Representation of the People Bill

Ellie Chowns Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 2nd March 2026 Commons Chamber

[Dr Ellie Chowns (North Herefordshire) (Green)]

Why don’t you tell your party leader?

[Danny Kruger]

That is our party position.

The importance of ruling out foreign interference in our democracy has been made repeatedly in the debate. Let me actually address the glaring foreign interference that we have, and which we saw in Gorton and Denton last week. I am sorry to say that it has not been mentioned in the debate so far. We have been talking about one disgraceful incident while mass abuse of our democracy has been going on.

It appears from the evidence of independent observers that as many as two thirds of polling stations had compromised voting in that election last week. As many as one in eight votes may have been cast under coercion—under pressure of family voting. That is a deplorable state of affairs, and it should be the focus of the whole House to understand what happened.

It is important that we speak truthfully and honestly in this place, so I will say what is clearly true and what we all know: we are talking about south-east Asian communities, as has been clearly and objectively demonstrated in the past. We are talking about people taking their orders on how to vote from mosques and from clans—often direct from Pakistan. We are seeing the criminal abuse of democracy by Labour—

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[Danny Kruger]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I am sorry if I inadvertently suggested that it was a party that was abusing our electoral system. What I am actually suggesting is that there is abuse of our electoral system through an influential network that applies in these constituencies. That appears to be the case.

[Dr Chowns]

Does the hon. Gentleman not recognise that the resounding victory of my hon. Friend the new Member for Gorton and Denton (Hannah Spencer) in the by-election was a victory for hope over hate? And does he not recognise that he sounds like an extremely bad loser?

[Danny Kruger]

I should have started by congratulating the new hon. Member on her personal victory. I am, however, very concerned about the circumstances in which many of those votes were cast. I am not plucking this concern out of the air; it is clearly apparent that there is widespread concern, and this is not the first time that it has happened.

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[Dr Ellie Chowns (North Herefordshire) (Green)]

Madam Deputy Speaker, you will know that I like to start with the positives and the areas of common ground. I warmly welcome the fact that this Bill has come forward and a number of measures in it. It is very positive that the Government are taking forward votes at 16—something that the Green party has campaigned for since the year dot.

It is really good that there is some commitment to improving transparency on political funding. I very much welcome what the Secretary of State was saying earlier about getting rid of the political control of the strategy and policy statement over the Electoral Commission. I also welcome the increase in the commission’s fining capacity. Those are all really positive measures, but there is much more to do. We need stronger action to stop disinformation, get dirty money out of politics and improve trust in our political system.

Briefly, on votes at 16, let me say that 16 and 17-year-olds are engaged, active, interested and really passionate about the political system. It is right that they should be—they will have to live with the decisions that we make for longer than any of the rest of us—so I very much welcome the extension of the franchise. As young people themselves say, it is crucial that the investment is made in supporting political literacy, both in schools and more broadly, to ensure that young people—and all of us—have the political literacy to engage actively in the political process, which is an increasing challenge because of the grave threat of disinformation. We have heard from the hon. Member for Mid Norfolk (George Freeman) and a range of other Members about the problems, and there is a clear need to place duties on the large online platforms to ensure that AI-generated or manipulated content is flagged and controlled.

While the Rycroft review is very welcome, it is not enough, and serious concerns remain about external influence on our politics. I repeat my call for a Mueller-style investigation into Russian and other influence on British politics. We need to know what attacks were made in 2016 and since so that we can have greater clarity and transparency over our politics.

I warmly welcome the points made by the hon. Member for Ellesmere Port and Bromborough (Justin Madders) about the importance of a transparent register of political adverts. We need to know who is saying what to who so that there is transparency, because currently we do not know that, and really disruptive and disinformative things are happening.

As the hon. Member for Lancaster and Wyre (Cat Smith) said, we must have, at a minimum, a cap on donations and a full ban on crypto-donations. That is critical. It is really quite extraordinary that the Thailand-based crypto investor Christopher Harborne has been allowed to donate £9 million to Reform UK—I notice that its Members are still not here. We also need annual spending limits, so that our politics is not distorted by money being spent around the edges of elections, for example.

What else is missing? We need to scrap voter ID, which is a barrier to political engagement and has no justification, and we need increased investigative powers—more money and teeth for the Electoral Commission. It is a profound irony that the Representation of the People Bill does not tackle the fundamental problem with our representation. True representation of the people requires seats to match votes and every vote to count equally, so I call on the Government to take this opportunity to bring forward proportional representation. Ensuring that everyone’s vote counts equally is the principled thing to do, and it is the popular thing to do.

[Caroline Voaden (South Devon) (LD)]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Dr Chowns]

I will not, because of the time. The British Social Attitudes survey shows that a majority of all political supporters are in favour of proportional representation, and of course, it is pragmatic and will improve our politics—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

Order. I call Florence Eshalomi.

Representation of the People Bill (First sitting)

Ellie Chowns Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 18th March 2026 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

Ms Chowns, we only have three minutes left, so I may not be able to come to others. Please be brief.

[Dr Ellie Chowns (North Herefordshire) (Green)]

Q Mr Bentley, I was really struck that you said twice in your answers that anything that makes voting easier for people has to be a good thing and should be supported. Mr Stanyon and Ms Yule, do you agree?

Peter Stanyon: Within the bounds of making sure the system is trusted, which goes back to the points that Emily made. Yes, it should be as easy as possible, but that cannot be at the cost of the integrity of the system.

[Dr Chowns]

Q Mr Bentley, having made that statement, do you agree that automatic voter registration makes it easier for people to participate in the democratic process?

Councillor Bentley: Yes, it does, but don’t forget that we have the right not to vote in this country. I make the same point again: we should test that with the public. It is their information we are talking about, and we should test that with them. It does make it easier, yes, but I think it is a question for the public to be consulted on.

[Dr Chowns]

Q To be clear, automatic voter registration is not compulsory voting; it simply makes people more able to vote. It is not forcing them to vote at all, so it would be a mistake to conflate the two.

Councillor Bentley: It is not, but you are automatically taking their data, and I think you need to ask permission for that.

[Dr Chowns]

Q Voter ID has clearly made it harder for people to vote—tens of thousands of people have been prevented from casting their vote in recent years—and it was introduced on the basis of virtually no evidence of cases of personation. Do you agree that the cost to people’s capacity to participate in the voting system from the introduction of voter ID far outweighs its argued benefits, and therefore there should be no voter ID requirement?

Councillor Bentley: Perhaps I should answer that first. It should be no problem to prove who you are—if you want to vote and take part in the democratic process, why shouldn’t you? I happen to vote by post, but if I did not, I constantly carry a driving licence, or I could find my passport. If you do not have either of those, what should you have? You can apply for a voter authority certificate from your local authority. I do not see harm in doing that, and I think it keeps everyone safe when they go to the ballot station and makes sure that the person voting is the person entitled to vote.

[Dr Chowns]

Q Thank you. Mr Stanyon, are you concerned about the effect of voter ID on the exclusion of people from voting?

Peter Stanyon: Yes, but I think the system in place has been developed to allow voter authority certificates and the like to be there to provide a safety net for those individuals. This is a difficult one for me to answer, because it comes into a policy area and involves personal views. The crucial bit from an administrative perspective is that whatever system is there for voter ID provision has to be smooth for the voter, and that could definitely be improved with the introduction of digital ID, for example.

[Dr Chowns]

And—

[The Chair]

Order. That brings us to the end of the time allotted for the Committee to ask questions of these witnesses. On behalf of the Committee, I thank the witnesses for their evidence and for their efforts in getting here this morning.

Examination of Witness

Vijay Rangarajan gave evidence.

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[The Chair]

We have eight minutes, so short questions and short answers, please.

[Dr Chowns]

Q I would like to ask your view on several things under the heading of political finance and disinformation. On political finance, could you comment on the benefits of a ban on crypto donations, on the potential benefits of a cap on individual donations, and on the potential benefits of an annual spending cap—not just a cap on spending during the regulated period—to avoid gaming of the system? On disinformation, do you think the Bill does enough to tackle disinformation?

Perhaps you could comment on proposals for an advert repository and for a ban on deepfakes. Do you think that a ban on deepfakes needs to operate not just during the regulated period, but also outside it?

Dr Garland: I will address those questions in that order. On crypto, yes, we would support a ban, or at least a moratorium, because there are many risks with crypto. They mirror the same risks in political finance across the board, but crypto is moving quicker than our regulations are keeping up, so we would very much support that being looked at.

On a donations cap, we are very out of step with most other European democracies, and comparable democracies, in having no ceiling at all on donations. That is a huge risk area and speaks to the risk around foreign donations as well. There is also a huge risk in how the public view our political finance regime. We heard earlier that confidence is pretty low. People see that millionaires have more influence in their democracy than they do, because we have moved so swiftly to an era where there are many multi-million pound donations. Having no ceiling at all is a risk, so I would very much support a donations cap. That can be supported by spending limits all year round, because quite often, the campaign does not limit itself to the regulated period. I would support that.

I would say that deepfakes are probably something for the other people you will be hearing from this afternoon; we have not looked at that area in detail. We have looked a lot at the imprints regime, and although I am very supportive of extending the imprints regime, it does not tell voters everything. An ad library would mean that we can increase transparency for voters, and enable them to see things such as who is paying for the ads and who they are targeted at. Often, that can highlight misinformation as well, so I would strongly support the amendment about an ad library.

[The Chair]

A short question from you, Mr Rushworth.

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[The Chair]

I do not think that that was part of Ms Murray’s question. Ms Jones, would you like to add anything?

Karen Jones: The experience in Wales is, I think, similar to what Malcolm just outlined for Scotland. We had small numbers—I am talking about very small numbers indeed—of people who turned up at polling stations without the correct ID, but with the passage of time, people will become more familiar with what is required. In devolved elections, we are seeing that people think they need to bring ID, so it does not present a problem in the devolved elections because people are over-providing rather than under-providing information.

[Dr Chowns]

Q I would like to return to the question of your experience of having the franchise extended to 16 and 17-year-olds, and particularly to the topic of political literacy. You have given a few examples of work there. What conversations are happening nationally to ensure maximum co-ordination and investment in supporting political literacy, particularly with the extension of the franchise? Is there anything further you would like to say on that? Do you feel that the Bill sufficiently addresses the issue, and what lessons can be learned for supporting political literacy among over-18s as well? Is there more to be done in that space, and what has your experience been in that arena?

Robert Nicol: Registration at 14 and votes at 16 have been embedded for quite some time, but I view this Bill—if it was to pass—as an opportunity to promote registration further. We are proud of the registration levels that we have been able to achieve, but there are still gaps and we want to make sure that we can narrow them as much as possible. I would welcome any involvement in trying to re-promote that across the franchise when the legislation does come into place.

The question of wider political literacy is quite interesting. We have heard much about the missing millions and so on in the Electoral Commission’s reports. No doubt, every single electoral registration officer wants to make sure that, for everybody who is eligible and wants to be registered, that facility is available to them in the format and means that best suit their needs.

The answer to political engagement and literacy will probably not come from a middle-aged guy. It will come from within our communities; that is where the engagement really has to happen. I think I am right in saying that there are particular funding streams available for some community groups around this. That has to be the appropriate way; the message that we are getting out there has to be delivered by trusted voices—people who are trusted in their communities to give accurate information. Some of the stuff that we give out is complex and difficult to understand. There is no single message or delivery method that will get that to everybody who needs it, so it is wider than just administrators in terms of enthusing the electorate, both to be registered and to actually take part in the process.

Malcolm Burr: It much depends on how much effort is made by everyone in the system. It is one thing having the right to vote, but our rights are arid without the feeling that participation makes a significant difference. It is always a work in progress. As an electoral administrator, it is a work in progress largely with our schools, and with the Electoral Commission, which does good work producing materials, generally. But of course, not all young people are in schools; you have to use other local media to encourage participation and show what the exercise of your right means practically.

As an anecdote, I always try to invite as many young people as the rules will allow to election counts. You see then where the process goes; you see what is done with your vote and how it makes a difference—along with other votes, obviously—and what candidates then say when they are elected or not elected, and what they talk about. It is very important to show that system and the difference that voting makes. In Scotland, we have the experience of the independence referendum in 2014. That showed, in respect of all groups, that when the electorate feel there is an issue at stake, they turn out in huge numbers to vote. That is the example of that.

As Robert Nicol said, accessibility is also important. We tend to think of accessibility in terms of voters with disabilities, but accessibility is beyond that; we have to look equally at how we reach hard-to-reach groups in the younger franchise. It is a combination of good publicity, good education and good appreciation, as much as possible, of how the voting system and casting your vote affects and changes things. It is a whole process. Sorry for the long answer.

Karen Jones: I have two points, if I may. I do not disagree with my Scottish colleagues. Young people helping to co-design some of the communications and engagement methods is important. I think Robert made the point about people of our generation maybe not being the obvious people to go and engage with young people, so there is an opportunity there to involve young people in how we go about those exercises. An evaluation report about the experience in Wales referred to the timing of some of these activities. Young people have periods when they are very busy sitting examinations and so on, so there are periods within a year when it is possible to get better levels of engagement. That was a practical lesson that we drew from the experience in Wales.

[Sam Rushworth]

Q One of the key arguments for lowering the voting age to 16 and allowing English 16 and 17-year-olds to have the same voting rights as their Scottish counterparts is that it increases turnout. Is there evidence from Scotland showing a higher turnout among 16 and 17-year olds?

Representation of the People Bill (Second sitting)

Ellie Chowns Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 18th March 2026 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

I will use the last minute to squeeze Dr Chowns in.

[Dr Ellie Chowns (North Herefordshire) (Green)]

Q You both mentioned disinformation. Do you think the Bill does enough to tackle disinformation? Are there additional measures that are not yet in the Bill that you would welcome—for example, a real-time repository of online adverts, or further measures to tackle online disinformation? I am open to your suggestions.

Harriet Andrews: For me, part of that democratic education piece would include support for young people to engage with disinformation. A really important part of preparing them is preparing them to engage with that work on disinformation. Also, as I said at the very beginning, we need to think about where the sources of information for young people are. I worry that if we focus too much on just, “We need young people to be educated about how to engage with disinformation,” and we do not try to create places they can go to that are trusted sources of information, we are putting a huge amount of pressure on young people to deal with a really complicated information landscape.

[The Chair]

You have 20 seconds, Dr Mycock.

Andy Mycock: I would think very strongly about how political parties can play their role in terms of connecting with young people. Young people’s membership of political parties is at an all-time low, as it is in trade unions and other organisations. The fact that you are engaging is commendable, but political parties need to do much more.

Those who are opposed to votes at 16 need to think about the unequal situation where young people in Scotland and Wales now have voting rights that young people in England and Northern Ireland do not. If the argument is about citizenship, there is an inequality with the voting age being 18 for the majority, but not for others. Moreover, there is a need for—

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[Zöe Franklin]

Q Can I go on to the issue of online attacks on candidates, their families and people involved in elections? Social media platforms play a massive role in the distribution of things like misinformation, disinformation and deepfakes. Is there more that the Bill could do to put a requirement on social media platforms to act more swiftly to address those issues?

Chris Morris: My one-word answer is yes, but let me explain it in various ways.

Broadly speaking, it is not unreasonable for us to ask the most powerful companies in the world—who have enormous power over our information environment and, therefore, increasingly over how everyone in this country gets information—to take on a more responsible attitude, some of which we believe should be made statutory.

As part of media and political literacy campaigns, for example, there could be education about why harassing candidates is not a good thing to do. Some of that behaviour comes from ignorance, and from people seeing how others behave on social media.

One of the recommendations we have made, and it is in our written statement, is that there should be a statutory obligation for the big tech companies, the online platforms, to make sure they are fully involved in media and political literacy campaigns. They do some good things, but we have to recognise, and we have to be realistic, that in the end their bottom line is their share price. Regulating how information flows is difficult. At the moment, we are essentially allowing them to regulate themselves, and I think sensible regulation of these companies—we know there will be howls of protest—is exactly what the Members of this House should be doing.

Azzurra Moores: Maybe I can quickly explain why we have gone for such a narrow scope in our recommendation on deepfakes. We recognise that deepfakes are a really complicated topic to regulate, and they need something far bigger than an elections Bill to regulate. Really, wholesale AI regulation is needed.

While the section 106 recommendation does not put new requirements on platforms, it starts to test the bounds on how you would regulate political deepfakes, which we appreciate is a really complicated topic. It is a slow and steady approach to amending legislation, rather than coming in and making big mistakes straightaway. This would be a first step, but obviously there need to be conversations within Government about how we could go further on that as well.

[Dr Chowns]

Q Thank you both for your work. You have made a powerful case for the danger of not better regulating disinformation. Can you share any lessons observed from how other countries have perhaps done this better? We have talked about the proposal for a repository of digital adverts. We have talked about deepfake labelling. What about other forms of disinformation, such as bot campaigns?

Secondly, do you agree that we need to regulate not just during the regulated period but all year round, because disinformation has corrosive effects all year round? Thirdly, do you have any comments on the need for better enforcement of existing imprint laws? Finally, you referenced the Rycroft review, which of course covers only foreign interference. Are we paying enough attention to domestic disinformation?

Azzurra Moores: There were lots of good questions there. You ask what more could be done on bots. Chris raised a proposal to increase the Electoral Commission’s investigative powers. For those of you looking at the amendment paper, that is new clause 25 tabled by Emily Darlington.

Tackling bots is going to be really complicated, but we think a really important first step is to give the Electoral Commission investigative powers on the back end of platform data, to try to understand the scale and scope of the problem. Part of the reason we cannot do much more at the moment is that we have a real evidence gap—a real evidence deficit. We need to start giving our regulators, which are on the frontline, more ability to understand the scale of the problem. For us, that would be a first step.

I am intrigued to see what the Rycroft review publishes. Demos gave evidence to Rycroft, and we highlighted that foreign misinformation is obviously impacting our democracy, but so is domestic misinformation. We are waiting to see what he publishes before going further on that.

On international counterparts, we have recommended that this Government establish a critical election incident protocol, modelling what happens in Canada. It is quite a complicated protocol, and it is proposed in new clause 26, but essentially, if there was any interference with an election—if there was an information crisis that impacted the integrity of the election—there would be a published protocol on what officials would do to react to that.

We are a real outlier here in the UK, compared with the other Five Eyes nations, in not having a public protocol. We think this elections Bill is another really important opportunity to say, “We know there are vulnerabilities. We know there are risks. We need to establish transparent public protocols so that, should any of these interferences happen, we have a set of measures that mean we know how to react in that instance.”

[The Chair]

You have 10 seconds.

Chris Morris: To add to that, Full Fact first put forward the idea of a critical election incident protocol in 2022, and really nothing has been done. The problem we have is that there are plenty of people working on this behind the scenes—the joint election security preparedness unit and the defending democracy taskforce—but it is all very much being done in the shadows. This is not always a case of democracy dying in darkness; this is about democracy under threat in the bright blue backlit light of a million scrolling phones.

That is the scale of the challenge we are facing now. It is not just about making sure we have an electoral framework that is fit for purpose; it is about making sure that there is a public perception that it is fit for purpose. That is why the issue of transparency is so important. If there were to be a major information incident—by that, we mean in the last days of the campaign, clear evidence emerging of a concerted attempt to alter the course of the outcome of an election in some way or another—the more transparent and public the process is for revealing that, the better.

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[Lloyd Hatton]

Q I have a very quick final question, taking a step back and responding to what you have just said. You feel that in the current landscape no single law enforcement body has overarching responsibility for enforcement, and particularly enforcement of electoral finance laws. It feels a bit patchwork at the moment: sometimes it is the police; sometimes it is the commission. Do you feel that is something that we need to look at overhauling so that we can have a much more comprehensive response that works more robustly, and hopefully more swiftly, in response to the issues that you just mentioned?

Dr Susan Hawley: We really welcome the recommendation of the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy—published today—that there should be a specific unit. I think that there is growing recognition within law enforcement bodies that that is required. Up to now, the problem has been that those law enforcement bodies will argue that they do not have the laws or the sentences that would empower them to use the serious investigative tools that they have at their disposal to get to the bottom of some of this behaviour. That is why the criminal offence in section 54 and section 54A really needs to be looked at. We welcome the amendment recently tabled by Matt Western to address the knowledge test so that it is not set too high.

We also need to look at sentences because we hear again and again from law enforcement that if you do not have a serious crime-level sentence, you cannot use the skills that you can deploy for serious crime for this kind of offending. If we are talking about foreign interference, those are the tools that need to be deployed against impermissible donations.

[Dr Chowns]

Q You have answered many of the questions that I had. Thank you all for your work. Briefly, do you have a view on where the cap on political donations should be, or how it should be set? That is a question for each of you. And should we have a cap on annual spending, to get away from the gaming of the system around regulated periods that Dr Power referred to? Where should it be set, and how?

Duncan Hames: We propose that a cap of £50,000 annually from any one donor is reached by 2030. That would still be much higher than in a number of other jurisdictions that have introduced donation caps, such as Canada, France, Italy and—from July—Australia. If it were phased in, with a cap reducing year by year between now and then, that would provide time for political parties to adapt.

We have done our own modelling, which I would be happy to share with the Committee, in which we look at the effect of that cap on overall party fundraising. I think you will find that, although we have recently had an arms race in campaign spending—not least because the spending limits were raised so dramatically just before the last general election—political parties fought all sorts of elections and referendums in the previous decade without needing anything near the kind of money that was available in the last general election, when nearly £100 million was spent.

Dr Power: I agree that we absolutely need a cap on donations. I am less wedded to a level as much as to the idea that there needs to be a cap that people can get around the table and agree to, and which seems fair. To not have a cap on donations risks much more than to have one. It is absolutely essential. We have seen the effect that can have in countries that do not have caps on donations, particularly the USA, and the effect that the very rich can then have.

What I mean by that is not an effect on the outcome of politics but an effect on the process of politics. You end up with about 400 individuals accounting for 75% of total party donations. Given that we are discussing the Representation of the People Bill, that is not a situation in which people are represented. It is essential that we find some way—in a Bill called “Representation of the People”—to fix the system properly such that the people feel represented. A cap on donations is essential and well within the remit of the Bill.

On a cap on spending, I align with the 1998 CSPL review, as well as Jack Straw when he introduced the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000. He said that there has been an “arms race” in spending and that we should always set a spending limit below the extent to which we expect to spend at an election. Until 2023, that limit was set at £19.5 million, if you stood a candidate in every constituency, which does not happen. If we say that the limit was £19.5 million, that should have been the baseline, and there was no good justification for it to be uprated in 2023—in fact, I think there is a good case for bringing the limit down further still. It would not have an effect on the good that money does in a system, which is to enrich debate and to allow political parties to get their positions across.

[The Chair]

That brings us to the end of this panel. On behalf of the Committee, I thank all our witnesses for their evidence.

Examination of witness

Samantha Dixon MBE MP gave evidence.

Representation of the People Bill (Third sitting)

Ellie Chowns Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 24th March 2026 Public Bill Committees

[Dr Ellie Chowns (North Herefordshire) (Green)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Dr Allin-Khan. I am delighted to speak on a Bill of such huge importance. I am also delighted to be speaking so positively in support of clause 1. I might have some constructive suggestions to make on further clauses, but I warmly welcome the long-overdue legislative change for votes at 16. The extension of the franchise to 16 and 17-year-olds will be hugely positive for our young people and for our democracy. It will be good for voter registration and turnout. It will help to embed healthy democratic habits in young adulthood that will continue into adulthood. It is vital that the voices of young people are giving the respect and the democratic space that they deserve.

Voting is a healthy habit that we want young people to form early on. Engaging younger voters in the process of voting creates positive habits for the future. Hon. Members will know that in 2024, turnout in the general election was just 59.9%—narrowly avoiding the 2001 historic low of 59.4%. Not only are too many voters not turning out; the turnout gap between younger and older voters has been expanding. We see lower levels of turnout in constituencies that have larger proportions of young people.

Introducing votes at 16 creates an opportunity to improve democratic education, providing a chance to create a seamless transition from learning about and discussing politics in the classroom to engaging in local and national elections. Research has shown that the earlier young people are engaged in voting, the more likely they are to carry on voting later in their lives. In Austria, Scotland and Germany, those who were enfranchised at 16 or 17 were more likely to turn out to vote into their twenties, compared with those who first voted at 18.

Enfranchised 16 and 17-year-olds also tend to turn out to vote in greater numbers than those voting for the first time who are aged 18 and over. That is likely because younger voters are better supported through their first experience of voting while they are at home and in education. By the time those who are 18 or older first vote, many will have already left home—for example, having gone to university—and are likely to be moving home more frequently, and may find it harder to register to vote or know where to vote. Registration levels for 18 and 19-year-olds are just 60%, compared with 96% of those aged 65 and over.

