Overseas Electors Bill (Third sitting)

Bob Stewart Excerpts

Wednesday 31st October 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Christian Matheson]

What a great pleasure it is to see you in the Chair, Ms McDonagh. I may be incorrect, but I think this is the first time that I have served under your chairmanship in my three and a half years in this place, in which I still consider myself richly privileged to serve.

My amendments and new clauses would require a detailed review of absent voting arrangements. I have some problems with the Bill in principle, including an objection to the idea of people continuing to have a vote when they have lived overseas for many years and have no direct connection with this country. However, these amendments reflect concerns not about the principle of the Bill, but about how its proposals will be administered.

My staff and I have sought the advice of local electoral administrators and the Association of Electoral Administrators to understand the administrative burdens and pressures that the Bill would place on them. Local administrators are charged with upholding our democracy by maintaining the integrity of electoral registrations; they need to ensure that everybody who should be allowed to register can do so, but that those who seek to exploit the register for nefarious reasons are exposed, caught out and dealt with. As with previous amendments, I have sought a response at least from the Minister and from the Member in charge, my good friend the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire.

The amendments would request consideration for the administrative burdens that might fall on local electoral registration officers, often at a time when the pressure on them is at a maximum—we know from past practice in election years that most people seek to register as voters only when an election is called. Given the current state of confusion surrounding absent voting arrangements for overseas voters, the Government need to carry out proper investigations into the reasons for that patchy record. Sufficient time is required for any absent voter arrangements to be put in place, so that overseas electors can cast their vote at the election or referendum in time for it to be counted.

The hon. Member for Kingswood, who is a former Minister, made a very helpful contribution last week, explaining that the timing issue is central to the way the timetable is worked out. It is worked back from polling day, and there are other considerations such as the close of nominations and laying out a suitable period for postal votes. As we already have that timetable in place, reviewing how it might be affected by a large increase in absent voting and postal voting might be a useful exercise to undertake before the Bill becomes law so that electoral registration officers are fully prepared for the arduous task that they may well face.

I am requesting a review to consider whether the current voting arrangements grant sufficient time for overseas electors to participate adequately in parliamentary elections. Furthermore, I share the concerns of the Association of Electoral Administrators that there needs to be greater emphasis on encouraging overseas electors to establish clear absent voting arrangements and to do so in good time. Failure to prepare absent voting arrangements serves to further burden our already overworked and dedicated electoral staff.

Currently the deadline to apply as an overseas elector and for absent voting arrangements is polling day minus 12 —I think this is getting to the point that the hon. Member for Kingswood alluded to last week. Absent voting arrangements refer to any form of voting not carried out at the polling station, with proxy voting and postal voting being the two principal mechanisms. In order to vote, overseas electors have three options; they can vote by post, by proxy or in person if they happen to be in the UK on election day. It is vital that those three options function efficiently in the run-up to elections. A review of the current system of absent voting for overseas voters is necessary before the Government consider enfranchising millions of new overseas voters. Indeed, a number of significant faults have been exposed in recent elections that need to be reviewed and resolved before we are ready to take the next step of expanding the franchise as significantly as is proposed.

At both the EU referendum in 2016 and the UK parliamentary elections in 2015, the processing of absent voting applications for overseas voters was a real challenge for EROs. The AEA has outlined a number of areas of concern relating to absent voting arrangements. It fears that difficulties experienced between 2015 and 2017 will only be exacerbated with the removal of the 15-year rule. One significant issue relates to the failure of many overseas voters to provide absent voting information. In what has become a commonplace occurrence, a significant number of overseas electors did not request absent voting facilities when originally applying to register. That resulted in administrators spending significant time contacting, or attempting to contact, those individuals to seek their instructions, and in numerous situations whereby overseas electors were registered but were unable to participate without returning to their polling station.

I will dwell on that point for a moment. The Association of Electoral Administrators talks about its members making a proactive attempt to contact overseas voters to encourage them to make suitable arrangements. That electoral registration officers will do that speaks not only to their dedication, but to the additional workload that will need to be supported, particularly if we increase the franchise as greatly as is proposed.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

I presume that British embassies have some sort of form or instructions for overseas voters. An overseas voter who wants to find out what is going on could go to the embassy if perhaps they did not have a computer or were not on the internet, for example.

[Christian Matheson]

I have to say that I do not know the answer to that question. The hon. and gallant Gentleman is probably better versed in international affairs than I am. That is precisely the kind of question that could be asked as part of such a review. The Cabinet Office Minister who will be responsible for implementing the Bill could well speak to their counterparts in the Foreign Office to find out what support and information is and, perhaps more importantly, should be available via British embassies and our network of high commissions and, in larger countries, consulates. That is a very interesting suggestion, which deserves deeper consideration. That is the intention behind the amendment.

