. The amendments clarify the extent of the power of direction and specify that it includes any planning and preparatory steps essential to the smooth running of the poll. That will enable the chief counting officer to require regional counting officers and counting officers to provide copies of plans, risk registers or other things that demonstrate that they are, or will be, discharging their functions in accordance with the chief counting officer’s directions. We believe that the amendments are necessary to enable the chief counting officer to prepare, plan and manage the poll effectively and to ensure compliance with any directions issued within the scope of her power.

Amendments 265 and 266 allow for the fees that are paid to counting officers and regional counting officers for delivering the referendum on the voting system to be reduced in circumstances where they fail to meet an adequate standard of performance.

[Mr Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

Is there any provision for a recount if the poll is very, very close? There have been several incidents across the world with hanging chads and so on. Have the Government thought about that possibility?

[Mr Harper]

My hon. Friend will have noted that we are going to debate recounts under amendments 153 and 154 to schedule 2. I am sure that if he waits for that point in the debate, we will be able to engage in some dialogue.

The approach that I have outlined will apply only to the fee paid for the performance of a counting officer’s duty relating to the referendum. It will not impact on the level of expenses that the same person can claim for carrying out their duties in their capacity as the returning officer for the election.