The main arguments being advanced against expanding the franchise are that 16 and 17-year-olds are not considered adults in many legal circumstances, such as in criminal law. We have heard comments today about the concept of full legal adulthood. The suggestion is that lowering the voting age conflicts with other legal thresholds of adulthood, such as restrictions on alcohol, gambling and jury service. I point out that adulthood starts in a phased way from 16, as 16-year-olds will pay tax, 17-year-olds can drive a car, and the majority of things that we prohibit 16 and 17-year-olds from doing are public health-faced, such as drinking and gambling. They are aimed at preventing people from developing unhealthy and potentially harmful habits.

[David Simmonds]

On the hon. Lady’s point about consistency, we often hear about the age at which one can purchase alcohol on licensed premises, but that is not a restriction that applies at home, so there is a significant inconsistency. Essentially, one is free under the laws of this land to consume alcohol at home from the age of 5. That is what the law says; one simply cannot purchase it on licensed premises. It is not the case that 16 is the point at which this becomes part of a consistent approach in the way that the hon. Lady describes.

[Dr Chowns]

I think the hon. Gentleman is in effect making my point for me, which is that adulthood starts in a phased way. There is no simple black-and-white cut-off at which things change from one night to the next. In society, we recognise that many aspects of growing up are part of a process. Voting is clearly a healthy, positive habit, and lowering the voting age to 16 and 17-year-olds will help to support their development.

The 16 and 17-year-olds whom I know and meet are thoughtful, interested and interesting. Their thoughts are worth having and are worth listening to. Their voice matters, and I want to know what they think. They have very pertinent and sometimes unexpected views on the key debates and decisions occupying much of our time in Parliament.

If we take the grotesquely unfair rip-off system of student funding, with the deeply unfair loans that young people wanting to go to university must take out unless they are exceptionally wealthy, 16 and 17-year-olds are thinking now about those loans as they think about whether university is for them. If we take the debate on whether social media should be banned for those under 16, these people can really tell us what it is like and how it affects them. If we take the debates we have had in Parliament on decriminalising abortion and any number of other vital issues, including the state of the planet and what that means for our futures, young people’s lives are the most affected by the decisions elected representatives take and they will have to live with the consequences of those votes for longer than any of us.

[Warinder Juss]

I want to reiterate what the hon. Member has said. In my experience, the younger the person the more politically engaged they appear to be. I spend so much time going into schools, and I find that younger people are more concerned about the environment than anyone else. I have more emails and letters from schoolchildren about climate change than I have from anyone else. So it is really important that we take that political engagement on board and give them a right to vote at 16.

[Dr Chowns]

I completely agree with the hon. Member. It is interesting that young people are often better able to engage with climate change than many of us who are older and are preoccupied with the short-term issues right in front of us.

I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Hazel Grove that we need a proportional voting system so that everybody’s votes are equally taken into account. That would enable us to make policy in a way that focuses more on the longer term and the investments we should make on a generational basis, rather than people, under the first-past-the-post system, being so focused on short-term decision making and on the next general election. Young people are concerned about what sort of world they will inherit—what the world will be like when they are 50—and they are going to have to live with the decisions we make for a very long time.

I want to speak briefly about trust in politics. Giving young people votes at 16 tells them that their voices, votes and views are valued, and this really does matter. The 2024 British social attitudes survey, conducted after the general election that year, recorded a new low level of trust, with only 12% of people saying they trust Governments to put the interests of the country above those of their own party. Votes at 16 would be a really valuable sign of trust in and respect for our young people, which is a healthy and important part of defending and bolstering our democracy. At a time when division and polarisation are unfortunately flourishing, it is vital to work with and support young people to make their voices heard, because they do want to bring the country together.

There is positive evidence for extending the franchise to 16 and 17-year-olds. For example, younger voters in Germany have had a positive impact on family discussions of politics. In a number of countries, 16 and 17-year-olds already have the vote. As has been mentioned, it is also the norm for many voters in the UK. Scottish and Welsh 16 and 17-year-olds are already enfranchised to vote in devolved and local elections, and I would love those in England and Northern Ireland to have the same rights.

In conclusion, enfranchising 16 and 17-year-olds would not drastically change the electoral landscape, but it would allow young people to have a voice in the decisions that are made for them every day at local, regional and national level. It is also a golden opportunity to improve democratic education, which I believe we will have a chance to discuss that in more depth later in our line-by-line scrutiny, as well as to register young people to vote and to embed that deep democratic respect for the right to vote. I congratulate the Government on taking this forward. Lowering the franchise is a really important opportunity to nurture more active citizens for the future. I will be absolutely delighted to vote for clause 1, giving 16 and 17-year-olds the vote, so we can positively engage the next generation in politics and improve the health of our democracy.

[Lewis Cocking (Broxbourne) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Allin-Khan.

We are coming at this debate in the wrong way. We need to look at when someone becomes an adult in this country, rather than at an arbitrary age at which it is acceptable to vote. The last Labour Government obviously thought that people become adults at 18. I remember that some people in my school year could buy cigarettes, at 16, and the last Labour Government raised that to 18. I would have supported that at the time, but the last Labour Government’s principle was obviously that adulthood started at 18 rather than 16.

The Liberal Democrat spokesperson, the hon. Member for Hazel Grove, said that someone can join the Army, RAF or Navy at 16. That is true, but they cannot be deployed on the frontline. A consequence of the Bill could therefore be that somebody can vote for a party or a Prime Minister of this country, which then, heaven forbid, has to send troops to the frontline, where they themselves cannot go, even though they are theoretically voting to send other people there. That is a difficult and challenging situation. We need to look at other age limits, whether for smoking, going to the frontline or driving. They all need to come at the age that someone becomes an adult.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Chowns]

I rise to speak to new clause 9 in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Brighton Pavilion, and to oppose clause 2 stand part.

New clause 9 seeks to extend voting rights to prisoners serving sentences of four years or less. That is the sentence length at which a prisoner would traditionally have been eligible for release after serving half their sentence. Extending the franchise to more people in prison would widen civic participation, strengthen our democracy and aid rehabilitation.

[Andrew Lewin (Welwyn Hatfield) (Lab)]

I just want to clarify my understanding of the Green party’s policy position. I have been looking at the Sentencing Council guidelines, and typically a person convicted of racially or religiously aggravated assault serves two years in prison. Is it the Green party’s position that those people should be allowed to vote in a general election?

[Dr Chowns]

I have made my position about the new clause clear, but perhaps this is a good moment to discuss a point that I was going to come to later. Various points have been made about the importance of restorative justice and rehabilitation. Imprisonment is a punishment for something that somebody has done wrong. There is a wide variety of things that people may have done wrong and for which they are rightly imprisoned, but should we not use the opportunity of a person’s imprisonment to support, encourage and reward prosocial behaviour?

Voting is prosocial behaviour that helps to integrate and rehabilitate the person and connect them back to the society from which they have become estranged through their crime. We encourage prisoners to use libraries to engage in educational opportunities and a whole range of other prosocial activities. In the same way, should we not encourage prisoners to engage in voting?

[Andrew Lewin]

I am grateful for the tenor of the debate. The hon. Lady talks about the connection to society, but I ask that she considers the victim for a minute. Let us stick with my example. Very sadly, we are seeing cases of religiously aggravated assault rising in this country, particularly relating to the Jewish and Muslim communities. Just this week, we saw the horrific example of the attack on ambulances. What does she think will happen if the victim learns that the perpetrator of the crime is allowed to vote? Does she think that is right?

[Dr Chowns]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention, although I am disappointed by his tone and what appears to be a politically motivated attempt to score points rather than to engage with the substance of the debate, which is about whether prisoners should be encouraged to vote.

Whether somebody is a victim of a racially aggravated assault, a rape or any other horrific crime, if the perpetrator receives a sentence that comes within the framework of the new clause—I very much hope that it would not be less than four years for a serious crime—we should encourage that perpetrator to participate in voting in the same way as we encourage prisoners to participate in other prosocial behaviours. That is done very widely in many other countries. Imprisonment is the punishment to the individual. The question is whether we should prevent those individuals from engaging in rehabilitative behaviours that reconnect them with society.

[Warinder Juss]

I am a member of the Justice Committee, and my biggest focus is rehabilitation and resettlement. I take the hon. Lady’s view that rehabilitation is extremely important, and that that is the way that we stop reoffending. But as someone who grew up suffering a lot of racist abuse—physical and verbal—I would be very affronted if somebody who had committed a racial crime against me was then allowed to vote, because going to prison is not only about rehabilitation but is a punishment. It is important that we do not lose sight of that fact. I am stating my personal position, bearing victims in mind. If somebody had committed a racial crime against me and they were given the same right to vote as anybody else I would feel very insulted.

[Dr Chowns]

I confess that I am a little puzzled at the questions that are being raised about specific types of crime. I am not sure whether hon. Members are suggesting that particular types of crime, for example those motivated by racial hatred, should be treated in a particular way in relation to voting, or whether they are simply objecting to the idea of any prisoner being allowed to vote. By raising one particular type of crime in making arguments against the new clause hon. Members are not, sadly, engaging with the substance of the argument that I am making.

By way of background—as has been mentioned—in 2005 the European Court of Human Rights ruled that the UK’s blanket ban on voting rights was unlawful. In 2017 the UK therefore extended the right to vote to prisoners on remand, civil prisoners—normally those in prison for failure to pay fines on time—and offenders on home detention curfew or released on temporary licence. However, that did not go far enough. The strength of our democracy is determined by how many of us participate in it. Against a backdrop of declining trust in our institutions and in democracy, that is more vital than ever. Not only are more than 21,000 people missing out on a key democratic right, they are having their chances of rehabilitation and resettlement harmed. Studies have shown the positive impact that democratic participation by people in prison has on rehabilitation and resettlement. Prisoners who keep the right to vote have an enhanced sense of civic responsibility and are more likely to be successfully reintegrated following release.

Let us consider other countries. In Guernsey all prisoners have had the right to vote since 1996. In Jersey, all prisoners serving a sentence of less than four years keep their right to vote, and in 2025 plans were announced to extend the right to vote to all prisoners. All prisoners in Ireland can vote by post. Across Europe, all prisoners have the right to vote—in Croatia, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and Ukraine. In France, disenfranchisement is considered as an additional penalty in some sentences, however the vast majority of prisoners retain the right to vote. In Germany, all prisoners retain the right to vote unless they have been convicted of an offence targeting the state or democracy. It is clear that the UK’s ban on prisoners voting makes us a real outlier among comparable countries.

Clause 2 provides for the disenfranchisement of detained 16 and 17-year-olds. I am profoundly opposed to that and would like to see the clause removed, because fostering civic responsibility, civic pride and involvement is particularly important for young people aged 16 and 17 who are in custody—that is, about 420 young people at any one time. Any young person in that position is likely to have been badly let down. That point was made last year by the Children’s Commissioner, who in 2025 published an important report, “The educational journeys of children in secure settings”. She found that children in youth custody are “failed before they arrive” and trapped

“in a cycle of disadvantage”.

The Commissioner made it clear that such young people faced

“disrupted education, low English and maths skills, unmet additional needs and high levels of exclusion, compounded by poverty”.

She also found that

“children in prison have been failed by multiple services long before they arrive in custody, and their time in the justice system worsens their disadvantages and limits future opportunities.”

I believe that it is wrong to cut those children—those young people—out of the voting process. They will know more about the failings of the state than many over-18s and their voices should be heard. The Bill is an opportunity to include them and to commit to supporting them to exercise their right to vote, which is a healthy habit that we should support and encourage all members of our society to engage in. As well as being right and fair, such inclusion, coupled with the right support and training for those who look after and educate them, could be a very positive part of their rehabilitation. I sincerely hope that the Minister will closely consider that in the context of clause 2.

It is clear that the current voting system for prisoners in the UK needs urgent reform. New clause 9 provides us with an opportunity to talk about how to fix that broken system by normalising democratic participation in our prisons, as so many other comparable countries do; strengthening civic society; restoring faith in our democracy; and supporting rehabilitation among some of the marginalised people in the UK, including some of our most disadvantaged young people.

[Paul Holmes]

I will speak briefly, because I spoke to new clause 9 before the speech made by the hon. Member for North Herefordshire. During the course of the debate, I heard a couple of things that I wanted to come back on. I thank the Committee for indulging me; I will be very quick.

There is absolutely no difference between my party and that of the hon. Member for North Herefordshire in advocating for the rehabilitation of the individual who is in the prison and criminal justice system. That is also the stated position of the Government. I was pleased to hear the passionate intervention from the hon. Member for Wolverhampton West, which was filled with conviction. I was disappointed, however, with the tone that the hon. Member for North Herefordshire took in responding to the hon. Members for Wolverhampton West and for Welwyn Hatfield. The former, having been through horrific prejudice growing up, and the latter, as an advocate, asked the hon. Lady about a crime that falls within the arbitrary four-year sentence proposed in new clause 9, tabled by the hon. Member for Brighton Pavilion.

There are many crimes for which someone can be issued a custodial sentence of four years that—I hope that the hon. Member for Wolverhampton West takes this in the right way—could be perceived as worse than the racially aggravated assault case that the hon. Member for Welwyn Hatfield mentioned, such as sexual assault. Many people are put away for less than four years for sexual assault. They would be able to vote under the proposals in new clause 9. The hon. Member for North Herefordshire said that those Members mentioned that crime to make a political point, but their point directly addresses the proposal from the hon. Member for Brighton Pavilion to set the sentence threshold at four years. If the threshold were six months, or anything less than four years, we could openly discuss that, but the crimes encompassed within a custodial sentence of four years can be some of the most serious perpetrated against victims.

I believe that everything the hon. Member for North Herefordshire does is well intentioned and principled. There is no doubt about that, and it should never be intimated that I take a different view. Members feel, however, that they have to challenge the Green party’s position because of that arbitrary figure for a custodial sentence in their proposal. The hon. Lady should therefore expect to be questioned on some of the terrible Pandora’s boxes that will be opened by the people serving those custodial sentences.

[Dr Chowns]

As I outlined in my speech, in many comparable countries, all prisoners are permitted to vote. The proposal in new clause 9, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Brighton Pavilion, sets an arguably arbitrary cut-off date, but that is intended to offer balance.

As we have to some extent previously covered, if someone is sentenced to four years they still become eligible for early release. That does not lessen the terrible nature of their crime. If somebody is sentenced to four years, they are still eligible to participate in educational programmes, rehabilitation, and a whole range of things that are not in themselves punishments but are designed to assist that person to reintegrate into society. Surely we all, victims included, want to ensure that perpetrators of crime are reintegrated and rehabilitated and do not offend again? That is the driving force behind this new clause: to reduce crime by reconnecting to society people who have been convicted and imprisoned.

Representation of the People Bill (Fourth sitting)

Ellie Chowns Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 24th March 2026 Public Bill Committees

[Lisa Smart (Hazel Grove) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the chair, Dame Siobhain. The Liberal Democrats support clauses 15 and 16. I will speak to new clause 44, in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Guildford. Her explanatory statement is clear that it

“requires the Government to report on proposals to support the extension of the franchise to 16 and 17 year olds, through promoting awareness or making changes required to strengthen civic education”.

Both the hon. Members for Hamble Valley and for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner made some good points about ensuring there is not the postcode lottery that we are in danger of. I look forward to their support for this new clause.

As I said earlier, the Liberal Democrats are strongly in favour of votes at 16 but enfranchisement must be meaningful. Not only does the Bill make provisions for votes at 16 and 17, but it allows for pre-registration on the electoral roll from age 14. We rightly support that, but if we are asking teenagers to enter the democratic system at that age, we must consider how we support these young people to be properly informed and prepared.

New clause 44 is modest. It does not delay enfranchisement or obstruct the Bill. It simply asks the Secretary of State to report within 12 months on how the extension of the franchise will be supported in practice. Civic education should never mean telling young people what to think. We want our young people to understand institutions and elections and to have media and democratic literacy. We need a joined-up strategy because we do not want a postcode lottery for civic education. Some schools and local authorities may do civic education really well and others may not. Young people across the country should not have significantly different levels of preparation for participation, depending on where they happen to live or study. I would include those who are in the care of a local authority very strongly in that. National enfranchisement reform deserves a national implementation plan. In the modern world, media literacy is very important alongside basic democratic literacy.

The Bill already recognises that practical support matters. Clauses 15 and 16 are important because they make clear that simply extending a legal right is not in itself enough. Placing duties on public bodies to raise awareness of voting rights and to assist certain young people with registration is a welcome step, and we support that principle. But if we are to create a new franchise, it is right to think about whether those who are newly franchised are able to exercise it. That is why new clause 44 is reasonable—it follows that principle.

Clauses 15 and 16 are welcome, and we recognise the necessity of targeting relevant young people, but it is yet to be determined which part of the system will take the lead on preparing young people for participation—schools, local authorities or national bodies. The new clause asks the Government to set out in much more detail how that responsibility will be approached.

[Dr Ellie Chowns (North Herefordshire) (Green)]

It is a pleasure to speak with you in the chair, Dame Siobhain. I rise to speak briefly in support of new clause 44, which, as the hon. Member has set out, is a very reasonable and modest proposal. As I said, I very strongly support the extension of the franchise to 16 and 17-year-olds, but it is crucial that investment in developing political literacy and supporting civic education goes alongside that. That is a message I have heard from young people themselves; from those who have come to Parliament to campaign for this, and those in my constituency who have also called for this.

I strongly urge Ministers to make sure they take this crucial opportunity to invest in developing trusted and accessible spaces where young people can explore political ideas, through the formal education system and other structures and spaces that work with young people. The role of youth organisations and youth workers in supporting democratic participation is crucial to remember.

We need to do everything possible to build young people’s confidence in navigating democratic processes and in forming their own political ideas. We need to give them support in navigating an increasingly complex political landscape of political information, misinformation and disinformation. That civic education part is a crucial component of, and complement to, the extension of the franchise itself. New clause 44 absolutely strikes the right balance here. This is not about delaying the extension of the franchise. It is simply about saying, on the face of the Bill, that we recognise the importance of civic education alongside the extension of the franchise, and that we ensure there is transparency and sufficient attention given to developing that.

[Samantha Dixon]

New clause 44, tabled by the hon. Member for Guildford, would require the Government to publish a report regarding steps to support the implementation of the extension of the franchise to 16 and 17-year-olds, discussed on Second Reading. The report would cover proposals to increase awareness of the franchise change among 14 to 17-year-olds and changes to civic education for that age group, to support the franchise change. That report would be required to be published within 12 months of this Bill becoming an Act.

As the Secretary of State said on Second Reading, extending the franchise is not simply “job done”. The Government are clear that young people must be supported and prepared to exercise their democratic rights. The new clause was clearly designed to ensure that the Government are as good as their word on this point, and it is excellent to see that hon. Members share our view on the importance of effective democratic engagement and education in delivering votes at 16. However, while the intention of the new clause is laudable, the Government do not believe that this is the right way to approach it.

On the part of the new clause concerning voter awareness, the Government will be playing an active role in this space, but will not be the only organisation to do so. The Electoral Commission, local and devolved governments, the electoral sector and civil society organisations will all be part of a team effort to spread awareness. A report from the Government on their proposals would be a partial picture at best. It would also not be right for the Government to speak on behalf of other organisations’ plans, particularly those from the Electoral Commission, whose independence from the Government is crucial.

Regarding the education-related limb of the new clause, last November the Department for Education committed to making citizenship compulsory in primary schools and to publish revised programmes of study to ensure all pupils receive a grounding in topics including democracy, government and law. It is for the Department for Education to lead this work; I have worked alongside colleagues in the Department, and I know they will be diligent in providing updates on the progress of its work.

[Dr Chowns]

I am sorry; I may have misunderstood, but is the Minister arguing that she does not support new clause 44 because a range of organisations will be taking part in action to raise awareness of the extended franchise and, therefore, it would not be right for the Government to provide a report only on what they were doing? That is not my reading of new clause 44, which asks the Government to do a report on proposals overall to support raising awareness and civic education. By definition, the Government are probably best placed to have that overview of all proposals, including their own, and those of the Electoral Commission and any number of other organisations, so that we can understand what is being done to support young people as they take on this new democratic responsibility.

[Samantha Dixon]

The Government’s view is that such a report would be partial; it would only cover the work that the Government are doing and we could not speak to other organisations and their work in this arena.

[Dr Chowns]

My reading of the clause is that it does not have to be partial: it calls for a report on all proposals. Therefore, perhaps the Government’s interpretation of the new clause is unnecessarily narrow. Might the Minister commit to going away and reflecting on whether this could actually be compatible and a helpful contribution to supporting the civic education of young people?

[Samantha Dixon]

This endeavour is an ongoing task; it is not a single point in time, which is what a report would reflect upon. The Government will move forward in partnership across the wide sector in public life, to continue to improve the education of young people. For that reason, we do not feel that the new clause is necessary.

--- Later in debate ---

[Samantha Dixon]

I accept that the hon. Member has a deep appreciation of civic education. However, we feel that a report after 12 months adds little value to the ongoing work that needs to continue over a number of years and a whole cycle of electoral events.

[Dr Chowns]

The Minister’s main objection to new clause 44 is that it is for a one-off report. Would the Minister support an amended new clause that would require an annual report looking at the effectiveness of civic education for young people?

[Samantha Dixon]

I do not think that I would because it would be a bureaucratic exercise, whereas the work needs to focus outwards. The scrutiny will come from within Parliament, and from within devolved Governments, so I will not accept the new clause as it stands.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lewis Cocking]

My hon. Friend makes an important point, and that is why Opposition amendments 26 and 27 are very important, because they go some way—not the whole way, but some way—to mitigating what he has just outlined.

[Dr Chowns]

It might be helpful if I remind the Committee of what the Electoral Commission itself says:

“Automated voter registration has the potential to significantly improve levels of accuracy and completeness of the registers and help ensure people can vote in future elections… Significant progress should be made on implementing forms of automated registration before the next UK general election… Pilots in Wales last year show how effective automatic registration can be.”

I am a little worried that, inadvertently, a false impression of the opinion of the Electoral Commission has been given.

[Lewis Cocking]

I am arguing that if we are going to do automatic enrolment, it should be for everybody, all at the same time, across the country. As I have pointed out, one could do pilots within council areas, as long as everyone in the whole area is being enrolled at the same time. I have given a number of examples.

In my constituency of Broxbourne, I have two registration authorities, so it could be that at a general election some people within the same constituency are auto-enrolled while others are not. I do not believe that is fair. I said at the start of this that I think the current arrangements for registering to vote in this country are perfectly fine, and that people have a choice to register or not. If someone says, “I do not wish to register to vote,” that is their choice. That is up to the individual.

[Dr Chowns]

If the hon. Member will forgive me, I will cite once more evidence from the Electoral Commission, which does not agree with him that the current system is fine. The Electoral Commission says that evidence from its research shows that

“as many as 8 million people across the UK are not correctly registered to vote”.

That is a huge proportion—a huge disenfranchisement. The Electoral Commission says:

“Introducing more automated forms of registration would remove barriers to voting and make it easier for people to register and vote.”

Does the hon. Member not think we should listen to the Electoral Commission?

[Lewis Cocking]

Some of those 8 million people may have chosen not to be on the electoral roll. Would the hon. Lady like to stand in a constituency where half of her electors are auto-enrolled and the other half are not? What are the consequences of that if the election is very close? Will it be taken through the courts?

--- Later in debate ---

Clause 27 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

[Dr Chowns]

On a point of order, Dame Siobhain. As I am a relative newbie in this House, could you clarify why it is permitted for a request to be made to vote individually on a range of grouped clauses, when everybody is voting exactly the same way on them, such that we have had five separate votes, all of which have gone the same way, and we are about to have four more? Is it possible to stop the waste of time?

[The Chair]

As Chair, I am completely in the hands of the Committee. Amendments and clauses are grouped to reduce the time taken—it is an administrative thing—but if anybody on the Committee wishes a vote to be taken separately, they are perfectly entitled to request that. I can give no better reason than that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Holmes]

Further to that point of order, Dame Siobhain. The hon. Member for North Herefordshire said the words, from a sedentary position, “It is time-wasting.”

[Dr Chowns]

Further to that point of order, Dame Siobhain. I do not object to voting on any of these clauses; I am simply pointing out that there is a more time-efficient way to do it.

Representation of the People Bill (Fifth sitting)

Ellie Chowns Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 26th March 2026 Public Bill Committees

[Lisa Smart]

The point I am making is about bank cards in particular. I want it to be as easy as possible for people to vote, and the Electoral Commission’s evidence was that the barriers put up by requiring photographic ID particularly impacted certain demographic groups, including young people, who often face additional barriers in terms of understanding how the world works.

