Angela Eagle
Main Page: Angela Eagle (Labour - Wallasey)Department Debates - View all Angela Eagle's debates with the Cabinet Office
(6 years, 7 months ago)
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Urgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
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Chloe Smith
That is precisely right. We are talking about a precious and intangible thing: the right to vote as we think fit and the right to enjoy confidence in the democratic system. That is what these pilots are about. My hon. Friend allows me to repeat the point that I would very much like to go out to citizens of the pilot areas. If anyone is concerned that they might not have the ID that is being spoken about, they should speak to the local authority, which will organise alternative arrangements. That is the crucial point—nobody who is eligible to vote will miss the chance to do so.
Ms Angela Eagle (Wallasey) (Lab)
The Minister is making a pretty poor job of defending the indefensible. Is it not the case that what she is setting out today is not only a huge hammer to crack a nut but actually, in disguise, a blatant attempt at voter suppression, by making it very difficult indeed for those who already have difficulties to vote? Many of those people come to visit me in my advice surgery because they cannot prove their identity to access benefits; she now wants to take their democratic rights off them.
Chloe Smith
We are talking about people who are already eligible to vote then being able to confirm who they are when they come to do so. I am concerned that I have just heard from the hon. Lady that she does not even stand by the previous Labour Government’s decision to do this in Northern Ireland, which has not damaged turnout and has reduced the impact of fraud. Why does she stand against reducing electoral fraud?