Individual Electoral Registration

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Wednesday 15th September 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Harper]

Again, as with my hon. Friends the Members for Chichester and for New Forest East, I have clearly heard what my hon. Friend the Member for Pendle (Andrew Stephenson) has said. I cannot add anything to what I said before—that I will reflect further on the matter.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

Only 84% of registration forms are returned in Newcastle because we are a large city with a large student and deprived population. I have always considered it to be a crime that people should lose their right to vote because of a moment’s inattention. In the new coalition Government’s “big society”, is the Minister saying that there is no obligation to register to vote?

[Mr Harper]

No, I did not say that at all. What I said was that with the current household registration, where one is not just responsible for one’s individual vote but for other people’s too, the law requires that when sent a form or approached for information, one has to give it. When this becomes one’s individual responsibility and the only person affected is yourself, I simply said that I did not think that it should be a matter for the criminal law.

On the issue of why people choose not to register to vote, the most common reason given is that people have moved house so that voting was not high up on the list of things to be done. For an awful lot of people—almost a fifth of those not registered—it happens because they have not bothered. As MPs and politicians, we all have to persuade electors that they should bother to register. Then, when they have registered, the next challenge is to give them a reason for coming out and using their vote at elections—something that does not happen enough today.