The hon. Gentleman and his colleagues have talked about how they have a number of bank cards and understand the system. That is great, but they are from a demographic group for whom the modern world is built, and it is not the same for everybody. If a person rents, often changes address or does not speak English as a first language, the world is harder to navigate, but everyone who is eligible to vote should be able to vote.

Bank cards are among the most common everyday items, but amendment 30 seeks to restrict that widened category, creating a barrier to entry that mimics a credit score-based franchise. Many legitimate voters, particularly younger people, including the 16 and 17-year-olds who are to be enfranchised, and lower socioeconomic groups, use basic banking services that do not require formal credit searches. We heard in the oral evidence sessions last week from Peter Stanyon, of the Association of Electoral Administrators, who pointed out that the measure would add unnecessary complexity for polling staff, some of whom are volunteers. It would require them to understand the nuances of credit check markers on cards, which would be an impossible administrative burden.

New clause 19 would abolish the legal requirement to show photo ID when voting in person in Great Britain. Liberal Democrats were not in favour of it when it was introduced, and we remain not in favour of it today. I have heard it described repeatedly as a solution in search of a problem. Before the introduction of voter ID legislation between 2019 and 2023, out of tens of millions of votes cast, only 10 people were convicted for personation during a UK election, and yet the scheme saw 16,000 voters turned away, according to evidence from the Electoral Reform Society.

This is not a crisis that required the legislation that was brought in. The Government are now trying to extend that, and it is certainly not a crisis that justifies the Conservative amendment before us. We believe it would make things worse rather than better. Restricting bank card voter ID only to cards issued after a formal credit check would significantly narrow eligibility, and we do not support that.

We believe that voter ID requirements should be scrapped because they are a deeply unfair policy. If bank cards, which include only a name to provide verified information, are seen as acceptable forms of ID, would it not make sense to extend the provision and allow any form of personal ID to be shown at the polling booth? Partial improvements are not enough when the underlying principle and policy remain deeply flawed.

I have mentioned some of the evidence presented to us by the Electoral Commission. Further evidence from the organisation showed that the number of voters turned away was 50,000 at the last election, with 34,000 of those people returning to exercise their right to vote. Meanwhile, the University of Manchester found that almost 2 million people did not have the right ID to vote in 2024. These people are not just a statistic; they are individual citizens who were not able to exercise their democratic right.

I remember knocking on doors at the last election and speaking to somebody who was livid that she could not exercise her right to vote. She had recently been divorced, and she had changed her name as a result. That meant that a lot of her ID was in her old name and so she was unable to cast her vote, which she felt very strongly about. She talked to me about the women—the suffragettes and suffragists—who had died to ensure that we had a right to vote. I remember that conversation on polling day very clearly.

We have talked already about how these measures disproportionately affect some communities over others. Hope Not Hate reported that 6.5% of ethnic minority voters were turned away from a polling booth at least once, compared with 2.5% of white voters. Evidence from the Electoral Commission shows that those in the C2 and DE social grades were significantly more affected, with 8% of lower-income non-voters saying that they did not vote because they lacked the required ID, compared with 3% of higher-income voters. We should not be stopping people who are entitled to vote for want of the correct photo ID. This is a solution in search of a problem—and for that reason, I commend new clause 19 to the Committee.

[Dr Ellie Chowns (North Herefordshire) (Green)]

It is a pleasure to serve under you, Dame Siobhain. I support clause 47 and the removal of the requirement for ID to be photographic and the introduction of credit and debit cards as acceptable ID insofar as those are important improvements for accessibility. However, they do not go far enough.

I want to speak in favour of new clause 19, tabled by my hon. Member for Hazel Grove. The Green party believes that we should be scrapping voter ID. Mandatory photographic voter ID was introduced via the Elections Act 2022, despite there being no evidence of a need for it in the first place. It was widely criticised at the time as a blatant act of voter suppression by the utterly discredited Johnson Government, who were presenting a solution looking for a problem—as the hon. Member for Hazel Grove has said.

We have heard today about the importance of defending the safety and integrity of our democracy, but I would contend that there are numerous other, far more pressing threats to the safety and integrity of our democracy: the influence of dodgy donors; the widespread prevalence of disinformation; the giving of covid contracts to mates; the stuffing of the other place with political appointees—including donors; and parties breaking election law without adequate penalties or prevention.

There are many threats to the safety and integrity of our democracy. I would contend that the threat of personation, which, as we have heard explained several times, is a numerically tiny and very rarely occurring offence, is not the main one. I very much hope to see a proportionate level of passion expressed by some colleagues in other parties when we come to discuss the urgent need to clean up political finance and stop disinformation later in discussion of the Bill.

[Paul Holmes]

Will the hon. Lady give way on that point?

[Dr Chowns]

I am very much aware of time, of which the hon. Member has had a lot. I know that people are keen to move on, so I would like to complete my remarks.

Out of all allegations of electoral fraud in the 2019 elections, only 33 related to personation fraud at the polling station—that is, 0.000057% of the over 58 million votes cast in all elections that year. Only one instance resulted in a conviction and one in a caution. Following the 2023 local elections, the cross-party democracy and the constitution all-party parliamentary group inquiry concluded that voter ID is

“a ‘poisoned cure’ in that it disenfranchises more electors than it protects”.

That inquiry found that voter ID brings with it a risk of injustice and highlighted that there is no immediate right to appeal for those who have been denied a ballot.

For those and other reasons, Labour Ministers should be scrapping the voter scheme in its entirety—not least because that would be consistent with their own opposition to the 2022 Act at the time. Labour tabled a reasoned amendment at the time, which was very good, and cited the creation of unnecessary barriers to entry for voting as one of the reasons for opposing Johnson’s anti-democratic legislation.

During that debate, the then shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Putney (Fleur Anderson), said the voter ID proposals are

“simply not proportionate to the risk of voter fraud.”

The hon Lady was right—as she was when she went on to flag that

“the significant staffing and financial impact was disproportionate to the security risk of voter fraud.”

She was also right when she said:

“Even if one person lacked their ID to vote, that should be a reason to rethink this Bill entirely.”––[Official Report, Elections Public Bill Committee, 7 September 2021; c. 261.]

We know that the requirement for voter ID has had a chilling effect on turnout. Statistics from the Electoral Commission have already been cited, so I will not repeat them. As we heard in oral evidence, Democracy Volunteers pointed out that those official statistics are likely a significant underestimate, because of all the people who do not even get to the clerk before they are turned away.

I hope the Minister will reconsider and adopt new clause 19, scrapping voter ID entirely, consistent with her party’s previous position. If not, I hope she will, at the very least, commit to ongoing monitoring of its impact, given the serious concerns about it. The Electoral Reform Society points out that the impact of the voter ID requirement is not currently being monitored at local elections, and that the next general election will be the last at which monitoring is required under the law as it stands. If we have just one more data point, we will not know whether the changes in clause 47 that the Government hope to introduce will have the desired effect, or whether improvements—such as scrapping this Tory scheme in its entirety—need to be made.

Evidence from the Electoral Commission suggests that some groups were particularly likely to have a problem voting, including disabled or unemployed people, and those from certain demographics. Evidence indicates that more deprived areas have a higher proportion of voters turned away compared with less deprived ones. If the Government refuse to scrap voter ID entirely, it is essential that the impact of voter ID requirements continues to be monitored and that data is collected, so that we can understand whether there is an indirect discrimination effect in how this policy affects voters.

Finally, several improvements have been suggested by a number of people, through oral and written evidence—including the Electoral Commission—for other mechanisms of widening accessibility and replacements for voter ID. I hope Ministers will consider the inclusion of poll cards as ID, given the good evidence that that lowers the percentage of voters turned away. Consideration should also be given to statutory declarations to allow provisional ballots to be cast and later verified, so that any failure to provide the required documentation can be cured. I am also sympathetic to calls for vouching to be allowed, which I believe is also one of the Electoral Commission’s recommendations.

I very much hope that the Minister will approach further measures to improve the accessibility of voting with an open mind, and ensure that we monitor the impact of what I feel has a repressive effect on our democracy. I look forward to discussing the far more pressing challenges to the security and integrity of our democracy as we come to later parts of the Bill.

[Samantha Dixon]

I have to say that I find it quite shocking to hear Members of the official Opposition supporting the exclusion of thousands of eligible voters from the polling station. That really is shocking. This proposal represents a broadening and an enhancing of the voter ID system so that those eligible can cast their vote. It is a very simple principle. I must correct the shadow Minister: there was support for this measure from the Electoral Reform Society, which said that

“Allowing IDs like bank cards and digital ID, which voters are likely to be carrying on them, will help voters who do not have access to the other accepted forms of ID and make it easier for all voters on the day.”

That is the point.

Representation of the People Bill (Sixth sitting)

Ellie Chowns Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 14th April 2026 Public Bill Committees

[Lisa Smart]

I welcome the shadow Minister’s intervention, and I think that we should talk far more than we do about domestic money in politics, as well as foreign money in politics. Power is concentrated in far too few hands. The price of elections is going up and up, and that is not good for democracy. I would welcome that discussion.

New clause 49 is in the name of the Chair of the JCNSS, so I am speaking to it on his behalf. We are talking about £500 during the course of a calendar year, so £50 a month breaches the threshold. I think there is a conversation to be had. As I say, this new clause is not in my name.

On new clause 50, the Committee heard evidence that the current 12-month prison sentence was not an adequate deterrent. Also, the low sentences reportedly limit the type of investigatory tools that law enforcement may use in an investigation. I am content to speak to the new clauses on behalf of the Member who tabled them, the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington.

[Dr Ellie Chowns (North Herefordshire) (Green)]

I rise to speak to both the clauses and the new clauses tabled by the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington, which the hon. Member for Hazel Grove spoke to.

Briefly, commencing section 9 to PPERA, as proposed by new clause 47, is something that was put into legislation 17 years ago, so it feels really quite overdue. Regarding the points that were just discussed around new clause 49, which proposes the reduction to £500 of the threshold for declaring the source of a donation, making such a declaration is not necessarily a hugely onerous process. I imagine that when someone makes a donation and fills in a form, they just put, “Source: my salary”. This is not necessarily a hugely problematic part of the process of creating more transparency. We surely all agree that more transparency is needed in our political financing system, to protect from the corrosive effect of foreign donations, and of huge inequalities and the lack of transparency over domestic donations. I strongly support all the new clauses.

I will raise a couple of additional points, which I would like the Minister to respond to. First of all, regarding the provision in clause 56 and schedule 7 to submit two returns now—to both the local returning officer and the Electoral Commission—I note that the Electoral Commission, in its briefing to the Committee, argued that this provision clearly makes things more complex and problematic, and it argued that the primary responsibility for submission should be to the Electoral Commission. Does that not make more sense? Given that the Bill is introducing a requirement to submit to the Electoral Commission, why do not we just say, “Submit the return to the Electoral Commission”? Then the Electoral Commission can correspond with the returning officer if it wants to. But let us just have one submission and make the process as simple as possible for candidates and parties. Could the Minister respond on that point from the Electoral Commission about the requirement to submit two returns?

Secondly, a point raised by Philip Rycroft in his extremely useful report, under recommendation number 7, is that

“The Electoral Commission should mandate political parties to submit their annual reports and accounts and campaign spending returns in a standardised format.”

Could the Minister comment on whether she proposes to take that recommendation forward? It would be very helpful in improving transparency and clarity in the system.

[Lloyd Hatton (South Dorset) (Lab)]

I will just make some very brief remarks on the record.

I welcome this landmark Bill, which does a great deal to bring our democratic landscape into the 21st century, but I will briefly put on the record some thoughts about new clause 47.

As we digest the Rycroft review, I think that the new clause is worth further consideration, particularly about how we can have meaningful deterrence for the most egregious flouting of political finance rules. If we want to be able to deal with that issue, we also need to have effective prosecutions for serious breaches. My concern at the moment is that there is something of an enforcement gap, and I know that that is a description that the Electoral Commission has outlined as well. I remain concerned that when it comes to the real risks posed by foreign interference, we are leaving that gap open, which would run contrary to the rightful and important aims of this Bill.

The director general of the National Crime Agency highlighted here in Parliament in February that there is a “gap in law” and that

“a foreign state or foreign individual—someone who is impermissible—can transfer money to someone who is in the UK, who is permissible, and that person can give money to a political party or a politician, and there is nothing to stop that. That is perfectly lawful.”

There is an enforcement gap there that I know that the Minister, along with other Ministers and officials, will want to address. It is worth reflecting further on the aims of new clause 47 and how it tries to strengthen this Bill further beyond the work that it already does. As we look to digest the Rycroft review, and the Bill proceeds to further stages, it is important that we give the aims in the new clause rightful consideration, and think about some of those issues around the gap in enforcement when it comes to the most egregious breaches of political finance rules.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Chowns]

Broadly, I hugely welcome all measures to improve the risk assessment of donations, which is critical, so I am glad to see those here. I agree that much more needs to be done than is currently in the Bill, as outlined by Philip Rycroft, among others, so I welcome the Government’s commitment to do that. I share the frustration expressed about the fact that we have two processes going on in parallel and so, from my perspective, we will not have sufficient opportunity adequately to scrutinise the proposals that the Government are promising to bring forward in relation to Rycroft. However, I absolutely feel their urgency and look forward to whatever opportunity we do have to scrutinise them.

I agree with the hon. Member for Hazel Grove that there are critical missing elements that we could and should be addressing in this part of the Bill: crypto donations, in particular, but also the desperate need for an overall cap on political donations. We will be able to discuss those issues later, when we come to the new clauses, but it seems rather odd that the Government have put nothing in this part of the Bill in relation to those critical elements.

I want to raise two specific issues in relation to this group of amendments. First, the Electoral Commission has made two points about the articulation of risk factors. It would like the list of risk factors to include any other risk factors that a reasonable party would consider relevant, rather than any other risk factors that a political party itself considers relevant, because that would constitute marking its own homework. It seems to me that that small tweak to language would clarify the risk factors. The Electoral Commission also recommends the inclusion of a risk factor relating to a person’s connections to other countries and jurisdictions. That might be a more inclusive way of addressing some of the points about a foreign influence registration scheme. I would welcome the Minister’s comments on those two recommendations—requests, essentially—from the Electoral Commission.

Secondly, in a report produced last month, CenTax—a joint initiative of the London School of Economics and the University of Warwick—pointed out that it would be potentially much more sensible to establish a donor registration system operated by the Electoral Commission itself. That would mean transferring responsibility for the risk assessment for “know your donor” checks to the Electoral Commission rather than to political parties, which, depending on their size and longevity and so forth, might have varying capacities to do that. When a donor wished to make a donation to a party above a certain minimal threshold, they would apply to the Electoral Commission for a donor registration number and then use that when making the donation. That would make it much easier to keep track of multiple donations by a given donor, either to a single party over a period of time or to multiple parties.

That seems to me a sensible and workable proposal for improving transparency and clarity in the system, recognising and addressing the burden of compliance requirements that will be placed on parties—including local parties, which, as has been mentioned, are very much reliant on volunteers—and ensuring a consistent approach to donor risk assessment and monitoring. I would welcome the Minister’s response to that recommendation from CenTax that a donor registration system should be established.

[Lloyd Hatton]

Before I speak to clause 58, let me say in response to the hon. Members for Hamble Valley and for Hazel Grove that this game-changing legislation and the Rycroft review have both come in the first Session of a new Government. There is a clear understanding—the Minister has made it known here and in the Chamber—that the threats that we face, whether through foreign interference or foreign money trying to influence our democratic process, are severe, and we have made a robust response to them, through this legislation and by commissioning the Rycroft review last year.

I want to make two points on clause 58. First, a key part of the changes introduced by the Bill is the “know your donor” principle, which will require political parties to take more responsibility for exactly who is funding them. Existing rules do not specifically require recipients to consider the risk that a donor is potentially facilitating an illegal donation. I welcome the fact that that will change as a result of this clause, which will bring about a complete overhaul of the system and I believe will improve the integrity of our democracy, help strengthen national security and help restore trust in political parties across the country.

Representation of the People Bill (Seventh sitting)

Ellie Chowns Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 14th April 2026 Public Bill Committees

[Paul Holmes]

That is the only time the Liberal Democrats have ever cheered me on, so I am glad we are in agreement.

The Minister gave a comprehensive outline of the proposals in clause 60. I will briefly talk to amendment 34, which was tabled by the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington (Matt Western) but moved by the hon. Member for Hazel Grove. The Conservatives think the amendment is well intentioned, but one of my big concerns—I think the Minister outlined this, but perhaps she will return to it in winding up—is the burden that would be placed on businesses, which already have quite extensive regulatory burdens placed on them by Government. I think all parties in this Committee have intimated that everybody wants more transparency and wants to talk more about donations to ensure that we really tighten up the regulatory regime on political party donations. However, although I am not averse to being radical, I think amendment 34 is probably a bit over-burdensome and we do not support it, but we are content to support clause 60.

[Dr Ellie Chowns (North Herefordshire) (Green)]

It is a pleasure to speak under your chairship, Sir Desmond. In clause 60, we are considering company donations in UK politics, and I ask the Minister to consider outright banning them, as happens, for example, in France and Canada. There is no real reason for companies to be permitted to make donations, particularly when we are concerned, as in this Bill, with ensuring that company donations are not a mechanism for channelling funds from outside the country into British politics. Why not make the situation clear and allow only individuals, whose connection to the country can be clearly tested, to donate? Company donations have been nearly half the size of individual donations in UK politics in recent years. These are really significant sums.

[Lewis Cocking (Broxbourne) (Con)]

The hon. Member is speaking about company donations. I am not saying I agree with this, but does she feel that the same logic should apply to trade union donations? If she feels that companies cannot donate, does she still feel that trade unions can?

[Dr Chowns]

I consider companies and trade unions to be completely different entities. One is a profit-making organisation, and the other is a membership association designed to represent the interests of its members. The two are not parallel, and I am completely fine with trade unions making donations.

Company donations have a huge influence on our politics. There is also a tax advantage for companies; there is effectively a taxpayer subsidy to them, and the advantage can be up to about 40% for companies making donations from company funds, compared with individual funds. I would therefore like to hear why the Minister thinks it is important to retain the ability for companies to make donations and does not want to follow the example of France and Canada in stopping such donations. Individuals can still make donations.

On a couple of specific points, the hon. Member for Hazel Grove referenced the fact that there is a clear problem in the Bill as currently drafted. A loophole permits companies to give donations up to the limit multiple times, both to a party and potentially to every single one of its candidates. Surely the limit should be set so that it reflects the total value of donations to all recipients. That has been argued for by the Electoral Commission and in Philip Rycroft’s recommendation 4, and it is also covered by amendments 36 and 37 in the name of the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington.

It is also clear that the test should be post-tax profit, not revenue. It is far too easy for companies to inflate their revenues by engaging in what is sometimes called transfer pricing in other sectors, effectively enabling them to completely bypass the intended restrictions. Surely it is in the spirit of the Bill, and should therefore be put into the letter of it, that the test should be post-tax profit, not revenue. If we are going to permit company donations, we should be really clear that they are derived from profit made in-country, because using the revenue test provides a huge loophole. Again, that is called for in Philip Rycroft’s recommendation 2, and by the Electoral Commission and many others, so I very much hope the Minister will respond positively.

Amendments 34 and 35, in the name of the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington, would make the donor criminally liable. The Minister responded by saying that the onus should all be on the recipient of those donations, but that is not how the law operates in other areas when it is broken: the commissioners of the offence, as well as the recipient of the funding, are guilty. So I ask the Minister to think again. If we are talking about large companies making huge donations, they arguably have greater capacity, and certainly just as much responsibility, as the recipient to check that they are operating within the law. I refer the Minister to my comments on a previous clause about establishing a donor register, which would enable us to deal with these issues and involve the Electoral Commission in ensuring that these checks are in place.

I will briefly touch on new clause 13, in the name of the hon. Member for North East Hertfordshire (Chris Hinchliff), new clause 32, in the name of the hon. Member for Poole (Neil Duncan-Jordan), and new clause 52, in the name of the hon. Member for Leeds East (Richard Burgon). They all recognise the widespread concern in UK politics, and among all of us to some extent, about how company donations risk twisting, and in some cases have twisted, our politics. Each of those Members has tabled a new clause seeking to ban donations from particular categories of company donor. The first seeks to exclude property development and construction undertakings, the second seeks to exclude those who have had public contracts at any time in the last 10 years, and the third seeks to exclude any companies involved in oil and gas extraction.

I have huge sympathy for the arguments and for the broad thrust of those new clauses. I am not necessarily convinced that, in their current form, they are ready to be incorporated in the Bill, but they highlight a key concern. For example, there has been widespread concern about cases where large donations by a property developer were associated with planning decisions under a previous Government that went in favour of that property developer. There have also been serious concerns about the revolving door between the Government and the legislature, and profit-making companies. I would really like to hear the Minister’s response to those three new clauses tabled by Labour Members, which highlight concerns about the influence of particular groups of companies on our politics.

However, the issues I really hope the Minister will respond to are, first, stopping all company donations, because people who want to make donations can still make them as individuals; secondly, adopting the post-tax profits test, rather than the revenue test; and, finally, ensuring that the donations limit applies to the total value of donations, not just single donations.

[Lloyd Hatton (South Dorset) (Lab)]

I will keep my remarks brief. As we start the afternoon sitting, it is worth putting on the record that clause 60 goes a significant distance towards finally tightening up the rules around corporate donations, which many campaigners, including in civil society, would argue have been left unaddressed for far too long. What clause 60 seeks to do is effective.

That said, and I will not repeat in too much detail the points made by the hon. Member for North Herefordshire, it is worth reflecting on the recommendations in Philip Rycroft’s review around revenue versus profits, and how we can tighten things up. So I am keen to understand how, as the Bill progresses, we can potentially take his recommendations into account.

It is worth remembering some of the big case studies that have been a cause for concern. We therefore know that, in some cases, corporate donations can carry a significant risk of nefarious interference in the democratic process. There was much media coverage and speculation about the idea that Elon Musk, the California-based billionaire, could legitimately make a donation to a UK political party via a UK subsidiary of Tesla.

When we look at some of the research conducted by CenTax or Transparency International, we see that around £1 in every £10 that comes via a company as a donation could be because the individual in question could not donate directly themselves. According to that same research, around a quarter of money donated by companies is completely untraceable. So these measures are really welcome.

--- Later in debate ---

[Samantha Dixon]

In the interests of time, I will continue.

On the other remarks made by the hon. Member for North Herefordshire, I hear her point about profit and revenue, and it is highlighted in the Rycroft review. As I said many times this morning, we will carefully consider the Rycroft review and respond to it appropriately.

The hon. Members for North Herefordshire and for Hazel Grove both highlighted the Government’s view that the responsibility rests with the donor. The Government strongly believe that. The onus is on the person or organisation receiving the donation to consider its origins very carefully. They can and should decline donations if they cannot satisfy themselves that those have come through the proper and legitimate channels.

Let me turn to the issue of why we should not ban donations from companies altogether. Political parties and other campaigners will remain able to raise sufficient funds because they need to communicate their views to the electorate about protecting our democracy better against those who seek to covertly undermine it. The hon. Member for North Herefordshire referenced the Canadian model. I have had the pleasure of meeting the Leader of the House from Canada. While it is tempting to suggest that there should be a ban on corporate donations, I remind the hon. Lady that 60% of their political campaigning is funded by the taxpayer—and it is a brave politician who would enter that particular plea to the British electorate at this time.

[Dr Chowns]

I thank the Minister for her engagement with my point. In UK politics, about 22% of donations into politics over the past few years have been from companies. We are not talking about requiring the Government to step in and put 60% of the funding into politics; we are talking about the risks associated with a specific form of donation.

Under the measures the Government is putting forward in clause 60, we are putting in place requirements to ensure that persons of significant control are clearly allowable donors. However, it is possible for a company to restructure so that it just goes underneath that and does not meet the 25% threshold. So that could still be a channel for illicit or foreign funding to come into British politics. Would it not be simpler to require any persons who have significant control in a company and who wish to make political donations to make them as individuals?

[The Chair]

This is a very long intervention.

[Dr Chowns]

I do apologise, Sir Desmond. I think I have made my point.

[Samantha Dixon]

The hon. Member has made her point. The Government believe that there is a place for company donations from UK companies. We just feel that we should be much stricter about the arrangements by which they do these things. We have set that out in the legislation, which is what we are discussing this afternoon.

Turning briefly to the points raised by my hon. Friend the Member for South Dorset, I remind all Members that these measures are not designed to prevent a specific individual or company from donating. Those who follow and meet the three tests and successfully meet the “know your donor” and section 54A requirements should be able to enrich our democracy by donating as they do. I therefore commend clause 60 to the Committee—

[Dr Chowns]

I apologise, but I have not heard the Minister respond to the point that I and the hon. Member for Hazel Grove made about donations being counted cumulatively, which is also one of the Rycroft recommendations.