Following the Bill’s passage, EROs will inevitably be overburdened by the intense administrative cost of registering the influx of new overseas voters. Given that extra workload, it seems only fair to grant EROs more time to process absent vote forms. At the very least, a review of the procedure is required.

At previous elections, there were issues with electors having limited understanding or unrealistic expectations of the process. Many applied for postal votes when they were unlikely to receive and return them in time. The significant spike in applications for postal votes in the lead-up to a general election inevitably places EROs under stress, as they are overburdened with applications in the short period before the election. That is despite the fact, which I have already referred to, that some go out of their way to try to resolve proactively the problems that electors face, in addition to dealing with complaints or queries from domestically resident voters on the register.

Many overseas voters who applied for postal voting expected to be sent a postal vote immediately. That is simply unrealistic and puts too much strain on EROs in the lead-up to a general election. In addition, some overseas voters appointed a proxy who themselves lived a distance from the local authority area in which the overseas elector was registered. Again, that led to many votes remaining uncast, simply because the proxy could not attend the relevant polling station.

Electoral administrators faced unnecessary and unreasonable criticism as a result of those issues. The process of applying for an absentee vote is convoluted and difficult. The AEA has raised that issue on many occasions, especially in view of the Government’s proposal to remove the 15-year registration period for overseas electors. Will the Minister consider whether her Department has responded to the AEA’s concerns? What consideration has it given to those issues?

Have the Government considered reviewing the proxy voting process for newly eligible overseas voters if the Bill passes? It may be difficult for voters who have lived abroad for decades even to find a proxy. They may lack any personal connection to their old constituency. Will regulations be put in place to require the proxy to live in the constituency? I do not believe that is the case at the moment, but I am interested to know whether this is necessary.

The AEA’s position on that matter is unequivocal. It stated:

“In view of this time limit being removed, consideration needs to be given to the deadline being brought forward for overseas electors to register so that it allows sufficient time to process and check previous revisions of registers, followed by documentary evidence or attestations being provided, if necessary. In addition, sufficient time is required to arrange for any absent vote arrangements to be put in place so that the overseas elector can cast their vote at the election or referendum in time for it to be counted.”

In moving other amendments, other hon. Members and I have suggested that people should have a greater responsibility, or be required to provide greater proof, to demonstrate a connection to a particular constituency. That may have seemed onerous, particularly when we were considering previous clauses. However, there is an argument that doing that earlier and making those applications much more robust would mean that less work would need to be done closer to the deadline for people who have already been through the process and registered.

--- Later in debate ---

[Christian Matheson]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

Once again, I refer the Committee to our previous discussions about the administrative burden on electoral registration officers and the spikes in applications for electoral registration that always occur close to elections and when elections are announced. The new clause would introduce a provision to prompt UK citizens who are considering moving abroad or are in the process of moving to register as an overseas voter.

The Labour party is committed to taking radical steps to increase voter registration and turnout. We feel that it is important to use the Bill to encourage overseas voters to register in the early stages of moving abroad. That would not only reduce the workload of EROs, who must send out reminders to encourage new overseas voters to register, but strengthen our democratic culture by encouraging voter registration. If new overseas voters register early, they will be more likely to remain invested and engaged in British politics in the long term. Of course, the purpose behind the Bill is to get people who have perhaps lived abroad for more than 15 years involved and give them a stake in the electoral process.

The basic structure of electoral registration has remained unchanged for many years. Under the current structure, it is electoral registration officers’ duty to ensure that the voting register is as accurate and complete as possible, to conduct an annual household canvass, and to issue and chase inquiry forms. Household inquiry forms are sent to every household to confirm the details of those living at the property. Although the forms do not directly generate new registrations, they are critical to producing information about voters across the country.

Under the new clause, any information suggesting that a British person is moving or has moved abroad would trigger a prompt from the ERO to encourage them to put themselves on the voter register abroad.

[Bob Stewart]

On the practicalities of sending out a form to someone abroad every year, presumably that would be quite an expense to the electoral system. I presume that the people abroad who want to stay on the roll will have to send a letter back, and will have to pay for the postage.

[Christian Matheson]

I thank the hon. and gallant Gentleman for his intervention. That is the current situation. The purpose behind the new clause is to ensure that people register at the outset so that we avoid spikes in registration in the immediate lead-up to an election period when, given everything else that is going on, electoral registration officers are at their busiest, their work is at its most hectic and they are under the most careful of examinations. As we saw in constituencies across the UK at the previous general election, there was not just a flurry of late registrations, but in certain constituencies there were complaints afterwards that people had not been allowed to vote, even though they felt they had registered in time. In some circumstances, they had confirmation that they had been registered, but they were not on the register. The new clause is intended to avoid that. The problem that the hon. and gallant Gentleman mentions would not necessarily have been avoided anyway.