[Samantha Dixon]

We will consider those points. The Rycroft recommendations are being considered very carefully. We will respond to them in due course and we will come back to Parliament with our recommendations as they come forward. I hope that gives the hon. Lady the assurance she is seeking.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Holmes]

I welcome the Minister’s comments on the clause. It is important that when we have been discussing the nature of this legislation, particularly regarding donations, we have outlined a clear stance that if people want to participate in our political process and make donations, they should have a physical stake in it. Any removal of the ambiguity around campaigners having to look to see whether it is permissible is welcome. It is a reasonable expectation from the Government that there has to be some level of participatory engagement in the political process. We have no problem with the clause; indeed we support it.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 61 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 62

Unincorporated associations making political contributions

[Dr Chowns]

I beg to move amendment 88, in clause 62, page 83, line 17, leave out “£11,180” and insert “£500”.

This amendment, together with Amendments 89 to 94, would bring the reporting threshold for donations from Unincorporated Associations in line with the permissibility threshold for donations to political parties.

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Amendment 89, in clause 62, page 83, line 26, leave out “£2,230” and insert “£500”.

See explanatory statement for Amendment 88.

Government amendment 79.

Clause stand part.

Amendment 90, in schedule 9, page 165, line 23, leave out “£11,180” and insert “£500”.

See explanatory statement for Amendment 88.

Amendment 91, in schedule 9, page 165, line 25, at end insert—

“1A For sub-paragraph (1) substitute—

(1) Where in any calendar year an unincorporated association falling within section 54(2)(h) makes a political contribution of more than £500, not having previously made any political contributions in that year, the association must notify the Commission accordingly within the period of 30 days beginning with the date on which the contribution was made.”

See explanatory statement for Amendment 88.

Amendment 92, in schedule 9, page 165, line 26, leave out sub-paragraph (2).

See explanatory statement for Amendment 88.

Government amendments 80 to 84.

Amendment 93, in schedule 9, page 170, line 26, leave out “£2,230” and insert “£500”.

See explanatory statement for Amendment 88.

Amendment 94, in schedule 9, page 170, line 26, at end insert—

“(aa) omit sub-paragraph (5)”.

See explanatory statement for Amendment 88.

Government amendments 85 to 87.

Schedule 9.

[Dr Chowns]

The clause contains the welcome measure of preventing donations from impermissible donors being made through the mechanism of unincorporated associations and reducing the level at which they have to register with the Electoral Commission and report gifts. That is very positive. The current situation really cannot continue, so I am pleased that, through these measures, the Government will try to manage and block malicious interference and ensure democratic safety.

Although unincorporated associations are used legitimately by some, they can be an opaque vehicle for funds of unknown origin, so there is potential for them to be used to introduce foreign interference in our political system. Interesting Transparency International research published last year found that, of the £40.4 million in donations made by unincorporated associations since 2010, a huge £38.6 million was unaccounted for. More than 95% of donations from unincorporated associations came from those that have not reported the source of their income, so it is clearly time for change Despite those concerning statistics, the previous Government increased reporting thresholds for unincorporated associations in the Elections Act 2022, so I am very glad that this Government are reversing that decision through the Bill.

Under normal regulations, donations to political parties must come from a permissible source if they are over £500, but if the donations are made by an unincorporated association, even with the lower threshold, the reporting requirements are not triggered until donations reach over £11,180 in a calendar year. Even with the new rules, it is possible for an unincorporated association that does not meet the threshold and is therefore not required to register to make donations without any checks. That is clearly an undesirable and unnecessary loophole, so I support the amendments that have been tabled by the hon. Member for Rochester and Strood (Lauren Edwards), which aim to close this loophole, and I urge the Minister to consider reducing the permissibility threshold for unincorporated associations to £500, equal to the permissibility threshold for other sources of donation.

[Samantha Dixon]

I will speak now to clause 62 and Government amendments 79 to 87, which were tabled in my name. I will come to the other amendments later.

The clause introduces measures that have long been called for by the Electoral Commission, the National Crime Agency and the Committee on Standards in Public Life, which is now known as the Ethics and Integrity Commission, to tighten the rules around unincorporated associations. Under the current framework, unincorporated associations are permitted to make political contributions provided their main office and activities are based in the UK, but there are no restrictions on the sources of the funds behind those contributions. Existing rules therefore do not provide sufficient transparency or assurance about who is ultimately funding the political contributions made through such bodies.

The clause introduces a strengthened framework to ensure that political contributions from unincorporated associations come from permissible sources and are subject to stricter and more consistent transparency requirements. The clause lowers the thresholds at which UAs must register with the Electoral Commission and report the gifts they receive, ensuring that significant contributors provide the same level of transparency as other regulated campaigners. It also extends transparency rules so that contributions to candidates count towards the registration threshold, and it requires UAs to appoint a responsible person, improving clarity about who stands behind such associations.

Finally, clause 62 introduces new controls to ensure that funds used for political contributions come from permissible sources. UAs will be required to verify political gifts they rely on, and they will be prohibited from using unverifiable or impermissible funds for political activity. I commend clause 62 to the Committee.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Holmes]

I have already said that I think the Government are being sensible in creating a unified or level playing field between companies and unincorporated associations. I was not an expert on the previous Act when it was passed, but in my view it is sensible for the Government to be taking this action, now that its consequences are clear, because the Act obviously did not work. If Members across the House look at some of my previous remarks on some of the proposals brought forward by the last Government, I am not ashamed to say that sometimes—I only say sometimes—we got it wrong. That is the nature of democracy.

The changes that the Government are making are sensible and my contention is that some of the amendments—especially amendments 88 and 90—use a sledgehammer to crack a nut. They create an overburden compared with the Government’s good intentions and what they want to get out of the proposals.

We would not support amendment 88 and we certainly would not support amendment 90, but we do welcome the strides that the Government, and the Minister, are trying to take in tightening up the regime.

[Dr Chowns]

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Amendment made: 79, in clause 62, page 83, line 28, at end insert—

“(h) create offences of—

(i) giving an unincorporated association false information about a gift that may be used to make a political contribution, and

(ii) withholding information about such a gift with intent to deceive.”—(Samantha Dixon.)

This amendment is consequential on amendment 85.

Clause 62, as amended, accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Schedule 9

UNINCORPORATED ASSOCIATIONS MAKING POLITICAL CONTRIBUTIONS

Amendments made: 80, in schedule 9, page 168, line 2, at end insert

“, unless it already has one (see sub-paragraph (6A))”.

This amendment, and amendment 81, amends the new provisions on responsible persons for unincorporated associations to make it clear that an association is not required to appoint a responsible person when it already has one in place, but that the Commission must be notified that the responsible person is willing to continue to act.

Amendment 81, in schedule 9, page 168, line 30, at end insert—

“(6A) Where an unincorporated association would be required by sub-paragraph (2) to appoint an individual to be the responsible person in relation to the association but an appointment of such a person is already in force, the notice under sub-paragraph (3) must inform the Commission that the responsible person is willing to remain as the responsible person in relation to the association (and sub-paragraph (4)(a) is to be read accordingly).”

See the explanatory statement for amendment 80.

Amendment 82, in schedule 9, page 170, line 7, after “within” insert

“any of paragraphs (a) to (g) of”.

This amendment prevents unincorporated associations from being permissible donors in relation to other unincorporated associations: it is intended as an anti-avoidance measure to prevent gifts being channelled through chains of unincorporated associations.

Amendment 83, in schedule 9, page 170, line 20, leave out from “within” to end of line 22 and insert

“any of paragraphs (a) to (g) of section 54(2),”.

This amendment makes similar anti-avoidance provision to that in amendment 82.

Amendment 84, in schedule 9, page 170, line 24, at end insert—

“(4) Section 162 (meaning of exempt trust donation) applies for the purposes of this paragraph as if, in subsection (2)(a), for ‘27th July 1999’ there were substituted ‘7th April 2026’.”

This amendment modifies the meaning of “exempt trust donation” for unincorporated associations by providing that a trust set up before 7th April 2026 (i.e. the date of tabling this amendment) is a permissible donor to an unincorporated association.

Amendment 85, in schedule 9, page 173, line 11, at end insert—

“(c) after sub-paragraph (3) insert—

‘(3A) A person commits an offence if—

(a) they knowingly give an unincorporated association any information relating to—

(i) the amount of any gift to the association, or

(ii) the person or body making such a gift,

which is false in a material particular, or

(b) with intent to deceive, they withhold from an unincorporated association any material information relating to a matter within paragraph (a)(i) or (ii),

in circumstances where they believe that the unincorporated association may use the gift for the purposes of making a political contribution.’”

This amendment creates a new criminal offence where a person knowingly provides an unincorporated association with false information, or withholds information with intent to deceive, about a gift that they believe the association may use for the purposes of making a political contribution.

Amendment 86, in schedule 9, page 173, line 15, at end insert—

“(b) in sub-paragraph (2)(b)(iii), at the end insert ‘or 3A’.”

This amendment inserts a missed consequential amendment so that paragraph 7(2)(b)(iii) of Schedule 19A to the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 refers to the new paragraph 3A inserted into that Schedule by paragraph 9 of Schedule 9.

Amendment 87, in schedule 9, page 174, line 9, at end insert—

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Clause 64 stand part.

New clause 10—Guidance on the law relating to digital communication offences in relation to elections—

“(1) The Secretary of State must, within six months of the passing of this Act, publish and lay before both Houses of Parliament guidance on certain digital communication offences, including digital manipulation and artificially generated content in relation to candidates and elected officials.

(2) Any guidance issued under section (1) must include guidance on the following—

(a) the operation of section 106 (false statements as to candidates) of the RPA 1983 in relation to digital communications;

(b) the operation of section 114A (undue influence) of the RPA 1983 in relation to digital communications;

(c) the interaction between the operations of sections 106 and 114A of the RPA 1983 and the duty of providers under the Online Safety Act 2023, including in relation to priority offences during election periods.

(3) Within 12 months of the publication of guidance under subsection (1) and annually thereafter, the Secretary of State must publish and lay before Parliament either—

(a) a statement that no updates to the guidance are required, or

(b) an updated version of the guidance.

(4) Before issuing—

(a) any guidance under subsection (1) or subsection (3) (b), or

(b) a statement under subsection (3)(a),

the Secretary of State must consult OFCOM and such other persons as they think necessary.

(5) For the purposes of this section “priority offences” means an offence listed in Schedule 7 (priority offences) of the Online Safety Act 2023.”

This new clause would require the Government to publish guidance on the operation of certain offences relating to digital communications as they relate to candidates and elected officials.

New clause 18—Information to be included with electronic material: generative artificial intelligence—

“(1) Section 41 of the Elections Act 2022 (requirement to include information with electronic material) is amended as follows.

(2) After subsection (3)(b) insert—

“(c) where the electronic material consists of or includes image, audio or video content that has been generated or materially altered by means of generative artificial intelligence, a statement that such artificial intelligence has been used.”

(2A) In this section, "generative artificial intelligence" means a machine-based system that can, for a given set of human-defined prompts or objectives, generate new image, audio or video content.”

This new clause amends the digital imprint rules in the Elections Act 2022 to require that any political campaigning material which contains images, audio, or video generated or materially altered by AI must include a statement that such artificial intelligence has been used.

New clause 24—Repository of digital political advertising—

“(1) The Elections Act 2022 is amended as set out in subsection (2).

(2) After section 61 insert—

“Part 6A Repository of digital political advertising

61A. Establishing a repository of digital political advertising

(1) The Secretary of State must, by regulations, make provision to require the Electoral Commission to establish a repository of paid-for digital political advertising.

(2) Any regulations made under subsection (1) must—

(a) provide for the repository of political advertising to be publicly accessible;

(b) specify that a provider of a Category 1 service within the meaning of the Online Safety Act 2023 must ensure that prescribed information relating to such advertising is submitted to the repository as soon as reasonably practicable, and, in any event, within 72 hours;

(c) set out the types of information to be prescribed; and

(d) provide for material in the repository to be transferred to the National Archives for preservation after a certain period.

(3) Before making any regulations that make provision for the matters under subsection 2(c), the Secretary of State must consult—

(a) the Electoral Commission;

(b) the Information Commissioner’s Office; and

(c) OFCOM.

(4) Any regulations made under subsection (1) must be laid before and agreed by both Houses of Parliament.””

This new clause requires the Secretary of State to bring forward regulations to require the Electoral Commission to establish a publicly available repository of political advertising.

New clause 25—Electoral Commission: powers to obtain information outside of a formal investigation—

“(1) The Elections Act 2022 is amended as follows.

(2) After Schedule 12, insert—

“SCHEDULE 13: Electoral Commission powers to obtain information outside of a formal investigation

1 The Secretary of State must, by regulations, make provision to allow the Electoral Commission to issue a notice requiring certain information from a regulated user-to-user service or search service, at any time during any regulated election period.

2 Any regulations made under paragraph 1 must specify that a person to whom a notice is given under this paragraph must comply with it within such reasonable time as is specified in the notice.

3 Any regulations made under paragraph 2 must specify the information which may be requested by the Electoral Commission, and include the following where they relate to elections—

(a) information relating to paid-for political advertising;

(b) algorithmic systems;

(c) coordinated inauthentic behaviour; and

(d) automated or bot accounts (whether domestic or foreign).

4 Any regulations made under paragraph 2 must also provide for any safeguards considered necessary by the Secretary of State as regards data protection or commercial confidentiality.

5 Any regulations made under paragraph 2 must be laid before and agreed by both Houses of Parliament.

6 For the purposes of this Schedule, “user-to-user service” has the meaning given by section 3 (“user-to-user service” and “search service”) of the Online Safety Act 2023.””

New clause 27—Government review of the “regulated periods” in relation to elections—

“(1) The Secretary of State must, within 12 months of the passing of this Act, commission a review of the adequacy of the current regulated periods for elections and referendums.

(2) The review must consider the following—

(a) the impact of campaign activity outside the relevant regulated period on elections;

(b) whether the length of the regulated periods are sufficient to tackle the prevalence of—

(i) manipulated content,

(ii) misinformation,

(iii) disinformation,

and their potential influence on elections.

(3) The review may make any recommendations it feels necessary for legislative or regulatory reform as a result of its findings.

(4) For the purposes of this section, “campaign activity” includes—

(a) digital campaigning;

(b) targeted advertising; and

(c) automated content distribution.

(5) For the purposes of this section “regulated period” means any period regulated under the Representation of the People Act 1983.

(6) The Secretary of State must lay a report of the review before both Houses of Parliament, together with their response to any recommendations for legislative or regulatory reform.”

This new clause requires the government to establish a review of the “regulated periods” in relation to elections which would consider whether the length of the regulated periods are sufficient in relation to the prevalence of manipulated content, misinformation and disinformation.

New clause 28—Information to be included with electronic material: data provenance—

“After Section 41 (requirement to include information with electronic material) of the Elections Act 2022 insert—

“Requirement to include information with electronic material created through generative artificial intelligence

(1) This section applies to electronic material which—

(a) meets the conditions in section 42 (paid for electronic material), or

(b) meets the conditions in section 44 (other electronic material),

and has been generated wholly through generative artificial intelligence.

(2) Electronic material to which this section applies must not be published unless it includes the following information—

(a) a statement that content was wholly generated by a generative artificial intelligence system;

(b) the name of the system used to generate the content.

(3) The Secretary of State may, by regulations, specify—

(a) additional requirements for information to be required under subsection (2);

(b) the form in which the information required under subsection (2) is to be provided.

(4) The form prescribed by regulations under subsection (3)(b) must be a form which can be detected and processed by regulated user-to-user services for the purpose of providing the required information to users of such services.

(5) Any regulations made under subsection (4) must be laid before and agreed by both Houses of Parliament.

(6) For the purposes of this section, “generative artificial intelligence” means computer system or software that—

(a) is capable of producing text, images, audio, video, or other content autonomously, wholly or substantially, based on prompts or instructions provided by a user;

(b) uses machine learning or other algorithmic techniques to generate content that mimics human-created material; and

(c) may produce content that is not pre-existing but is synthesized based on patterns learned from existing data.””

This new clause requires campaign material which has been generated by generative artificial intelligence to include a statement to that effect along with the name of the system used. It creates a power for the Government to make regulations about the information to be included.

Amendment 4, in clause 80, page 100, line 35, at end insert—

“(ha) Section (Guidance on the law relating to digital communication offences in relation to elections)”.

This amendment is consequential on NC10.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Holmes]

Does anyone on the Committee intend to speak to new clauses 10 or 24?

[Dr Chowns]

indicated assent.

[Paul Holmes]

In that case, I reserve my right to speak until after the hon. Member for North Herefordshire.

[Dr Chowns]

I will speak to new clauses 10, 24, 25, 27 and 28—I will rattle through them. First, new clause 10—tabled by the hon. Member for Milton Keynes Central (Emily Darlington), whom I thank for her work on this—relates to guidance on the law regarding digital communication offences in relation to elections. We need this clause and, although it is more complex, one word explains why: deepfakes. This new clause is, to a significant degree, about deepfakes.

Tackling deepfakes is complex, but we can take practical steps now to modernise election law and improve our ability to regulate in this area. Both the Electoral Commission and the Crown Prosecution Service have highlighted the need for clearer guidance on whether deepfakes fall within existing election offences. Unfortunately, the law on digital election offences is currently unclear. That uncertainty creates confusion for candidates, platforms and law enforcement, weakens democratic protections and leads to inconsistent enforcement.

New clause 10 would require the Government to address that gap by publishing clear guidance within 12 months of the Bill’s passage, setting out how digital communication offences apply during elections, so that expectations are clear and enforcement is consistent. In terms evidence for why this is needed, we all know that deepfakes and manipulated content targeting politicians are already circulating, including outside election periods. Existing laws may technically cover those harms, but their application in digital context remains unclear.

Recent examples include a deepfake video in October last year of a Conservative MP, the hon. Member for Mid Norfolk (George Freeman), which falsely claimed that he had defected. I was part of an event where he explained that, under the Online Safety Act 2023, he could potentially make a complaint about that, but would have to demonstrate that he was psychologically terribly damaged by it. That is not really what this is about—it is politics that is damaged by the proliferation of such material, so we should take our collective responsibility to deal with it very seriously.

In October 2023, a deepfake audio of our current Prime Minister went viral and has repeatedly resurfaced. In Ireland last year, an AI-generated video disrupted a presidential election. Those cases and many others demonstrate the growing risk. Clear guidance is needed to ensure that the law can be effectively applied during election periods. The new clause is very reasonable. It does not require the Government to commit absolutely to something right now; it simply requires the Government to publish guidance to clarify the situation.

The Government, in their response to the Speaker’s Conference report published recently, said:

“The Government recognises that there are potential issues with Section 106 of the Representation of the People Act 1983. We are reviewing how this legislation should apply in a modern electoral setting. Where necessary, we will take appropriate action to clarify the scope of Section 106, particularly to ensure that it captures emerging technologies (such as deepfakes and other AI technologies) and is future-proofed.”

Where better to do that than in this legislation? This is the point when the Government should action the commitment that they have already made.

New clause 24 proposes a repository of digital political advertising. Such advertising plays a key and increasingly central role in election campaigns, but remains significantly less transparent than traditional campaign materials. Voters are often unable to see who is targeting them, how much is being spent or whether messaging is consistent across audiences. Campaigners are able to use targeting on social media platforms, for example, to make very targeted adverts, so that nobody can see what material is going to whom.

That lack of transparency creates real opportunities for misinformation. It undermines trust in the democratic process and leaves the system vulnerable to manipulation by foreign or domestic actors, as well as opaque funding sources. While the Bill, as it stands, makes progress on digital imprints, it does not go far enough to ensure meaningful, real-time transparency.

New clause 24 would address those gaps by requiring the creation of a comprehensive, publicly accessible repository of digital political advertising and strengthening existing disclosure requirements. The reasons for that are well understood. Digital adverts can be micro-targeted to specific groups without wider scrutiny and there is currently no single public record of what ads are being run, by whom, at what scale or with what funding. International evidence, including from elections in the US and Europe—and, I would argue, in the UK—has shown how online political advertising can be exploited to spread disinformation and obscure funding sources.

That issue was addressed by Philip Rycroft in his very useful report; I note that, on page 47, he says:

“Strictly speaking, this issue of advert libraries strays beyond my remit”,

but that he has

“heard enough evidence to suggest that there would be considerable benefit”

from establishing this practice, and he calls on the Government to take action. I welcome that point and very much hope that the Government will consider this new clause, a practical and proportionate transparency measure that would align digital campaigning more with offline political advertising.

New clause 25 relates to the Electoral Commission’s powers to obtain information outside formal investigations. That is something we heard about in oral evidence and Philip Rycroft speaks about it specifically in his recommendations 9 and 10. The regulation of digital campaigning requires timely access to information, especially during very fast-moving election periods. At the moment, the Electoral Commission can effectively gather information from online platforms only through formal investigations, which can be initiated only once there is sufficient evidence of wrongdoing. There is a bit of a chicken-and-egg situation there—a significant gap.

The Commission cannot proactively monitor or respond to emerging risks in real time, including the risk of foreign interference or bot activity—a growing problem that we have seen in previous elections. As election campaigns increasingly take place online, that reduces the effectiveness of enforcement. Philip Rycroft has made a clear case for that change, so I do not need to labour the point. I very much hope that that is one of the recommendations that the Government will take away and come back on, and I would welcome some warm words from the Minister on that.

New clause 27 would require a Government review of regulated periods in relation to elections—again, something addressed in the Rycroft report, which covered the need to ensure that transparency requirements apply year round. Philip Rycroft is clearly seriously concerned about the risk of gaming the system. Currently, because regulation applies only within the regulated period, but expenditure applies during the entire year, there are strong incentives for political actors to front-load expenditure just before the regulated period kicks in. There is huge evidence of that; I have seen it from another party in my own area, with huge chunks of spending coming in just before the regulated period. That is a clear loophole.

Philip Rycroft draws attention to that issue, stating that high spending limits,

“combined with unlimited spending possibilities outwith the regulated period, drives a sort of arms race among political parties and actors to out-raise and out-spend their competitors.”

The net effect is extremely problematic for our politics. He goes on to state:

“Reducing the spending limits and introducing such limits across the whole electoral cycle could potentially relieve some of the fund-raising pressure, in turn diminishing the inducement to look to non-permissible sources to stay ahead.”

Rycroft acknowledges that the issue was beyond his direct remit, but it is useful that his report comments on where issues to do with foreign influence overlap with broader questions about how we regulate finance in our system. He states:

“The issue of spending limits and wider caps is one for the political class as a whole to consider if it wishes to restore confidence in the political process and to keep big money out of UK politics. This might be something that could be usefully debated during the passage of the Representation of the People Bill.”

Indeed—so today is our opportunity to debate it. I am saddened that the Bill, as it stands, does not address the need for year-round spending limits or for caps on overall donations—we will come to that a bit later—but this is the moment when we can and should respond to Philip Rycroft’s call to discuss this issue. I challenge the Minister on this: there is a clear need for regulation outwith the regulated period—for year-round regulation of political expenditure—and I hope that she will address that and take it forward.

Finally, new clause 28, also in the name of the hon. Member for Milton Keynes Central, is essentially about labelling AI-generated material. Just in the past 24 hours we have seen a global controversy over the use of an AI-generated image, posted by a person who shall perhaps remain nameless. It is clear that AI-generated material is widespread in politics. Sometimes it is easily spottable, as in the case I have just referenced, but at other times it may not necessarily be so. Legislation has not yet caught up with that issue. This new clause, like new clause 18 on the same topic, which I suspect the hon. Member for Hazel Grove may speak to shortly, is a much-needed step to improve transparency so that we know when material is produced using AI.

The Electoral Commission briefing raises some questions about the specifics of how the issue is addressed, and makes the point that there is a need for similar approaches to be taken across digital and non-digital formats. I take that point broadly, but I do not think it is beyond the wit of civil servants to come up with a form of words that will address the issue. The use of generative AI has been particularly prevalent in the digital space, so this is a real opportunity for regulation to catch up. I look forward to hearing from the Minister on all these very useful new clauses.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Holmes]

I hope that the hon. Member for North Herefordshire did not mind that I gave up speaking to enable her to do so, but I wanted to check whether someone would speak to those new clauses. I wanted to allow her to elaborate the argument so that I could come in with some of my thoughts at the end.

As the shadow Minister, I was intrigued, in various meetings that I have had, as we have all had, with outside organisations about the Bill, by the ideas outlined in new clauses 10 and 24. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Milton Keynes Central for tabling them; they are substantive new clauses that I think are very well intentioned. The number of Members who have supported them on the amendment paper shows the importance of tackling some of these issues in a cross-party and urgent way.

On new clause 10, on the guidance on law relating to digital communication offences in relation to elections, the hon. Member for North Herefordshire outlined the problems that we are currently having. Digital communication offences are becoming a bigger problem, and they cause harm to people. The current duty is to demonstrate that the person has been harmed emotionally. She used the example of the deepfake that went out of my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Norfolk, showing him saying that he was leaving the Conservative party and going to Reform. Although that has not necessarily been a strange development in the last couple of months, anyone who knows my hon. Friend knows that that is incredibly unlikely. It would also cause a great deal of distress to many of us moderate Conservatives for it to ever be thought that we could go to Reform. There is serious point behind that, which is that for anyone harmed by something like that, there should be laws relating to digital communication offences.

We do not think that new clause 10 would be arduous on the Government. It asks them to publish guidance on the operation of certain offences, and it does not ask for immediate action. It allows the Minister and the Government to go away and provide guidance. The Minister has said many times today that she is considering, for example, the Rycroft review, and that she will come back with suitable guidance and proposals. The new clause is in that spirit. It would allow her to go away and look at what we need to do in this increasingly concerning area of election campaigning. The call from the hon. Member for Milton Keynes Central is eminently sensible, and so we will support new clause 10 if it is pressed to a vote because we want that guidance to be brought in.

New clause 24 proposes a repository of digital political advertising. I do not expect Committee members to remember the questioning in the oral evidence sessions—particularly my questions—but I was really quite fascinated by the proposal. Like the hon. Member for North Herefordshire and other members of the Committee, I have met some organisations that have advocated for it. I do not think that we should be fearful, as politicians and members of any political party, or of none, of standing by the things that we put out in elections. Therefore, instead of going in the bin, as some of mine do, they should be kept online to ensure transparency and accountability through a simple repository regime.

The Government have repeatedly proposed to put more burdens—more regulatory responsibilities, I should say—on the Electoral Commission. I do not think this proposal would be a particularly bad burden to place on it. There is a question about resourcing the Electoral Commission, but I know that the hon. Lady and the various organisations that are advocating for new clause 24 are pretty relaxed about who would manage holding the information and transferring it to the National Archives, so I think that is something that the Government should explore.

I was interested that the hon. Lady outlined that she is concerned about misinformation, manipulation and the exploitation of the electoral process by foreign actors. I hope that when we come to new clause 37, she will be equally concerned about the exploitation of votes using foreign languages in electoral literature. I hope she will look as favourably on that proposal as I am on this one, because I believe that is equally exploitative of various communities in the country.

We support new clause 24, which we think is radical, but sensible and transparent. If we stand by what we put out there, we should not fear the people who elect us holding us to account for what has been put out, so I think that is actually quite an exciting prospect for democracy.

That is where the consensus between me and the hon. Members for Milton Keynes Central and for North Herefordshire ends. I have a number of concerns about new clause 27, not because I am opposed to having a general conversation about the regulatory period. The hon. Member for North Herefordshire is right that parties of all colours front-load and send out a lot of stuff before the regulated period starts. The regulated period is inherently there to protect the smaller parties from the bigger parties and to give everybody a level playing field.

I know that when the regulated period starts—and we are all currently going through the start of one—every party has equal right to put out an equal amount of election literature to people in our constituencies, boroughs or counties. All parties are held to the same standard and it can be proved if there has been—I hope not—manipulation of the election expenses. The regulated period is there to protect parties.

Do not get me wrong: in my constituency five Liberal Democrat “in touch” communications go out every year. It drives me mad. I do not like it. I do not like its content, but the Liberal Democrats have every right to communicate with their residents. Putting an annual limit on the amount of literature that can be put out is anti-democratic. It is quite good to have some element of competition, where many parties can put out election communications throughout the year. I worry that having an arbitrary annual cap on the amount of literature that we can put out will harm independent candidates and local parties—they may exist: we have the Eastleigh borough independents, of whom three were successfully elected councillors. They should not be held to the same standard as national parties, which can absorb the cost. I am slightly concerned about the unintended consequences of that.

New clause 27 does not outline whether it covers material related to the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority, which some of we elected representatives, choose to put out. We have a budget to communicate to our constituents. Are we going to be held to the same reporting threshold for those IPSA communications, which are not party political but are elected literature? [Interruption.] Would the hon. Member for North Herefordshire like to intervene to correct me?

[Dr Chowns]

I will pick up the hon. Member’s points in my summing up.

[Paul Holmes]

I am not being adversarial; there is an argument that although the literature that goes out via IPSA is not party political, as an elected official, IPSA is giving me the ability to send out literature that would not be included within the threshold. Other parties that oppose me at the next general election should be entitled to put out resources to match those, and I do not think that should be governed within an annual spending limit.

It worries me that if we get to a period in which we are controlling smaller, larger, regional and local political parties and holding them to the same standard in election spending as national, established parties such as those that hon. Members on the Committee represent, that would start to erode free and fair democratic access to the people who elect us and elect our colleagues in local government across the country. I am uncomfortable with that, although we could have a conversation about the lengths of regulated periods.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to consider the following:

Schedule 10.

Clause 66 stand part.

Schedule 11.

Clauses 67 to 69 stand part.

New clause 41—Electoral Commission: civil penalties and enforcement—

“(1) PPERA 2000 is amended as set out in subsection (2).

(2) In Schedule 19C, in paragraph 1, after sub-paragraph (1) insert—

‘(1A) When deciding whether to impose a fixed monetary penalty under this Act, the Commission must have regard to whether the penalty will—

(a) change the behaviour of the offender;

(b) eliminate any financial gain or benefit from non-compliance;

(c) be appropriate for the particular offender and regulatory issue;

(d) be proportionate to the nature of the offence and the harm caused;

(e) restore the harm caused by regulatory non-compliance, where appropriate; and

(f) deter future non-compliance.’”

This new clause would put the ‘Macrory principles’ for regulators on to a statutory footing as regards the Electoral Commission.

New clause 46—Power of Electoral Commission to require disclosure from financial institutions—

“In Schedule 19B of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 (investigatory powers of Commission), after paragraph 1 insert—

‘Power to require disclosure from financial institutions

1A (1) The Commission may give a disclosure notice to a financial institution requiring the institution—

(a) to produce, for inspection by the Commission or a person authorised by the Commission, any documents which—

(i) relate to the income and expenditure of an organisation or individual to which paragraph 1 applies, and

(ii) are reasonably required by the Commission for the purposes of carrying out their functions; or

(b) to provide the Commission, or a person authorised by the Commission, with any information or explanation which relates to that income and expenditure and is reasonably required by the Commission for those purposes.

(2) A financial institution to whom a disclosure notice is given shall comply with it within such reasonable time as is specified in the notice.

(3) In this paragraph, “financial institution” has the same meaning as in Schedule 6 to the Terrorism Act 2000 (see paragraph 6 of that Schedule).’”

This new clause gives the Electoral Commission the power to require information from a financial institution relating to the income and expenditure of political parties and associated individuals.

New clause 53—Electoral Commission: pre-investigation decision notices—

“(1) PPERA 2000 is amended as set out in subsection (2).

(2) In Schedule 19B, paragraph 3, subparagraph (5), at end insert—

‘or;

(b) relevant to determining whether to start an investigation.’”

This would enable the Electoral Commission to require information before launching a formal investigation.

New clause 57—Electoral Commission fining power—

“(1) Schedule 1, paragraph 5, to the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums (Civil Sanctions) Order 2010 is amended as set out in subsection (2).

(2) For ‘is £20,000’, substitute ‘is the greater of—

(a) £500,000, or

(b) 4% of the total campaign expenditure incurred by the person or organisation during the relevant regulated period.’

(3) At end of sub-paragraph (1) of paragraph 16 of Schedule 19C to PPERA 2000 insert—

‘(1A) Notwithstanding sub-paragraph (1), the Secretary of State may only make a supplementary order which amends the percentage of campaign expenditure incurred by the person or organisation during the relevant regulated period which can be used as a maximum monetary penalty by the Electoral Commission, if the condition in sub-paragraph (1B) has been met.

(1B) The condition in this sub-paragraph is that a recommendation for the amendment has been made to the Secretary of State by the Electoral Commission following consultation with the Ethics and Integrity Commission.’”

This new clause amends the Electoral Commission’s power to fine, increasing its maximum from £20,000 to £500,000 or 4% of campaign spending, whichever is higher. It further prevents the percentage used being changed through Order unless a recommendation has been made by the Electoral Commission following consultation with the Ethics and Integrity Commission.

[Dr Chowns]

On a point of order, Sir Desmond. Do we need to check whether any of the amendments debated with the previous clauses need to be moved, including the ones that I tabled?

[The Chair]

While it was convenient to debate those new clauses with the last group, it will not be convenient to reach a decision on them until much later in our proceedings.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lloyd Hatton]

I will keep my remarks brief in the interests of avoiding repetition. It is important to put on the record the changes in the Bill, which are hugely welcome. One of those is massively improving the information sharing and investigatory powers of the Electoral Commission to ensure closer working with regulators and law enforcement.

It should go without saying that the commission is the key watchdog in our democratic process and that it ensures that our elections and our political parties operate with integrity day to day. That is why it is particularly important that we look at some of the points being made as part of new clause 46. As has been said often today, that is touched on in some detail as part of Philip Rycroft’s review; the need to ensure that the information-sharing and investigatory powers of the Electoral Commission are as effective as they need to be, and that they work in a two-way direction to ensure that that work is undertaken.

I note that the Minister already touched on this at the start of this grouping, and that her and her officials will be wanting to look at it in more detail. I look forward to that, because it is important that we get this right as we make these positive steps forward in this part of the Bill. We must ensure that the Electoral Commission, as our key national watchdog for elections and the democratic process, has the powers and information at its fingertips to operate as effectively as possible.

[Dr Chowns]

I strongly support measures to strengthen the capacities and powers of the Electoral Commission, which plays a crucial role in regulating our politics. I will speak briefly to new clauses 46 and 53. As has already been highlighted, they are basically fully in line with Philip Rycroft’s recommendations 9 and 10, so I hope that Government amendments will be tabled in due course to address those recommendations, the justification for which has been clearly outlined.

My new clause 57 concerns the Electoral Commission’s fining power. I very much welcome the Government’s announcement that they will bring forward secondary legislation to increase the commission’s maximum fine to £500,000 from £20,000, which is clearly peanuts and no disincentive at all. That will be a significant improvement, and of course will bring the measure in line with the penalty that can be imposed for breaches of electoral finance rules in relation to referendums in Scotland.

[Lloyd Hatton]

Does the hon. Member share my view that the old system that we inherited meant that foul play by a political party was essentially priced into the system, because the fine was so small? What the Government are doing, by increasing the fine to £500,000 for a single offence via secondary legislation, means that that type of culture, in any political party, will come to an end—no party can simply say that these fines are the cost of doing business.

[Dr Chowns]

Absolutely. It is clear that the previous level, £20,000, was utterly inadequate, so I welcome the Government’s commitment to strengthen that. The purpose of my new clause 57 is to suggest ways in which it could be strengthened further, namely by putting the maximum fine into primary legislation, and by providing that the maximum fine would be £500,000 or 4% of campaign spending, whichever was the higher. I will explain why.

Most other regulators in the UK can impose unlimited fines, a high multimillion-pound fine or a fine as a percentage—for Ofcom, for example, 10%—of annual turnover. In its 2021 review of electoral finance, the Committee on Standards in Public Life recommended that the fine should be 4% of the value of campaign spending or £500,000, whichever was the higher. My new clause simply calls for what the Committee on Standards in Public Life argued for.

Analysis from Spotlight on Corruption has shown that the currently proposed increase to a £500,000 maximum fine would amount to a mere 1.5% and 2.1% of the campaign spending of the Labour and Conservative parties respectively, as the two largest-spending parties. If those parties had committed an egregious offence during the 2024 general election and the 4% measure had been in place, the maximum fines would have been £1.2 million or £955,000 respectively—double the current maximum. Arguably, it should be even higher—Ofcom can fine 10%—but my new clause simply puts forward the recommendation of the Committee on Standards in Public Life.

The Minister touched on the question of whether to have the limit in primary or secondary legislation. She argued—I think I am paraphrasing accurately—that one of the advantages of having it in secondary legislation is that it can be easily updated. However, the previous level of the fine, which was £20,000, was set out in secondary legislation—it was in the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums (Civil Sanctions) Order 2010—and it was never updated. The Minister said that the level of the fine might need to be set out in secondary legislation so that it could be more easily updated to make it higher, but the historical record shows us that we have had fines that are far too low and that they are not adapted.

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[Samantha Dixon]

I will speak to each of the new clauses, beginning with new clause 41, which seeks to place the Macrory principles on a statutory footing in relation to the Electoral Commission’s use of civil sanctioning powers.

We fully recognise the importance of the Macrory principles and agree that regulatory enforcement should always be flexible, transparent and proportionate. These principles were designed to guide the construction of regulatory systems and sanction regimes. As such, the Macrory principles directed the development of the Electoral Commission’s regime of civil sanctions, which was introduced by the Political Parties and Elections Act 2009 and therefore is already embedded in the commission’s regulatory practices. That includes the ability to issue fines for a wide range of offences, the use of stop notices and enforcement undertakings, and provision for representations and appeals.

The Electoral Commission is also required to publish guidance on its use of such powers, which it must have regard to when exercising its functions. It does this through its enforcement policy. Therefore, fairness and proportionality are already central to how the Electoral Commission operates. Indeed, the commission’s enforcement policy explicitly states that it will impose sanctions where appropriate, proportionate and in the public interest. For that reason, we do not consider it necessary or appropriate to apply the Macrory principles as the new clause proposes. The Electoral Commission is, and must remain, an independent regulator. It is vital that it retains the flexibility it needs to decide how best to use its enforcement powers, rather than being tied to a rigid statutory checklist for individual enforcement decisions.

The Government have been clear in our commitment to strengthening the Electoral Commission’s independence, including through the repeal of the strategy and policy statement, which the commission was previously required to consider in the exercise of its functions. Introducing further statutory requirements of this kind risks cutting across that principle and altering the balance of the commission’s operational autonomy. There is a very real risk that amending PPERA to codify these principles in this way is unnecessarily duplicative and could lead to legal uncertainty. Enforcement decisions could become a quagmire of legal challenge, which would delay action and weaken the commission’s overall effectiveness as a regulator. Having given these assurances, I hope that the hon. Member for Hamble Valley will not press new clause 41.

I turn now to new clause 53, which seeks to provide the Electoral Commission with powers to request information from any person where such information is relevant to determining whether to open an investigation. The Government recognise the importance of ensuring that the commission has the right tools it needs to make informed decisions about potential breaches of political finance rules. The commission already has substantial information-gathering powers to support its regulatory functions, including the enforcement of political finance and imprint rules. That said, the Government recognise that we cannot be complacent, which is why we commissioned the Rycroft review to consider whether political finance rules and their enforcement can be strengthened in the light of emerging risks, including covert funding and foreign interference.

Although we do not support the amendment, we are carefully considering relevant recommendations from the Rycroft review that reinforce measures already included in the Bill to ensure political finance rules and their enforcement remain robust and fit for purpose. There will be a full Government response to the review, and we will consider whether further amendments to the Bill are appropriate in the light of that work. With those reassurances, I hope the hon. Member will withdraw her amendment.

New clause 57 seeks to increase the Electoral Commission’s maximum fine from £20,000 per offence to a new maximum of £500,000 or 4% of campaign expenditure, whichever is greater. It also requires that any order seeking to amend the suggested percentage can be made only if recommended by the Electoral Commission following consultation with the Ethics and Integrity Commission. The Government fully recognise the importance of ensuring that the commission has robust enforcement powers. A strong and proportionate civil sanctions regime is essential for securing compliance with the rules and upholding trust in our democracy.

The current maximum fine of £20,000 does not provide a meaningful deterrent against rule breaking. The Electoral Commission has argued for a long time that it risks becoming a mere cost of doing business for the largest political parties and campaigners. The Government agree that increasing the maximum fine is essential, so that sanctions reflect the scale of modern political campaigning and ensure that all campaigners, no matter how large, face significant repercussions when the rules are broken. That is why we intend, through secondary legislation, to increase the commission’s maximum fine significantly to up to £500,000 per offence.

The reason why the change will be made through secondary legislation is that Parliament has already provided the Secretary of State with the power to make supplementary orders in relation to the Electoral Commission’s civil sanction regime. Any such order is subject to parliamentary approval under the affirmative procedure. It was through the exercise of that power, and through that process, that the existing maximum fine was established in the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums (Civil Sanctions) Order 2010, which is referenced in the new clause. It is therefore appropriate to follow the same process for making changes to the commission’s regime of civil sanctions where it is already provided for in legislation.

In terms of adding statutory requirements that must be met before the Secretary of State can make a supplementary order, the Government have seen no evidence that such conditions are necessary. We have worked closely with the Electoral Commission through the development of the measures in the Bill, and we will continue to work collaboratively as we develop the detail of proposals for increasing the maximum fine that it can impose. Those details will be set out in secondary legislation in due course, and at that time Parliament will rightly have the opportunity to scrutinise and debate the Government’s approach and consider whether to approve the legislation. For those reasons, and with those reassurances in place, I hope the hon. Member will withdraw her amendment.

[Dr Chowns]

The Minister will forgive me, but I did not hear her respond to the reference in my new clause to the 4% of campaign spending. Did I briefly drop off? Will she consider that when introducing secondary legislation?

[Samantha Dixon]

We have considered it, and we have decided to opt for a fine of £500,000. However, when we introduce the secondary legislation, the debate may flesh out that argument, and the figure may change, should secondary legislation and the debate lead to that conclusion. However, at this stage, we will not accept the amendment.

New clause 46 seeks to give the Electoral Commission powers to compel financial institutions to disclose information related to income and expenditure of regulated entities, such as political parties and candidates, where it is reasonably required by the commission to carry out its functions. The Government fully recognise the importance of ensuring that the commission has the tools it needs to enforce compliance with political finance rules. The commission already has substantial information gathering powers to support its regulatory functions, including the enforcement of political finance and imprint rules.

That said, the Government recognise that we cannot be complacent, which is why we commissioned the Rycroft review to consider whether political finance rules and their enforcement can be strengthened in the light of emerging risks, including covert funding and foreign interference. As Members know, we are considering the relevant recommendations of the review that could reinforce measures already in the Bill to ensure that political finance rules and their enforcement remains robust and fit for purpose. I note that new clause 46 draws on a recommendation from the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy and covers very similar ground to one of Mr Rycroft’s recommendations. We will revert with a full Government response to the review and consider whether to make further amendments to the Bill in the light of that work.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 65 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Schedule 10 agreed to.

Clause 66 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Schedule 11 agreed to.

Clauses 67 to 69 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Ordered, That further consideration be now adjourned.—(Deirdre Costigan.)

Representation of the People Bill (Eighth sitting)

Ellie Chowns Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 16th April 2026 Public Bill Committees

[Zöe Franklin (Guildford) (LD)]

It was very good to hear from the Minister setting out this group of clauses. The Liberal Democrats are very pleased it seeks to address the hostility towards those who administer our elections. As colleagues on the Conservative Benches and the Minister have outlined, they play such an important part in our democracy.

Amendment 38 and new clause 55 in my name address the need for there also to be protection for the families and staff of candidates. I was a member of the Speaker’s Conference, and I would like to put it on record how pleased I am to see so many of its recommendations in the Bill. We considered in quite some depth the issue of abuse of candidates.

The survey of MPs and their staff highlighted the nature of the abuse and intimidation they experience, and the sad reality that it is not limited to them. Rather, where a bad actor is unsuccessful or unable to silence the candidate directly, they turn to the people around them. That can be partners, children or staff. We firmly believe that should not be deemed to be okay in the eyes of the law, and that it needs to be addressed.

New clause 55 amends the Elections Act 2022 so that relatives and staff of candidates are a protected category for the purposes of hostility-based disqualification and related provisions, defining “relative” by reference to the Family Law Act 1996, and “staff” as people

“employed by or working under the direction”

of a candidate. Amendment 38 amends clause 71 of the Bill to include candidates’ relatives and staff in the list for the hostility aggravating factor.

I hope that the Minister and the Government will support those important provisions. If they do not, could the Minister please outline how the Bill as drafted already covers candidates’ relatives and staff, or what the justification is for leaving such a gap?

[Dr Ellie Chowns (North Herefordshire) (Green)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Dame Siobhain. I rise briefly to say that I fully support these measures, which are clearly welcomed across all parties. I also support the comments of the hon. Member for Guildford in relation to extending the measures further, because by definition, anybody who is essentially associated with the political process is potentially subject to the hostility that we have discussed. Extending those protections is clearly important.

[Samantha Dixon]

Those who are convicted of relevant offences motivated by hostility against a candidate, campaigner or elective office holder can be banned from standing for or holding elective office for five years. As I have set out, the Bill will also introduce a new aggravating factor for those same offences and extend the regime to include relevant offences motivated by hostility against electoral staff.

Amendment 38 and new clause 55 would extend the list of relevant persons to include candidates’ staff and their relatives. I am pleased to inform the Committee that the regime already covers those circumstances. The application of the existing disqualification order and new aggravating factor is based on the motivation behind the offence committed, regardless of precisely who the offence was committed against. For example, if it were found that a relevant offence was committed against a candidate’s relative for the purpose of intimidating the candidate, ultimately the offence was motivated by hostility towards the candidate, and thus a disqualification order or aggravating factor could be applied.

Regarding employees of candidates specifically, I draw the attention of the hon. Member for Guildford to the fact that campaigners employed by candidates are already directly protected under the regime by section 34 of the Elections Act 2022. Other employees would be covered indirectly in the same way that I have outlined for a candidate’s relatives. I hope the hon. Member is reassured by that and will consider not pressing the amendment.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

Does anyone wish to make a contribution?

[Dr Chowns]

I just want to say, well done to the Government.

[Samantha Dixon]

I thank the hon. Lady very much.

Question put and agreed to.

New clause 14 accordingly read a Second time, and added to the Bill.

New Clause 60

Power of Scottish Ministers to vary sums in Schedule 7 to PPERA 2000

“In section 155 of PPERA 2000 (power to vary specified sums or percentages), in subsection (1A)—

(a) after ‘vary’ insert ‘—

(a) ’;

(b) at the end insert

‘, or

(b) any sum for the time being specified in Schedule 7 so far as that sum applies in relation to a donation to a member of a local authority in Scotland who is not also a member of a registered party.’”—(Samantha Dixon.)

This new clause, which would be inserted after clause 62, amends section 155(1A) of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 to provide a power for the Scottish Ministers to vary the sums in Schedule 7 (control of donations to individuals and member associations), so far as they relate to areas of devolved competence.

Brought up, read the First and Second time, and added to the Bill.

New Clause 2

Permissible donors not to include individuals serving a foreign administration

“(1) Section 54 of PPERA 2000 (permissible donors) is amended as follows.

(2) After subsection (2) insert—

‘(2A) An individual who would otherwise fall within subsection (2)(a) is not a permissible donor if that individual is, or has been—

(a) a member of, or

(b) a politically-appointed adviser to

a foreign administration.’

(3) After subsection (8) insert—

‘(9) In subsection (2A)—

“foreign administration” means the government or state apparatus of any country or territory outside the United Kingdom;

“member” includes elected and appointed members.’”—(Lisa Smart.)

This new clause would ban those who are or have been members of a foreign administration, or advisers to a foreign administration, from donating money to a political party, think tank or campaigning body.

Brought up, and read the First time.

--- Later in debate ---

from making donations to political parties. It is a straightforward proposition: those who have sought to undermine democracy through violence should have no financial role in shaping it. We firmly hold the principle that our democratic institutions must command public confidence and that those who have sought to undermine them should face serious consequences. Certain terrorism and national security offences should be treated as a special case to maintain confidence in our democratic institutions. It is right to protect the integrity of those institutions against those who seek to undermine them through violence and extremism.

[Dr Chowns]

I completely support the thrust of these new clauses tabled by the hon. Member, in terms of protecting British democracy. I have a specific question in relation to new clause 3. Last year the Government proscribed a protest organisation. That proscription has since been overturned in the High Court, and it is still being considered. Is the hon. Member concerned about her new clause might interact with that particular case? Is there a case for thinking carefully about that issue?

[Lisa Smart]

I am grateful to the hon. Member for giving me the opportunity to wade into such a thorny political issue—and an issue where it is important to stay on the right side of what can be said in discussing a proscribed organisation. The Government should use their powers of proscription proportionately, in all cases, and should be able to robustly back up their decision to proscribe an organisation with very clear evidence that is made public. I am on the record many times as saying that.

The police and any authorities that we are asking to implement the law must do so according to the law as it is at the time. At the moment there is a live case where an organisation was proscribed and there are relevant court cases. The hon. Member is absolutely right to highlight that. Over the weekend, arrests were made in relation to that proscription. New clause 3 is about donations to political parties. If an organisation is proscribed—and it is still proscribed—it would fall under the scope of new clause 3, even if there are ongoing legal processes that have not yet concluded.

[Dr Chowns]

Just to be clear, my concern is that literally hundreds of people have been arrested for holding placards in relation to that organisation. Potentially, under the hon. Member’s new clause 3, all those hundreds of people could be forbidden forever from donating to any political party. I am not sure that that is proportionate. It strikes me that there is complexity there, relating to the specific new clause. I am fully on board with excluding promotion of political violence and so forth, but that particular case highlights a complexity, particularly around the hundreds of people arrested for holding placards.

[Lisa Smart]

The arrests were made for support for a proscribed organisation via holding a placard that said the holder supports that organisation. I think we are talking about the same case. I understand the point that the hon. Member makes. Proscription of organisations is a tool that the Government rightly uses, although I have questioned the proportionality of the use of that tool. New clause 3 particularly mentions political violence; the hon. Member is talking about peaceful protest, if I understand her correctly. All hon. Members on this Committee, and everyone beyond it, should support the right for people to tell a Government that they think the Government have got it wrong. We should all support that and not make it harder for people to do it. If, however, someone is guilty of a

“prescribed offence relating to the promotion, incitement, or use of political violence”,

I do not think that they should be able to financially support a political party. The promotion of an organisation is the same as supporting an organisation. There are ways of supporting organisations and causes that stay exactly the right side of the law. While I am not of the view that the Government have always used proscription rules proportionately in recent months, I do think that, if those rules exist, they should be able to be used in that way by those who are enforcing the law.

[Lisa Smart]

New clause 3 talks specifically about political violence. While we can sometimes agree with the message that opponents of our adversaries use, it is right that we are against political violence and those who promote political violence. I think that covers his question on new clause 3.

[Dr Chowns]

There are some people who renounce political violence— Nelson Mandela comes to mind. Obviously, he was never a British citizen, but there is a genuine question there.

[Lisa Smart]

We should all be against political violence. People who propose and promote political violence should not be permitted to donate to political parties in the UK. I am thinking about people who have various convictions in the UK for promoting political violence and about people who own tech platforms but are based on the west coast of the United States and have spoken at rallies that promote political violence. We should not be welcoming their interference in our politics and new clause 3 seeks to stop them from doing so.

On new clause 2, the hon. Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner talked about people who have been politically appointed to be an adviser for a foreign Administration, whether in a business ambassadorial or trade envoy role, and I see his point. I would have thought those are politically appointed, rather than on a civil service basis. However, there are people who are not political appointments who would not fall within new clause 2, so they could continue to operate both as an envoy or an ambassador in that informal business ambassadorial role and continue to donate. I do not think that is covered under new clause 2 as it is currently written.

Returning to new clause 3, the principle that our democratic institutions must command public confidence, and that those who seek to undermine them should face serious consequences, is one that we hold firmly.

On new clause 15, voters have a right to know who is financing the people seeking their vote. That is a basic condition of democratic accountability. Real-time disclosure of donations in a publicly searchable database of all online political ads and spending are commitments we have held for years. New clause 15 is entirely consistent with that agenda. There have been other amendments and proposals from other Members that have touched on some of those issues, which we also support.

New clause 16 would require the treasurer of each registered political party to prepare an annual statement setting out the steps taken to mitigate risks relating to donations originating from a foreign nation, to be delivered to the Electoral Commission alongside the party’s statement of accounts. We have heard a great deal throughout this Committee about the importance of transparency, and we agree.

This new clause makes transparency operational. It requires parties not simply to accept or reject donations, but to demonstrate annually that they have actively assessed and mitigated the risks of foreign money entering their finances through UK-registered vehicles. Foreign-owned UK entities are a known vector for influence. The public record of recent years—Russian money, oligarch links and opaque corporate structures—makes that plain. An independent annual audit is a proportionate and practical response.

New clause 17 is about prohibiting politicians from receiving payment from proscribed state broadcasters. State-controlled broadcasters have been used as instruments of foreign influence, disinformation and political interference for decades. It would be extraordinary to allow individuals seeking or holding elected office to receive financial benefit from those very organisations. That is not a blanket ban on media appearances—heaven forbid—it is a prohibition on financial relationships with broadcasters acting as foreign propaganda arms.

Moving on to new clauses 45 and 51 proposed by the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington (Matt Western), the Joint Committee that he chairs noted potential risks around permissible donors being used as “conduits” to channel foreign money into UK politics. It further noted a discrepancy between corporations needing to have a UK connection—for example, generating enough revenue in the UK to cover their donation—and individuals, for whom there were apparently fewer such requirements. The report considered various options, balancing security interests against the risk of creating chilling effects.

New clause 45 would mean that overseas individuals wishing to donate would need to hold funds or assets that may be taxed in the UK, sufficient to cover the cost of their donation. That broadly mirrors the Government’s proposals for corporations to have generated sufficient UK-based revenue.

On new clause 51, the Joint Committee’s report also highlighted the resourcing challenges faced by the Electoral Commission and law enforcement bodies such as the National Crime Agency, and noted that legislative changes will be effective only if there is adequate resourcing to enforce the rules. New clause 51 would require the Electoral Commission and the National Crime Agency to report annually on the risks of foreign interference in the UK’s political finance system and the adequacy of systems in place to address those risks.

--- Later in debate ---

Brought up, and read the First time.

[Dr Chowns]

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

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

New clause 12—Controls on accepting donations in form of cryptoassets—

“(1) The Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 is amended in accordance with subsections (2) and (3).

(2) After section 54 (permissible donors to registered parties) insert—

‘54A Controls on accepting donations in form of cryptoassets

(1) A donation received by a registered party by way of a transfer of cryptoassets to the party must not be accepted by the party unless the donation meets requirements specified in regulations made by the Commission.

(2) For the purposes of this section, section 52(2)(a) (minimum donation to be disregarded) does not apply.

(3) Regulations made by the Commission may include requirements relating to—

(a) the identity of the holder of the cryptoassets donated to the registered party;

(b) the nationality and country of residence of the holder of the cryptoassets donated to the registered party;

(c) the value of a donation that is to be disregarded for the purposes of this section;

(d) the maximum value of the cryptoassets that may be donated to a registered party;

(e) the original source of the funds that were transferred into the cryptoassets donated to the registered party;

(f) any other matter that the Commission considers appropriate for the purpose of improving the transparency of donations made by way of a transfer of cryptoassets.

(4) In this section, “cryptoasset” means a cryptographically secured digital representation of value or contractual rights that uses a form of distributed ledger technology and can be transferred, stored or traded electronically.

(5) The Secretary of State may by regulations made by statutory instrument amend the definition of “cryptoasset” in subsection (4).

(6) A statutory instrument containing regulations under subsection (5) may not be made unless a draft of the instrument has been laid before and approved by a resolution of each House of Parliament.’

(3) In Schedule 7 (controls on donations to individuals and members associations), after paragraph 6 insert—

‘6ZA Controls on accepting donations in form of cryptoassets

(1) A controlled donation received by a regulated donee by way of a transfer of cryptoassets to the donee must not be accepted by the donee unless the donation meets requirements specified in regulations made by the Commission.

(2) For the purposes of this paragraph, paragraph 4(3)(b) (minimum donation to be disregarded) does not apply.

(3) Regulations made by the Commission may include requirements relating to—

(a) the identity of the holder of the cryptoassets donated to the regulated donee;

(b) the nationality and country of residence of the holder of the cryptoassets donated to the regulated donee;

(c) the value of a donation that is to be disregarded for the purposes of this paragraph;

(d) the maximum value of the cryptoassets that may be donated to a regulated donee;

(e) the original source of the funds that were transferred into the cryptoassets donated to the regulated donee;

(f) any other matter that the Commission considers appropriate for the purpose of improving the transparency of donations made by way of a transfer of cryptoassets.

(4) In this paragraph, “cryptoasset” means a cryptographically secured digital representation of value or contractual rights that uses a form of distributed ledger technology and can be transferred, stored or traded electronically.

(5) The Secretary of State may by regulations made by statutory instrument amend the definition of “cryptoasset” in subsection (4).

(6) A statutory instrument containing regulations under sub-paragraph (5) may not be made unless a draft of the instrument has been laid before and approved by a resolution of each House of Parliament.’

(4) In the Representation of the People Act 1983 in Schedule 2A (controls on donations to candidates), after paragraph 6 insert—

‘6A Controls on accepting donations in form of cryptoassets

(1) A relevant donation received by a candidate or his election agent by way of a transfer of cryptoassets must not be accepted unless the donation meets requirements specified in regulations made by the Commission.

(2) For the purposes of this paragraph, paragraph 4(2) (minimum donation to be disregarded) does not apply.

(3) Regulations made by the Commission may include requirements relating to—

(a) the identity of the holder of the cryptoassets donated to the candidate or agent;

(b) the nationality and country of residence of the holder of the cryptoassets donated to the candidate or agent;

(c) the value of a donation that is to be disregarded for the purposes of this paragraph;

(d) the maximum value of the cryptoassets that may be donated to a candidate or agent;

(e) the original source of the funds that were transferred into the cryptoassets donated to the candidate or agent (including information relating to any transactions between the original source of the funds and the transfer of those funds into the cryptoassets);

(f) any other matter that the Commission considers appropriate for the purpose of improving the transparency of donations made by way of a transfer of cryptoassets.

(4) In this section, “cryptoasset” means a cryptographically secured digital representation of value or contractual rights that uses a form of distributed ledger technology and can be transferred, stored or traded electronically.

(5) The Secretary of State may by regulations made by statutory instrument amend the definition of “cryptoasset” in subsection (4).

(6) A statutory instrument containing regulations under sub-paragraph (5) may not be made unless a draft of the instrument has been laid before and approved by a resolution of each House of Parliament.’

(5) This section comes into force on the day on which this Act is passed (and section 80 is to be construed accordingly).”

This new clause introduces controls on donations made by way of transfers of cryptoassets. Donations or transfers would have to comply with requirements set out in regulations made by the Electoral Commission in order to be accepted and would be prohibited until the Commission has made such regulations.

New clause 20—Disclosure of past donations in cryptoassets—

“(1) Part 4 of PPERA 2000 (control of donations to registered parties and their members etc) is amended as follows.

(2) After section 66 (declaration by treasurer in donation report) insert—

‘66A Report on past donations involving cryptoassets

(1) The treasurer of a registered party must, within the period of six months beginning with the day on which this section comes into force, prepare a report under this section.

(2) The report must record the relevant details in relation to each donation received by the party during the relevant 5-year period which was—

(a) made wholly or in part with cryptoassets; or

(b) accepted by means of a custodian wallet provider or cryptoasset exchange provider.

(3) For the purposes of this section, the “relevant 5-year period” means the period of 5 years ending with the day on which this section comes into force.

(4) In this section, “the relevant details” in relation to a donation means—

(a) the name and address of the donor;

(b) the amount or value of the donation;

(c) the date on which the donation was received; and

(d) the date on which, and the way in which, any necessary steps were taken regarding the donation under section 56 (acceptance or return of donations: general).

(5) The report must be delivered to the Commission within the period of 14 days beginning with the end of the period mentioned in subsection (1).

(6) In this section—

“Cryptoassets” has the meaning given by Regulation 14A(3)(a) of the Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing and Transfer of Funds (Information on the Payer) Regulations 2017;

“Custodian wallet provider” has the meaning given by Section 131ZC(3) of the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002; “Cryptoasset exchange provider” has the meaning given by Section 131ZC(3) of the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002.’”

This new clause amends PPERA 2000 to require registered political parties to compile and submit a one-off report to the Electoral Commission detailing the source, value, and dates of any donations made via cryptoassets, or accepted via crypto wallets/exchanges, over the past five years.

[Dr Chowns]

I rise to move new clause 4, tabled by the right hon. Member for Birmingham Hodge Hill and Solihull North (Liam Byrne). I will also speak briefly to new clause 12, tabled by the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington, and new clause 20, tabled by the hon. Member for Hazel Grove. She is here and I am sure she will speak.

This incredibly important group of new clauses responds to a glaring absence in the Bill relating to crypto donations. As I will get on to, Rycroft has talked about this and the Government have committed to bringing forward related amendments. I am pleased about that, but it is very important that, in Committee, we take the opportunity to discuss in detail what shape those amendments might take and what the issues are around this topic.

There is consensus across wide parts of the political spectrum that cryptocurrency poses particular risks in relation to political donations. Transparency International has highlighted a number of factors: cryptocurrencies are fast and borderless, there are various exchanges offering anonymity and they are increasingly used for money laundering. There are clear risks with crypto, which makes it a high-risk vehicle for political donations through which foreign actors, who would otherwise be unable to, might be able to donate to political parties and candidates and try to influence British politics. Again, as Transparency International points out,

“it is reasonable to assume there is a strong likelihood that this alternative payment method is being used by hostile actors, such as Russia, to destabilise Western political systems.”

We need to take these warning very seriously.

Indeed, the Royal United Services Institute says:

“Cryptocurrency donations to UK political parties present an urgent and under-addressed challenge to the UK’s electoral integrity and, by extension, to its national security.”

It points out that

“the Bill does not mention cryptocurrencies”,

and says:

“This leaves a critical gap in our foreign interference defences as the pseudonymous, cross-border and decentralised features of crypto enable it to be used as a political money laundering accelerant”.

There are clearly many risks associated with crypto.

Philip Rycroft pointed this out himself and recommended:

“The government should legislate in the Representation of the People Bill to introduce a moratorium on political donations made in cryptoassets, with a power to end the moratorium only once Parliament and the Electoral Commission are assured that relevant regulation is effective.”

There is some debate about whether we should have a blanket ban on cryptoassets or a moratorium with safeguards.

I am mainly concerned about the outcome, rather than the particular terminology that is used to deal with this. We must ensure that crypto is not used as a vehicle for the pollution of British politics. One of the key issues is the use of AI to split donations into lots of tiny fragments that go under the radar of any benchmarks or limits, and of the scrutiny of donations. That is a risk, but as RUSI points out, the more significant, under-recognised and under-dealt with risk is the indirect use of crypto.

It is very easy to translate crypto into a fiat currency at the point of donation, so although I am moving new clause 4, tabled by the right hon. Member for Birmingham Hodge Hill and Solihull North (Liam Byrne), which would

“prevent parties and candidates from accepting donations in cryptoassets”,

we actually need a stronger regulatory environment and to recognise that there may be even bigger risks from the indirect use of crypto further down the chain, which could still be used to hide the provenance of funding, even though it may not be in the form of crypto when it enters the coffers of a political party or candidate.

[Lloyd Hatton (South Dorset) (Lab)]

The hon. Member is articulating very real concerns about cryptocurrency and the way it can manipulate our democratic processes. Will he join me in welcoming the fact that, when the Rycroft review was published before the Easter recess, the Government responded pretty swiftly on this, and particularly on a moratorium on political donations made through cryptocurrency. Does she welcome the Government’s urgent response in the Chamber?

It was clear from Ministers that they intend to get this right. The immediate response to the Rycroft review was about making sure that we get something in place straight away. From listening to Ministers inside and outside the Chamber, I know there is an enthusiasm to make sure this is done right. Does the hon. Member welcome that initial response and, like me, does she look to see how we can tighten up our defences against cryptocurrency in the longer term, however they may be used to try to infiltrate our democratic processes?

[Dr Chowns]

I welcome the commitment that the Government have made. I participated in that statement in the Chamber before Easter. As the hon. Member will have noticed, I even welcomed and congratulated the Government on their positive actions under the Bill without prompting from the Government Benches. It is important to give credit where it is due. It is also important to have the opportunity, in this Committee, to debate some of these details.

If the Government are to bring forward legislation to institute a moratorium, it is important to think about what conditions will be set under which any such moratorium might be lifted in future. That is crucial, because it could otherwise be overturned very easily. I suggest that, at a minimum, the criteria for lifting any such moratorium should be that an adequate regulatory environment is in place for controlling the ultimate risk and that there is triple positive approval from Parliament, the Electoral Commission and the Financial Conduct Authority—the three most important oversight organisations on this issue. It will be very difficult and complex to find a mechanism to regulate cryptocurrency; I hope that we just get rid of it from our politics completely. But if the Government are going to introduce a moratorium, the conditions under which that moratorium might be lifted must be included in the primary legislation that puts it in place.

[Paul Holmes]

The hon. Lady is making an excellent speech. I agree with every word she says about there being a very fine balance between a moratorium and a ban—a ban could, actually, be retrograde—but if we have a moratorium we should at least have a regulatory framework that makes sure that cryptocurrency cannot be moved upstream. Does she share my concern that, despite the good intentions of the Minister and the Government, and despite consistent pushing for a timescale for the implementation of the Rycroft review, we have not had that? She is therefore right that the Committee is the perfect opportunity to get the ideas of all political parties, and to hopefully get a better idea of the Government response.

[Dr Chowns]

I share the hon. Member’s enthusiasm and sense of urgency about getting Rycroft implemented as soon as possible. In the spirit of giving credit where it is due, the Government did commission that review—which was good—the review was quite fast, there was an immediate statement, and the Bill is going through. I do not think that we are in a perfect place.

I would have liked the Bill to have longer in Committee to give the Government a chance to introduce amendments that we could properly scrutinise. It is deeply unfortunate that, for a Bill that is about the workings of our electoral system, we are not able to do that core scrutiny in Committee—the crucial line-by-line scrutiny in the Commons, which is the elected Chamber. We are being asked, basically, to take it on trust. It is not that I distrust Government, but it is important to have this discussion now. I hope that the Minister will respond to those points.

I have made the point about the importance of including in primary legislation the criteria under which any moratorium might be lifted in the future, and that there must be really strong safeguards. I have also made the point that a ban on crypto donations will not itself stop the risk, because of the downstream issues. We have to think carefully about how whatever mechanism is introduced deals with that.

We have already seen that Ben Delo, who has given £4.5 million to Reform in recent months, has said, “Oh dear, since I am going to be hit by this retrospective moratorium I am going to move back to the UK to evade it.” That is clear evidence of gaming the system by a guy who, by the way, was convicted in the US of impropriety in relation to political financing. He was subsequently pardoned by Donald Trump. We have to be really careful of how bad actors might manipulate any legislative proposals that are introduced.

A ban on cryptocurrency will not, in itself, stop the risks. We also need a cap on all political donations—we will discuss a group of new clauses relating to that in a bit, so I will save my arguments on that topic until then—plus a donor register, as I spoke about in Tuesday’s sitting. A donor register with donor registration numbers would address the issue of traceability and address the risk that donations are split into many tiny donations to hide the fact that they are all from the same place. Having to have a donor registration number that is associated with a particular, identified, allowable donor would go a long way to addressing that problem. I look forward to hearing from the Minister.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Holmes]

I thank the hon. Lady.

[Dr Chowns]

For the sake of the record, I feel duty bound to say, “Me too!”

[Paul Holmes]

I thank both hon. Members. Who would have thought that I could get some agreement from the Liberal Democrats and the Green party? I entirely welcome it: they are absolutely correct. This is not a party political matter; it is a genuine attempt to fill the void that the Government have created through the lack of a timetable for ensuring that we tackle this issue.

The Minister is correct to say that this is a really complicated issue, so we must get it right in this legislation. Electoral reform legislation usually comes before the House only every decade and if we do not get it right, we will allow malign influences into the political process. I hope that the Minister takes that seriously. We stand ready, between stages of the Bill, to have a meeting on a cross-party basis, perhaps through the Parliamentary Parties Panel. The Opposition think that a moratorium is better than a ban, but the right regulatory framework has to be in place. We stand ready to assist.

--- Later in debate ---

[Samantha Dixon]

However, had the hon. Gentleman come along, he would have had the opportunity to raise anything he wanted to discuss, as other Members did— I am always happy to meet the hon. Gentleman.

Given the assurances I have provided, particularly that the Government intend to table an amendment on the moratorium period for cryptocurrencies, I hope the hon. Member for North Herefordshire will consider withdrawing her new clause.

[Dr Chowns]

I tabled the new clause as a probing amendment, and I recognise that the Government have stated their intention to bring other amendments forward. I look forward to engaging constructively with the Government, not necessarily just in formal settings, on the specifics of the issues and concerns I raise. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 6

Overseas electors: postal ballots

“(1) RPA 1985 is amended as follows.

(2) After section (12) insert—

‘12A Overseas electors: postal ballots

(1) The Secretary of State must, by regulation, make provision regarding the casting of postal ballots by overseas electors.

(2) Any regulations made under subsection (1) must provide for overseas electors to be offered the ability—

(a) to request an electronic version of their ballot paper for elections to print using the elector’s own printing facilities; and

(b) in a relevant country, to return their completed ballot paper to a United Kingdom embassy, High Commission or consulate for onward delivery to the relevant returning officer by diplomatic mail to be counted.

(3) For the purposes of this section, “a relevant country” is one where the United Kingdom maintains an embassy, Hight Commission or consulate.

(4) Regulations made under subsection (1) may amend provision made by or under any other Act as necessary.

5) Any regulations made under this section must not be made unless a draft has been laid before and approved by resolution of each House of Parliament.’”— (Zöe Franklin.)

Brought up, and read the First time.

[Zöe Franklin]

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

Representation of the People Bill (Ninth sitting)

Ellie Chowns Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 16th April 2026 Public Bill Committees

Brought up, and read the First time.

[Dr Ellie Chowns (North Herefordshire) (Green)]

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

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to discuss amendment 23, in clause 80, page 100, line 35, at end insert—

“(ha) Section (Report on electoral online harms)”.

[Dr Chowns]

I will briefly speak to the new clause, because it is important, and has clearly garnered support from a large number of Government MPs—indeed, the second signatory is the Chair of the Science, Innovation and Technology Committee, the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West (Dame Chi Onwurah).

The new clause is quite reasonable; it simply would require the Electoral Commission to publish a report setting out its assessment of the risk of electoral online harms. As we have already discussed in Committee, there is clear evidence of electoral online harms, so it would be useful to ask the Electoral Commission to produce such a report to set the risks out clearly and the measures it intends to take to address them.

I will not press the new clause to a vote. I am open as to whether this necessarily needs to be in statute or simply in Government guidance, but it is an important element of improving the safeguards against online harms in our electoral system. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

[Lisa Smart (Hazel Grove) (LD)]

I thank the hon. Member for North Herefordshire for her comments. We have seen this over the last couple of elections in ’19 and ’24, and we are going to see it again in local and national elections: our regulatory framework is not keeping pace. As far as I am aware, there is no electoral framework—I would love to hear from the Minister on this—for anyone to systematically map the risks posed by deepfakes and associated online issues. Voters deserve to make free, informed choices, not tainted by some of the things that are seen online. I hope that the Government will take this forward.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Samantha Dixon)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Desmond. The Government do not believe that the new clause is the right or effective way to address these concerns, although we acknowledge the seriousness of the issue that our hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes Central (Emily Darlington) is raising.

The new clause would risk blurring regulatory boundaries between two rightly independent regulators. The Electoral Commission and Ofcom have distinct statutory roles, with Ofcom responsible for regulation and enforcement of online safety duties on services. Requiring the Electoral Commission to make proposals for amending the Online Safety Act 2023 would cut across that, and risk duplication in an area where clarity is essential.

Secondly, the Electoral Commission already has the power under section 6 of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 to produce and publish reports on matters relating to elections where it considers that appropriate. We therefore do not consider it necessary or proportionate to mandate a further statutory report.

I would also note the risk of duplication with the recent Speaker’s Conference report, which examined these issues and included evidence from the Electoral Commission. The Government welcomed the conference’s findings, and our response was published on 5 March. Under the Online Safety Act, Ofcom is the independent regulator responsible for overseeing the risk-based framework, including publishing codes of practice and requiring the largest services to provide transparency reports about their systems and processes for addressing online harms. That framework provides an appropriate basis for regulatory oversight and platform accountability.

The Online Safety Act also places clear duties on services that host user-generated content to tackle illegal content online, including illegal abuse, threats and incitement of violence. Ofcom is now implementing and enforcing that framework, and the Government will work closely with Ofcom, the Electoral Commission and law enforcement through existing arrangements. For those reasons, I ask the hon. Member for North Herefordshire to withdraw the new clause.

[Dr Chowns]

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 24

Repository of digital political advertising

“(1) The Elections Act 2022 is amended as set out in subsection (2).

(2) After section 61 insert—

‘Part 6A Repository of digital political advertising

61A. Establishing a repository of digital political advertising

(1) The Secretary of State must, by regulations, make provision to require the Electoral Commission to establish a repository of paid-for digital political advertising.

(2) Any regulations made under subsection (1) must—

(a) provide for the repository of political advertising to be publicly accessible;

(b) specify that a provider of a Category 1 service within the meaning of the Online Safety Act 2023 must ensure that prescribed information relating to such advertising is submitted to the repository as soon as reasonably practicable, and, in any event, within 72 hours;

(c) set out the types of information to be prescribed; and

(d) provide for material in the repository to be transferred to the National Archives for preservation after a certain period.

(3) Before making any regulations that make provision for the matters under subsection 2(c), the Secretary of State must consult—

(a) the Electoral Commission;

(b) the Information Commissioner’s Office; and

(c) OFCOM.

(4) Any regulations made under subsection (1) must be laid before and agreed by both Houses of Parliament.’” —(Paul Holmes.)

This new clause requires the Secretary of State to bring forward regulations to require the Electoral Commission to establish a publicly available repository of political advertising.

Brought up, and read the First time.

Question put, That the clause be read a Second time.

--- Later in debate ---

Brought up, and read the First time.

[Dr Chowns]

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

The new clause would require the Government to establish and publish a transparent protocol for responding to election information incidents and place that protocol on a statutory footing. That is important, because there is currently no clear, publicly accountable mechanism in the UK for informing voters about serious information incidents during election periods, such as co-ordinated disinformation campaigns or foreign interference.

Although there may be internal processes, under the radar, in Government, those are not transparent, they lack clear triggers for action and they are not subject to democratic oversight. Their absence creates uncertainty about how and when the public would be notified if there were such attacks or threats to the integrity of an election. That potentially undermines trust, and leaves voters without information and potentially exposed to unchallenged misinformation at critical moments during an election. We can all recognise that that is a growing threat.

The new clause would address that gap. It would establish a clear, publicly accessible protocol that would set out how, why and when election information incidents would be identified, assessed and communicated to the general public. The rise of disinformation has shown that co-ordinated online campaigns, bot campaigns and so forth can spread very rapidly during election periods, and can influence public perception before corrective action is taken. I will not name particular electoral processes, but we can all call examples to mind. It is a problem that we lack a transparent framework for dealing with public notification when such incidents occur.

Other democracies have taken steps in this regard; most notably, Canada has already introduced a formal mechanism to respond to these risks. That highlights the gap in the UK. We should look at international best practice on this issue. We should be trying to stay ahead of—or at least catch up with—the threats that our democracy faces, as fast as possible.

The new clause is clearly directly related to the Bill, so I would welcome the Minister’s response. To clarify, I do not intend to press it to a vote—I should have mentioned that it was tabled by the hon. Member for Milton Keynes Central—but I move it because it raises an important issue that is crucial to the safety of our elections.

[Samantha Dixon]

These are important issues, and I thank the hon. Member for raising them.

Earlier today, I described the work of the Joint Elections Security and Preparedness Unit, which exists as an enduring function to protect our elections and our democracy; that includes monitoring for mis and disinformation. The JESP election cell brings together Whitehall Departments, law enforcement and intelligence agencies as well as key stakeholders to agree monitoring thresholds and response options where necessary. The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology is a core member of JESP’s election cell, as is the Electoral Commission.

--- Later in debate ---

Where we judge that the public should be informed, we will take clear action to do so. The work of JESP and the wider Government response, as well as law enforcement and intelligence agencies and the Electoral Commission, makes sure and will continue to make sure that elections in this country remain free, fair and secure.

[Dr Chowns]

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 30

Cap on political donations

“(1) Part 4 of PPERA 2000 (control of donations to registered parties and their members etc) is amended as follows.

(2) After section 54B (Declaration as to whether residence etc condition satisfied) insert—

‘54C Power to set cap on political donations

(1) A registered party must not accept a donation from a person if the value of donations from that person during the course of that calendar year exceeds the maximum amount specified by regulations made under subsection (3).

(2) Where a registered party receives a donation which would cause the limit for the purposes of subsection (1) to be exceeded, the amount by which the limit is exceeded is to be treated for the purposes of this Act as a donation received from a person who is not a permissible donor.

(3) The Secretary of State must by regulations specify the donation limit for the purposes of subsection (1) within three months of the day on which this act is passed.

(4) A statutory instrument containing regulations under this section may not be made unless a draft of the instrument has been laid before and approved by a resolution of each House of Parliament.

(5) Before laying a draft statutory instrument containing regulations under this section, the Secretary of State must commission an independent review of the level of the cap on political donations.

(6) The review must consider and make recommendations on the level of the cap in light of—

(a) the prevailing economic conditions;

(b) the effect of the cap on democratic participation and political competition; and

(c) any other matters the Secretary of State considers relevant.

(7) The Secretary of State must appoint an independent person or panel with relevant experience to conduct the review.

(8) The person or panel appointed under subsection (7) must—

(a) consult the Electoral Commission and any other persons the person or panel considers relevant; and

(b) prepare and publish a report of its findings.

(9) The Secretary of State must lay the report under subsection (9)(b) before both Houses of Parliament as soon as practicable after receiving it.

(10) No later than three years after a report under subsection (10) has been laid the Secretary of State must commission a new review under subsection (5) for the purposes of determining whether the cap under subsection (1) should be amended.’”— (Zöe Franklin.)

This new clause requires the Secretary of State to set an annual cap on permissible political donations from a person, following an independent review to be conduct every three years.

Brought up, and read the First time.

[Zöe Franklin (Guildford) (LD)]

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

[Zöe Franklin]

The new clause, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Stratford-on-Avon (Manuela Perteghella), goes to the heart of this basic question: who does our democracy serve—voters or those with the deepest pockets? It would introduce a cap on political donations from any one individual or entity each year, with that cap set following independent review and approved by Parliament. It would ensure that the level is kept under regular review so that it remains appropriate over time. At present, there is no upper limit on political donations in the UK, which is a striking gap in our system that allows vast sums to be given by a single donor, creating the risk of disproportionate influence by an individual.

Already, too many people across the UK look at our politics and see a system that appears to be tilted towards those with wealth and access. They question whether decisions are made in the public interest, or in the interests of those who can afford to make the largest contributions. That is unsustainable, and it undermines our democracy. My hon. Friend wishes to be clear that the new clause is not about stopping people supporting political parties; it is about drawing a reasonable line to ensure that no individual or organisation can dominate political funding simply because of the scale of their resources.

There is also a clear issue with integrity and security. While there are rules on permissible donors, there remain loopholes that allow money to be routed through UK-registered companies and complex structures, which creates a real risk of foreign or opaque influence on our politics. A cap alone would not resolve that problem, but it would significantly limit its scale. The new clause seeks to take a careful, balanced approach to the issue. It does not impose an arbitrary figure, but instead requires an independent, evidence-based review to recommend the level of the cap, considering economic considerations, democratic participation and political competition. It would place that decision firmly within a transparent and accountable process.

Ultimately, elections should be decided by voters persuaded by the strength of arguments, the quality of ideas and the credibility of leadership—I do not think that any member of the Committee would disagree with that. They should not be about the scale of financial backing. If we allow money to operate without meaningful limits, we undermine the fundamental democratic principle that every voice should carry equal weight. I do not wish to press the new clause to a vote, but I would like to hear the Minister’s thoughts on it.

With your permission, Sir Desmond, I will also speak to new clause 54, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Hazel Grove. The Committee has established that, unfortunately, public trust in political funding—and sometimes in democracy itself—is at a very low point. With donations in the millions from a handful of wealthy individuals, spending wars between parties and loopholes that undermine the spirit of the rules, there is a public perception that politics can be bought and that elections can be won through the donations of the few. I think we would all agree that that is not a place we want to be.

New clause 54 calls for a royal commission to look at the evidence properly and make recommendations, which would allow for a level of independence and cross-party process. The current system allows single donors to give millions to a party, which raises legitimate questions about whose interests are being served. There are limited financial provisions on long campaigns; significant money is spent well before the official period begins and the limits do not catch that.

The Liberal Democrats have long called for greater transparency in political spending; the real-time disclosure of donations, a cap on political donations and annual expenditure limits sits squarely within that agenda.

[Dr Chowns]

I will speak to new clauses 30 and 54, tabled by the hon. Members for Stratford-on-Avon and for Hazel Grove respectively, which both deal with the important topic of a cap on donations. I will then speak to new clauses 58 in my name and new clause 65 in the name of the right hon. Member for Oxford East (Anneliese Dodds), which both deal with limits on campaign expenditure, as the two topics are closely related.

First, as the hon. Member for Guildford just set out, there is a very strong case for having a cap on political donations, which the Government have recognised to some extent in promising to take forward the Rycroft recommendations on instituting a cap on donations from British citizens living abroad. However, on the broader question of donations from any British voter, the issue of the total amount of donations, and the number of very large donations, has significantly increased over time. The public widely recognise the extent to which political parties—some, in particular—are reliant on funds contributed by a small handful of very wealthy donors, and it is a rightly a cause for concern for a large majority of them. As the public understand, that carries the risk that individuals with very deep pockets can potentially have a disproportionate influence on our politics.

Back in 2011, the Committee on Standards in Public Life produced a report addressing precisely this risk, the problem of increased reliance on significant donations, and recommended a donations cap. That was 15 years ago. The problem has only become more and more significant since then, as we have seen just within the last year with several donations in the many millions of pounds to one political party. This is clearly a problem and a risk to our politics—and a risk that has been recognised worldwide.

As I understand it, about half of countries globally and well over two thirds of European countries impose some sort of limit on donations. The UK was one of I think 22 signatories to a UN resolution in December 2025 that identified the risk of corruption in politics from large donations and called for countries to consider instituting a cap on donations. It would only be consistent with our signing that UN resolution for us to take action on this ourselves.

Philip Rycroft, if I may quote directly from page 29 of his report, identified this problem too. He talked about his worries that the lack of year-round spending limits on campaign expenditure plus the lack of limits on donations could lead to an

“arms race among political parties and actors to out-raise and out-spend their competitors.”

Although he felt that this issue fell beyond his remit, he pointed out that it was

“something that could be usefully debated during the passage of the Representation of the People Bill”,

so I am very glad that a number of colleagues have tabled amendments to allow us to discuss it and to hear from the Government.

This proposal is widely supported by a large number of individuals and organisations that submitted evidence to this Committee—the Electoral Reform Society, Transparency International, Spotlight on Corruption, Open Britain and a whole range of others—and by a number of academics who specialise in this area: Sam Power, who gave evidence to us, Alan Renwick and a number of others. Transparency International points out:

“Other comparable democracies have sought to curb the corrosive influence of big money in politics by setting donation caps…Canada caps donations to political parties at CA$1,750 annually; France caps donations to political parties at €7,500 annually and €4,500 for presidential campaigns; Italy’s cap is €100,000…and Australia has introduced AU$50,000 caps per donor per year, due to apply from July 2026.”

This proposal has been recommended by the Committee on Standards in Public Life, as I have said, and by the Hayden Phillips review, and it is supported by a majority of voters. YouGov polling published in December 2025 showed that 67% of UK voters say that there should be a cap of £50,000 or less, or indeed no private donations at all—some people feel the system should be dealt with like that.

I will briefly pre-empt a point that I suspect the Minister will raise in her response, the fact that some other countries have greater state funding of politics. A balance has to be struck. My case is not that there should be no ability for voters to contribute to politics; arguably, that is an important part of the democratic process. The problem is that in a democracy, in which by definition one person has one vote, money can buy huge amounts of influence that outweigh and hugely influence many of those votes. If a party has received many millions of pounds just in the past six months, it is not surprising that it will have a capacity to spend that in the non-regulated period in a way that is highly likely to influence voting.

There is therefore a strong case for introducing some sort of annual donation cap now. Transparency International advocates for that being £50,000 a year. The CSPL, I believe, advocated for £10,000 a year, although that was 16 years ago; if we multiply that by inflation, it is about £15,000 a year now. Others have talked about £100,000 a year, which would bring the cap in line with the system that the Government have already committed to putting in place for donations from British voters overseas.

There is clearly a problem with the distortion of our political system caused by the influence of big money, big donations in politics, and we have a crucial opportunity, in the passage of this Bill, to take action to address it. On many of the other issues that we have talked about—company donations, the influence of foreign money, crypto donations—I have repeatedly drawn a connection with the need for a cap on all political donations, because those things cannot be completely divorced. We will not be able to address the issues that concern us in relation to the distorting effect of money on our politics if we do not implement a cap on political donations. I look forward to hearing from the Minister on that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Chowns]

Will the Minister give way?

[Samantha Dixon]

I would prefer to press on; the hon. Lady will be able to respond later.

To better protect against those who seek to covertly undermine UK elections, we are instead strengthening rules and closing loopholes at all stages of the political donations process. I have described the measures in some detail earlier today: “know your donor”, the three steps for foreign companies, and the consideration we are giving to the Rycroft review.

A cap is not being placed across all donations because currently the majority of funding for political parties in the UK comes from private, corporate or other organisational sources. State funding accounts for around 10% of the total income of UK political parties. There is no public or political appetite to increase the level of state funding. I urge hon. Members of this Committee to reject this new clause.

New clause 54 proposes that the Secretary of State shares plans for establishing a royal commission to consider the effectiveness and merits of political expenditure controls and, in particular, a cap on political donations. A public inquiry is an extremely costly and lengthy process. Instead, we have already sought to ensure that our democracy is strengthened by considering recommendations from authorities and expert bodies in this area, including the Electoral Commission, the Committee on Standards in Public Life and the National Crime Agency.

Those risks and recommended solutions were taken forward and set out in our strategy for modern and secure elections, published on 17 July last year. Those commitments are now set out in full in this Bill. To ensure no stone was left unturned, the Secretary of State commissioned the independent Rycroft review to see where we could strengthen our laws and what could be recommended to protect against covert funding and foreign interference. I therefore hope that the hon. Member for Hazel Grove will withdraw new clause 54.

The purpose of new clause 58 is to require the Electoral Commission to conduct a review of the feasibility of a cap on annual expenditure by political parties, candidates and third parties, and then for the Government to issue a response containing proposals informed by that review. The Government agree that transparency and fairness are vital principles to be upheld in elections. Further, it is of the utmost importance to limit the risk of foreign interference.

We are committed to ensuring that we have robust systems to protect the UK from foreign interference, and this Bill reinforces electoral legislation against foreign interference. The commitment of the hon. Member for North Herefordshire to fairness and transparency in elections has been clear throughout the parliamentary process, and I share that commitment. The Government note the recommendations of the Rycroft review and will respond to those measures in due course.

New clause 65 would substantially cut national spending limits for political parties and would, for the first time, bring most campaign staff costs within scope. National spending limits were intended to strike a careful balance, allowing parties to communicate effectively with voters across the country while preventing money from dominating elections. In practice, parties generally campaign within the cap, which operates as a ceiling rather than a target. Those limits were set by Parliament in 2000 and have been uprated over time to maintain their real-world value.

Periodic uprating helps avoid eroding parties’ ability to communicate effectively with the electorate, so is consistent with the original policy intent that Parliament approved. The proposal to include campaign staff costs would represent a significant change to the regulatory framework, introducing additional complexity in how parties define roles and apportion costs. There is not currently clear evidence of a problem with this arrangement.

The Government note the issues raised about the level of the spending limits, including those highlighted by the independent Rycroft review. As Members know, we are considering those very carefully and will respond in due course. On that basis—and to allow that work to be completed first—I invite the hon. Member to seek to withdraw the new clause.

[Dr Chowns]

I have three quick points. First, the Minister implied that any limit on donations is unacceptable to her. That seems a very extreme position for the Government to take. Is that really the Government’s position in responding to new clause 30, tabled by the hon. Member for Stratford-on-Avon? The Minister seems to be taking that position, yet that new clause does not specify a particular level but that a cap should be set after a review, which is itself regularly reviewed. That seems a very reasonable approach. Does the Minister not recognise at all even the theoretical possibility that large donations can skew our politics? I would find that an extraordinary position for the Government to take.

Secondly, this seems to be completely inconsistent with the fact that last year the UK and at least 59 other countries co-sponsored a resolution passed at the Conference of States Parties to the United Nations Convention against Corruption that calls on states parties to consider limitations on donations

“with a view to combating corruption”.

The Government have already recognised that large donations into the political system carry a risk of corruption.

I do not expect the Minister to put a number on the table today, but to be consistent, would the Minister please take this away for consideration alongside the other issues that have come out of the Rycroft review? It is clear through this Bill Committee process that we need amendments to come forward that are not just driven by Rycroft, but also by some of the issues that Rycroft himself has highlighted as relevant yet outwith the specific terms of reference of his report—certainly including caps on political donations, expansion of the regulated period and reform of political advertising.

Thirdly, there is the point about how politics in the UK is largely funded through private company and trade union donations—I tried to pre-empt this, but the Minister did come back with it as well. I have not at any point argued for more state funding of politics—that could be a separate debate, but I am not arguing that. By discussing the arguments in favour of a cap on donations, together with the arguments for stronger limits on expenditure, I am arguing for a politics in which money skews politics less overall.

We can surely recognise that if one person can contribute—for the sake of argument—£9 million to an organisation or political actor then that will inevitably have a hugely skewing impact on our politics. Do the Government really not recognise that? Will the Government really not take any steps to limit political donations and that skewing and pollution of our politics?

[The Chair]

Does the Minister wish to respond further?

--- Later in debate ---

[Zöe Franklin]

New clause 31 would require the Secretary of State to use regulations to ensure that the Electoral Commission established a fund to help disabled candidates meet additional disability-related campaign costs in England. Historically in England, the access to elected office fund and the EnAble fund provided funding for practical support and reasonable adjustments to remove barriers for disabled candidates standing for election. That could include help with communication, transport or personal assistance, not general campaign costs.

The interim £250,000 EnAble fund was launched in 2018. It involved a two-stage approval process, with an independent panel of experts on disability as well as the political groups of the Local Government Association. In total, 41 candidates were awarded funding and 45% of those were elected. In the 2022 Scottish local elections, 46 people got support from a similar fund available in Scotland; of those, 22 were elected.

Based on those numbers, I would suggest that the types of funds that provide support make a tangible difference. However, the English fund was discontinued in 2020 and, although I understand the Government have indicated that they wish to do something about that, it has not yet been reinstated and an alternative has not been put forward. That leaves a distinct inequality between the different nations of Britain—Wales and Scotland both have funded schemes; England does not.

Representation in politics is crucial, whether here in Parliament or in our council chambers across the country. The House of Commons Library estimates that 25% of the UK population is disabled, with 24% of working adults stating that they are disabled. A truly representative parliamentary House would have 156 MPs indicating that they have a disability, yet only 12 declare themselves as having a disability—less than 2% of Parliament. According to the Local Government Association’s 2022 census, approximately 15% of local authority councillors in England declared a disability or long-term health condition. Essentially, we are consistently not returning a set of councillors or MPs that is truly representative of the people we seek to serve.

In my view, that is a wrong that needs to be corrected. Establishing a new fund in England to provide that support is absolutely crucial. That change is supported by Elect Her, Centenary Action, the Jo Cox Foundation, Unlock Democracy, the Fawcett Society, the Disability Policy Centre and others. This Bill is the opportunity to right this wrong. I would welcome hearing whether the Minister agrees with the new clause. I hope that she will but if she does not, will she outline how the Government plan to support candidates with disabilities and to address this glaring disparity between the nations? We really must do better when it comes to representation of people with disabilities in our politics.

The other new clauses are also important; they continue the theme of ensuring that our democracy is truly representative of the people we serve. New clause 34 would require the Secretary of State to bring section 106 of the Equality Act 2010 into force within three months of Royal Assent.

New clause 35 would place a duty in the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000, which is the main law governing political parties, campaign finance, donations and so on, requiring the Electoral Commission to publish the information in an accessible form. It would also give Ministers the power to require registered political parties to publish anonymised information about the diversity of the people coming forward as candidates—for example, information about protected characteristics among applicants, selected candidates and elected candidates. This duty applies only so far as it is possible to publish characteristics while, of course, retaining the privacy of the people it is referencing.

For a long time, we have as a nation talked about ensuring that that information is made available. In March 2026, the Minister for Equalities, the hon. Member for Feltham and Heston (Seema Malhotra) stated:

“The Government is committed to commencing section 106 of the Equality Act 2010, requiring registered political parties to publish anonymised data relating to the diversity of their candidate selections…officials are currently exploring when and how to commence the provision under section 106.”

She said that there would be an update “in due course”. That was then repeated in the House of Lords. That statement took place a while ago, yet we have not seen any movement as yet.

Again, I personally feel that this Bill gives the opportunity to enact that section of the Equality Act. I would therefore like to hear from the Minister whether she supports the amendment and, if she does not, when the Government will bring into force section 106 of the Equality Act.

[Dr Chowns]

I will speak very briefly in support of the three amendments tabled by the hon. Member for Guildford, which highlight really important issues. It seems extraordinary, really, that we have such inequality between England, Wales and Scotland in relation to support for disabled candidates. Clearly, with such huge levels of under-representation of disabled people in our politics, it is imperative that support is put in place to try to rectify that. I fully support the call for the reinstatement of the access to elected office fund.

[David Simmonds (Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner) (Con)]

I appreciate that the main focus of these amendments has been around disability. However, I was proud of the work that my party did in Government to try to improve the diversity of candidates, particularly in local elections.

Has the hon. Member given any consideration to the broader concept of diversity in terms of candidates? We know that disability can present some specific challenges, but one of the issues for political parties is about engaging those much wider communities, from which sometimes very few people feel willing to put themselves forward as candidates. Does she have a view about that that she would like to share with the Committee?

[Dr Chowns]

I absolutely do—indeed, that is what the next two amendments are specifically about. That clearly should be the next step; the provision was put in place in the Equality Act, so it is just about commencing something already there under section 106 that would apply to reporting on diversity with a range of protected characteristics, not just in relation to disability.

I completely agree that our politics should be representative of our population as a whole; we should all be challenging ourselves constantly, as individuals and as parties, to ensure that we are doing everything possible to address under-representation of certain groups. The lack of representation of women is particularly brought into focus by the fact that it is now nearly 100 years since the franchise was fully extended, yet women are still seriously under-represented in this House—and even more under-represented in local politics nationally. But there are many other dimensions of under-representation; while the first amendment relates specifically to support for disabled candidates, the next two amendments relate to that much wider spectrum. That is crucially important.

[Samantha Dixon]

New clause 31 would require the Electoral Commission to establish a fund to provide financial assistance to disabled candidates standing for election in England. It is the Government’s ambition to see more disabled people in public office, and we know that some disabled people still face additional financial barriers when contesting elected office. To address that, we are currently developing a new fund to support disabled election candidates with the disability-related extra costs they can experience, to enable participation on an equal basis.

We put the lived experience of disabled people and lessons learned from previous funds at the heart of our work to develop that new fund. We have engaged with a wide range of stakeholders, including MPs and disabled local councillors. We have heard how ensuring ongoing support is important to providing the reassurance people need to plan for the long term, as it can take a number of attempts to get elected. The Government are able to provide that type of support without this amendment, as they have done in the past, with the access to elected office fund from 2012 to 2015 and the EnAble fund from 2018 to 2020.

As part of our work to develop the new fund, we are considering how design elements might better support longevity, retaining the flexibility needed to ensure that the fund provided is fit for purpose. Given the ongoing work that the Government are doing in this area to establish a fund, I gently ask the hon. Lady not to press the new clause.

I now turn to new clause 34. The Government are committed to improving representation in politics. We encourage increased diversity in Government and political candidates, and have taken action to address that. Section 106 of the Equality Act 2010 is an uncommenced provision that would require registered political parties to publish anonymised data about the diversity of their candidate selections, in accordance with regulations. The Government are committed to commencing section 106 of the Equality Act. However, careful consideration needs to be given to how it might be implemented, the supporting regulations and whether any phasing might be needed in implementation. Officials will consult with stakeholders, including political parties, in due course.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Holmes]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend. This is not about whether one political party—or one party in government—is more trustworthy than the other; we leave that to the voters. This is about trusting in the integrity of the voters. He is absolutely right that the greatest influence and first right of every citizen in this country should be their ability to participate in the democratic process, pick their Government and pick the elected representatives who stand up for them, but there needs to be integrity.

My hon. Friend is right to outline that this should be seen not in a party political way, but in a process way. The new clause would contribute to that aim by giving powers to the independent Electoral Commission, which, as the Minister reminded us in the previous sitting of this Committee, is governed by Parliament, not the Government. This is a step that the Minister could take, seeing that they are very keen to give the Electoral Commission increased power.

This new clause is crucial and non-partisan, and it would allow us to have a tangible effect on the trust in and integrity of our system. Nobody is bigger or better than the system that we have, but that system can be improved, and we should not be shying away from allowing ourselves to improve it, no matter who is in government, to make sure that every time that a voter walks into a polling station, they know that their vote will be cast in the most secret and best way possible. I hope the Minister will look kindly upon the new clause, although I am sure she will not. I look forward to her remarks in response.

[Dr Chowns]

Ballot secrecy is extremely important. The shadow Minister has talked about family voting. I am deeply disappointed and concerned by the implicitly discriminatory accusations made by some parties in relation to family voting in recent weeks. I wish we saw as much passion about the far greater threat to our democracy posed by the skewing effect of huge donations.

Conservative members of the Committee made no contribution in the discussion on caps on donations or limits on expenditure earlier this afternoon, but have devoted considerable airtime to this particular topic. I ask all of us to consider: what is the greatest threat to the integrity of our political system?

[David Simmonds]

There is a crucial distinction that I am interested in with the hon. Member’s reflection on—

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Chowns]

I think that I have made my point. Let us consider what the greatest threat to the integrity of our democracy is. I am concerned about the ways that concerns such as those articulated in these amendments have been weaponised by some political actors, so I will abstain if they are pressed to a vote.

[Samantha Dixon]

New clause 36 and amendment 25 would place a new legal duty on the Electoral Commission to produce guidance for returning officers on how to enforce the offences introduced by the Ballot Secrecy Act 2023. I stress at the outset how seriously the Government take all forms of electoral fraud or coercion, including family voting. It is illegal and unacceptable, and polling staff should feel confident to challenge and report any incidents.

However, I have serious concerns about these amendments. It is essential to point out that the commission can already issue guidance, and it already provides extensive guidance for returning officers. Putting the requirement into legislation would set a new precedent, allowing Parliament to direct how the commission produces its guidance in the future. The Commission’s independence, as we discussed earlier, is central to public confidence in how elections are run. Because the amendments would require Ministers and Parliament to approve or even change the guidance, there is a real risk that people would see that as political interference and involvement in something that should remain an operational matter for the commission.

The extra approval steps could also delay clear guidance for returning officers. If Parliament rejected the draft guidance, the commission would have to start again, creating uncertainty for those responsible for enforcing ballot secrecy. For those reasons—concerns about independence, ministerial involvement, added complexity and the precedent they set—the Government cannot support the amendments.

[Paul Holmes]

The hon. Member for North Herefordshire made some comments that, I think, questioned my integrity in making my speech.

[Dr Chowns]

Not the hon. Gentleman’s integrity—his judgment.

[Paul Holmes]

The hon. Lady says it is my judgment. It is interesting that I am being accused of weaponising an issue because of one aspect where I think there is an imbalance, or a different interpretation of ways of overseeing voting at polling stations. First, that is a subjective term—

[Dr Chowns]

On a point of order, Sir Desmond. The House will note that I did not accuse anybody in particular of weaponising an issue. I observed that the issue had been weaponised.

[The Chair]

The hon. Lady has made her point, and it is on the record.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Holmes]

No, it would not. I have a lot of respect for the hon. Lady; we get on, and I believe we are both in this for the same reasons. My explanatory note is very clear about what the new clause would protect, and where it would not have an impact. It states:

“It would not ban campaigning in native languages of the British Islands such as in English, Welsh, Cornish, Ulster Scots, Irish, et al. Nor would it prevent campaigning via the likes of BSL or Braille.”

So no, because that is officially known as a minority language within the British Isles. We have been very careful to ensure that people in Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland, and those who read Braille or rely on sign language, will not be excluded by the new clause. Communities that are not learning English should be able to read the English through translation services, which are encouraged by the social cohesion strategy.

We also have to think about the other side: many people living in multi-ethnic communities receive leaflets in a foreign language, and they cannot read what is being said by a party. That is not a level playing field in the voting system, and I think it is wrong. We have seen examples where that has been used in an exploitative way in recent months, and there is no doubt that we will see it used in an exploitative way in future. That happened in Tower Hamlets, it happened in Gorton, and it will happen again.

If the Minister will not support the new clause, will the Government look at how to streamline the voting system in this country, so that we have, at least, guidance on languages? She may say that it already exists, but we need to toughen the regulations to prescribe, or describe, how parties should treat British languages versus foreign languages. I look forward to her Minister’s response on new clause 37.

[Dr Chowns]

I am going to rise above the party political aspects of the shadow Minister’s comments, but I want to engage with his extraordinary claim that communicating with people in their mother tongue is, in some way, exploitation. He expressed concern about the inclusion of diverse communities in our country. He talked about social cohesion, but what he is proposing is essentially a nativist policy. As was highlighted by the hon. Member for Cumbernauld and Kirkintilloch, Gaelic speakers are accepted but Urdu speakers are not. I fundamentally disagree.

Of course, as a country we should provide support to assist people to learn English, but we should not force them, as the shadow Minister argued. If they are not yet fluent, it seems perfectly reasonable—in fact, clearly helpful for inclusion and participation—to provide election materials in the language in which they can be best understood. Indeed, that is what returning officers do. Election officers provide information in multiple languages, so why should parties and candidates not also be free to do so?

Let me quote from the guidance for returning officers on the Electoral Commission’s website:

“Some voters may need assistance in another language because of their limited English (or English or Welsh) language skills. You should consider what support you are able to provide to those voters in your area, such as providing translations of the polling station notices.”

In Gorton and Denton, the polling station provided information in multiple other languages. The effect of the new clause would be exclusionary and discriminatory, and I strongly oppose it.

[Samantha Dixon]

New clause 37 would ban the use of foreign languages in campaign material during the regulated period—it would make it a criminal offence. A primary purpose of the Bill is to encourage more people across society to engage and participate in our democracy. The new clause would not serve that purpose. It is not for the Government to prescribe the languages that campaigners are permitted to use to engage voters who come from a wide range of diverse backgrounds across the constituencies we represent. It is certainly not for the Government to criminalise the use of certain languages.

Various electoral and non-electoral offences protect against malicious forms of campaign material, which is, in essence, what the hon. Member for Hamble Valley was talking about. For example, it is an offence to publish or distribute threatening, abusive or insulting material that is intended or likely to stir up racial hatred. It is also an offence to improperly influence someone to vote in a particular way or refrain from voting. That would include, for example, a leaflet that threatened to make use of force or place undue spiritual pressure on a person in order to induce them to vote in a particular way or refrain from voting. Those offences apply regardless of the language used in the campaign material.

The Government have no plans to regulate the use of foreign languages in campaign material. We are seeking to minimise barriers to participation while safeguarding the integrity and security of elections. The measures in the Bill are intended to restore faith in our politics and ensure that the UK continues to be a thriving and diverse democracy. The new clause is entirely incompatible with those intentions. I therefore ask the hon. Gentleman to withdraw it.

[Paul Holmes]

I wholly accept the Minister’s comments; I did not expect that she would be looking into this. I acknowledge the comments made by the hon. Member for North Herefordshire, too. She used the example of returning officers. They are filling things in and conducting a process; they are not using foreign languages to exploit a section of our society against a policy or a party in this country with which they happen to disagree. That is the clear and distinct difference, and that is the example that I used in moving the new clause. Her example is about the process; my example is about using foreign language to exploit a political message in an advantageous way. That is why I tabled the new clause, and I wish to press it to a vote.

[Dr Chowns]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[The Chair]

The hon. Gentleman has concluded his speech, but the hon. Lady is entitled to speak again if she wishes.

[Dr Chowns]

The hon. Gentleman seems to say that the making of any political argument that he disagrees with is exploitation. That is ridiculous.

Question put, That the clause be read a Second time.

--- Later in debate ---

Brought up, and read the First time.

[Dr Chowns]

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

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

New clause 61—Code of Conduct for Political Campaigning—

“(1) The Electoral Commission must prepare and publish a Code of Conduct for Political Campaigning (‘the Campaign Code’).

(2) The Campaign Code must set out principles and guidance relating to political campaigning and must in particular include provisions relating to—

(a) honesty in political debate and reasonable efforts to not mislead voters, and

(b) the avoidance of intimidation, harassment or abusive conduct.

(3) In this section ‘political campaigning’ means any conduct, communications or other activity which can reasonably be regarded as intended, directly or indirectly, to influence public support for, or opposition to—

(a) a registered political party,

(b) a candidate or prospective candidate at a general election, by-election, local election or mayoral election, or

(c) an outcome in a referendum.

(4) Before preparing or revising the Campaign Code, the Electoral Commission must carry out such consultation as it considers appropriate and must in particular consult—

(a) representatives of parties appointed to the Parliamentary Parties Panel in accordance with section 4 (parliamentary parties panel) of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000, and

(b) such other persons as the Electoral Commission considers appropriate.

(5) The Electoral Commission may revise the Campaign Code from time to time, and subsections (1) to (4) apply to a revised Campaign Code as they apply to the original.

(6) Electoral advertising as defined in this Part is regulated under the Electoral Advertising Code of Practice and subject to enforcement by the Electoral Advertising Code Committee.

(7) This Part applies in relation to elections and referendums for which provision may be made by an Act of the United Kingdom Parliament.”

This new clause would establish a Code of Conduct for Political Campaigning. It is connected to NC62 to NC64. The reference in this new clause to “this Part” is a reference to a new Part which would be formed of NC62 to NC64.

New clause 62—Electoral Advertising Code of Practice—

“(1) The Electoral Commission must prepare and publish an Electoral Advertising Code of Practice (‘the Advertising Code’).

(2) The Advertising Code must include principles and guidance relating to electoral advertising and must in particular include provisions relating to—

(a) ensuring the accuracy of factual claims,

(b) the need for relevant and reliable evidence to substantiate factual claims,

(c) the need to clearly identify the political party affiliated with an advert,

(d) transparency in the use of artificial intelligence, and

(e) issuing prompt public corrections to address mistakes.

(3) In this section ‘electoral advertising’ means any factual claims in marketing communications, whenever published or distributed, whose principal function is to influence voters in a local, regional, national or international election or referendum.

(4) Before preparing or revising the Advertising Code, the Electoral Commission must carry out such consultation as it considers appropriate and must in particular consult—

(a) the Electoral Advertising Code Committee,

(b) representatives of parties appointed to the Parliamentary Parties Panel in accordance with section 4 of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000, and

(c) such other persons as the Electoral Commission considers appropriate.”

This new clause would require the Electoral Commission to produce an Electoral Advertising Code of Practice. It is connected to NC61, NC63 and NC64.

New clause 63—Electoral Advertising Code Committee—

“(1) The Electoral Commission must establish an Electoral Advertising Code Committee (‘the Committee’).

(2) The functions of the Committee are—

(a) to advise the Electoral Commission on the preparation and revision of the Advertising Code,

(b) to adjudicate on alleged breaches of the Advertising Code, and

(c) to oversee the operation of and monitor the effectiveness of the Advertising Code.

(3) In exercising functions under this Part, the Committee must have regard to the importance of freedom of political expression and open democratic debate, and will not determine matters of political opinion unless they fall within the scope of factual claims in electoral advertising.

(4) The Committee is to consist of—

(a) a Chair,

(b) a member nominated by the Electoral Commission,

(c) a member nominated by the Advertising Standards Authority or its successor body,

(d) a member nominated by the Office of Communications, and

(e) a member nominated by the United Kingdom Statistics Authority.

(5) Nothing in this Part limits the powers of the bodies identified in subsection (4) under any other enactment.

(6) The Chair is to be appointed by the Electoral Commission following a fair and open competition conducted in accordance with the Public Appointments Code, with a majority of independent members on the assessment panel and a senior independent panel member.

(7) The appointment of the Chair requires the consent of the Speaker’s Committee on the Electoral Commission, which must not be unreasonably withheld or delayed.

(8) In making the appointment, the Electoral Commission must have regard to the need to secure the independence of the Committee.

(9) A person appointed as Chair holds office—

(a) for a single non-renewable term of five years from the date of appointment, and

(b) in accordance with terms and conditions (including as to remuneration and pension) specified by the Electoral Commission.

(10) The Chair may resign from office by giving written notice to the Electoral Commission.

(11) The Electoral Commission must pay to the Committee the sums determined by the Chair as appropriate for, or in connection with, the carrying out of the Committee’s functions.

(12) The Secretary of State must, within the period of 6 months beginning with the day on which this Act is passed, carry out a consultation on a levy on registered political parties’ election advertising spend for the purpose of funding the Electoral Advertising Code Committee.

(13) In carrying out the consultation, the Secretary of State must consult—

(a) the Electoral Commission,

(b) representatives of registered political parties, and

(c) such other persons as the Secretary of State considers appropriate.”

This new clause would require the Electoral Commission to establish an Electoral Advertising Code Committee. It is connected to NC61, NC62 and NC64.

New clause 64—Status of the Campaign Code and enforcement of the Advertising Code—

“(1) Persons engaged in political campaigning must have regard to the Campaign Code.

(2) A registered political party must prepare, publish and keep under review a code of conduct relating to its political campaigning.

(3) A code under subsection (2) must be consistent with the Campaign Code and must in particular include provisions relating to—

(a) honesty in political debate and reasonable efforts to not mislead voters, and

(b) the avoidance of intimidation, harassment or abusive conduct.

(4) The following persons, when engaged in electoral advertising, must comply with the Advertising Code—

(a) registered political parties,

(b) members of the House of Commons,

(c) members of any local authority in any part of the United Kingdom,

(d) members of the Greater London Assembly,

(e) candidates or prospective candidates at a United Kingdom general election, by-election, local authority election, Greater London Authority election or mayoral election,

(f) recognised third parties within the meaning of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000, and

(g) election agents within the meaning of the Representation of the People Act 1983.

(5) The Committee may, by written notice, require a person to provide information or documents reasonably required for the purposes of investigating a suspected breach of the Advertising Code.

(6) A person must comply with a requirement under subsection (5) unless the person has a reasonable excuse.

(7) If, on an application by the Committee, a court is satisfied that a person has failed to comply with a requirement under subsection (5), the court may make an order requiring the person to provide the Committee with—

(a) information referred to in the notice, and

(b) other information which the court is satisfied the Committee requires.

(8) Where the Committee considers that electoral advertising is inconsistent with the Advertising Code, it may take the following steps which it considers reasonable to secure compliance—

(a) issuing a notice requiring the person responsible to amend, withdraw or substantiate the advertising within a specified period,

(b) publishing a formal finding of non-compliance on its website [and in the repository of political adverts],

(c) requiring the publication of a correction, clarification or updated version of the advertising with similar prominence where practicable,

(d) notifying relevant online services or publishers and requesting prompt suspension or removal of advertising during the regulated period, and

(e) referring repeated or serious breaches to the Electoral Commission to impose civil sanctions in accordance with its powers under Schedule 19C to the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000.

(9) In deciding whether to impose a civil sanction under subsection (8)(e), the Electoral Commission must have regard to—

(a) the findings and recommendations of the Committee, and

(b) any enforcement action taken in relation to the same conduct under any other enactment.

(10) Where the Electoral Commission imposes a civil sanction following a referral from the Committee, it must publish a notice setting out—

(a) the nature of the breach,

(b) the sanction imposed, and

(c) the reasons for the sanction.

(11) A person on whom a civil sanction is imposed under subsection (8)(e) may appeal in accordance with the appeal provisions under the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000.

(12) Failure to comply with the Campaign Code or the Advertising Code does not of itself give rise to criminal liability.”

This new clause is connected to NC61 to NC63.

[Dr Chowns]

The new clause, tabled by the hon. Member for Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland (Luke Myer), proposes creating a new offence of misleading the public by candidates in a parliamentary election campaign. We are witnessing a proliferation of disinformation with a concurrent rise in distrust among the public. A recent survey by Ipsos MORI found that just 11% of the UK public trust politicians to tell the truth. That is clearly problematic and, unlike in advertising, finance or medicine, there is no legally enforceable standard of requiring truthfulness from those who hold or seek public office.

Ministers are not allowed to lie, but, under the current situation, candidates can. This lack of accountability does, unfortunately, create an incentive to deceive. As the old saying goes, a lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes. This legal vacuum has, unfortunately, enabled far-right figures to weaponise disinformation. It has enabled foreign powers to covertly manipulate elections and policy, and manipulation of voters through false factual claims has changed the landscape of the nation. There are already examples of that, including Brexit and campaign tactics in previous elections.

New clause 59 aims to protect voters from political deception by holding parliamentary candidates accountable for acts intentionally designed to mislead the public or manipulate voting in their favour. A similar measure is already provided for in the Government’s Public Office (Accountability) Bill. That creates a new offence of misleading the public, which will cover public officials. The parallel measure in new clause 59 will ensure that candidates are included in a similar provision and cannot use deliberate deception to win public office.

As it happens, the Welsh Government have recently introduced equivalent legislation to create an offence of deliberate deception by candidates. Westminster would not be acting alone, and the new clause would provide consistency across Britain.

This would not be a law to punish genuine mistakes, misspeaking and so forth, or to restrict legitimate political rhetoric. It would not cover manifestos, as a manifesto is a statement of intent. It would not create a new area of law, but merely extend it to plug the gaping loophole of political deception by applying existing legal principles.

The new clause includes safeguards to ensure fairness, such as a high legal threshold for wrongdoing and a defence for those acting with reasonable excuse. Its phrasing ensures that the threshold for wrongdoing is high. It applies only to conduct that is “seriously improper,” so it targets deliberate misinformation campaigns, major false claims that could influence voters and manipulative or dishonest campaign tactics that are falsely used to steer voters towards a particular decision.

There is overwhelming public support for this measure. A petition on this issue has more than 200,000 signatures, and polling by Opinium shows that 72% of voters support it. Further research by Survation found that a majority of voters in every single party is in favour of it. This measure would go some way to help repair trust in our politics, and I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.

I will briefly speak to new clauses 61 to 64, tabled by the hon. Member for Ellesmere Port and Bromborough (Justin Madders). New clause 61 would introduce a code of conduct for political campaigning and put that on a statutory footing. There is already widespread agreement that we need a code of conduct for political campaigning—that was a recommendation from the Speaker’s Conference last year. The Government have committed to establishing a code of conduct for campaigns following that recommendation, and the Electoral Commission has absolutely welcomed this.

I draw colleagues’ attention to one of the evidence sessions at the Speaker’s Conference last year, in which Labour’s executive director of governance and legal highlighted the question of whether the code of conduct should be statutory. He said:

“A code might be helpful in setting a public benchmark of acceptable behaviour…ultimately, you would probably want it to be enforceable in some way, and then the question would be, is it appropriate to put that on a statutory footing? Is there a possibility of agreeing something?”

I ask the Minister to consider that we have an excellent opportunity to put it on a statutory footing in this Bill to ensure that that code of conduct, which is so widely recognised as being absolutely necessary as per the recommendations of the Speaker’s Conference, has the force of primary legislation behind it.

New clause 62 is about an electoral advertising code of practice. We have already discussed issues relating to electoral advertising, and I have shared with the Committee my huge concerns about the regulation of online political advertising in particular and the urgent need for a real-time political adverts library. This new clause is more general. It is frankly unclear why ads for commercial products are held to greater account than ads that move votes and affect election outcomes. Fundamentally, that seems weird, unequal and deeply problematic.

The organisation Reform Political Advertising has been campaigning very effectively, long and hard, in this area. In the 2024 London mayoral election, for example, it trailed a factual accuracy code, which seven London mayoral candidates, including Sadiq Khan and the Green and Liberal Democrat candidates, signed up to, and others supported.

International precedent also exists. Regulation of factual claims in electoral advertising has been in place in New Zealand for several decades, with cross-party support.

[David Simmonds]

For the benefit of the Committee, will the hon. Lady briefly set out who—it could be a body or an individual—would be the appropriate judge of factual accuracy? I am sure all political parties have been on the receiving end of the famous Lib Dem bar chart, which says, in tiny letters underneath, “Survey of 10 people we asked in the pub last night.” It could be argued that it was factually accurate, based on that very dubious source. How will we ensure that, where there is some dispute about the facts, there is a sufficient degree of independence in arbitrating that question?

[Dr Chowns]

I refer the hon. Gentleman to the very next new clause on the selection list, which engages with precisely that question.

In addition to New Zealand, there are similar rules about the regulation of political advertising in Australia. On the question of who will adjudicate, there is currently no independent body with the power to adjudicate on the truthfulness or accuracy of non-broadcast political advertising. That is an issue. Provision has been made in the new clauses for a separation: the code of practice would be established by the Electoral Commission and the oversight of the decision making—the adjudication—would be done by a different body.

The 2020 report by the Lords Democracy and Digital Technologies Committee, “Digital Technology and the Resurrection of Trust”, called for a regulatory committee on political advertising that would involve relevant experts from the Advertising Standards Authority, the Electoral Commission, Ofcom and the UK Statistics Authority, who would co-operate through a regulatory committee on political advertising. Political parties would then work with those regulators to develop a code of practice, along with appropriate sanctions, that restricts fundamentally inaccurate advertising during a parliamentary or mayoral election or referendum. The Lords Committee recommends that that regulatory committee should adjudicate breaches of the code, and that is effectively what new clause 63 would put in place.

“What then would happen about sanctions?” I hear hon. Members ask. Well, that takes us on to new clause 64, which again creates a separation. It would establish an enforcement framework and enable the Electoral Commission to impose civil sanctions for breaches of the advertising code, basically according to a ladder of increasing seriousness.

I warmly recommend the new clauses to the Government and the Committee. Despite the rapidity of my speech, given the shortness of time, the way that advertising can distort our politics is a crucial issue. I very much hope that the Government will warmly consider the issues, alongside all the other ones that they will hopefully come back to us on at a later stage.

[Samantha Dixon]

New clause 59 would create a new offence of misleading the public in a parliamentary election campaign, which could be committed by candidates in election campaigns. Unfortunately, that approach risks turning the courts into political fact checkers. It risks undermining public confidence in the judiciary and would create significant freedom of expression concerns. In line with the recommendation from the Speaker’s Conference, we will work with the Conference, the Electoral Commission and political parties to develop a campaigning code of conduct that is fit for purpose and reflects the need of candidates across the political spectrum.

I also draw the hon. Member’s attention to section 106 of the Representation of the People Act 1983, which makes it an illegal practice to make or publish a false statement of fact in relation to the personal character or conduct of a candidate the effect of which impacts the election result.

I will speak to new clauses 61, 62, 63 and 64 together. These new clauses would amount to a significant expansion of the regulatory framework governing political campaigning and electoral advertising. They would introduce a statutory code of conduct for political campaigning, a statutory electoral advertising code and a new electoral advertising code committee to oversee, adjudicate and enforce compliance with the advertising code, funded through a levy on political parties.

We welcomed the recommendation from the Speaker’s Conference to develop a code of conduct for campaigning. We are working with the Speaker, the Electoral Commission and political parties on an approach that is fit for purpose, and that works across the broad range of candidates and campaigners.

That work is already under way. Ahead of the May 2026 elections, the Electoral Commission has published a first set of advisory principles for campaigning respectfully and safely. The published principles already address key issues that these new clauses try to address. The Electoral Commission has also made it clear that these principles are the start of that work, rather than the end of it, and, after the May elections it will assess how the principles operated in practice, and use that assessment to inform development of a fuller code of conduct.

A non-statutory approach offers the best opportunity for the code to be developed collaboratively, with strong cross-party engagement and sufficient flexibility to ensure that it remains meaningful, and can be refined in the light of experience and developments in campaigning practice over time. It would be better to allow that work to continue and to be evaluated in practice, rather than to prescribe the content and process for an evolving set of codes in the Bill.

New clauses 62, 63 and 64 would place regulators in the position of adjudicating factual claims made in the course of political campaigning, an area that is inherently contested and closely connected to political opinion. Although safeguards are included, there remains a real risk of regulatory creep, drawing independent regulators into disputes around policy or political arguments, which can be rebutted by rival campaigners and scrutinised by the press as part of the normal course of political debate.

Any reforms in this space must be considered carefully and developed in consultation, in order to ensure that changes to the regulation of political advertising are proportionate, protect freedom of expression and maintain public confidence in the independence and impartiality of regulatory bodies.

Therefore, I respectfully ask the hon. Member to withdraw new clause 59.

[Dr Chowns]

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

New clause, by leave, withdrawn.

[David Simmonds]

On a point of order, Sir Desmond, may I seek your guidance? I know that the hon. Member for North Herefordshire said earlier that, for reasons of time, she did not wish to go into sufficient detail. Can you just confirm to the Committee that we have two further full days of consideration, which are already in everybody’s diaries? I know that the Government Whip declined my suggestion of an adjournment earlier; however, Members should not feel constrained in fully setting out the concerns that they have or the issues that they wish to raise about the Bill, given that—as I understand it and as I have just said—we still have a further two days of consideration available to us.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Chowns]

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

The new clause would remove the prohibition on the Electoral Commission’s instituting criminal proceedings in England, Wales and Northern Ireland—a capacity that the Electoral Commission previously had, which was removed by the Elections Act 2022. We currently have a bizarre situation where any individual or organisation other than the Electoral Commission can make a private prosecution against breaches of political finance law but the Electoral Commission cannot. That gives rise to a criminal enforcement gap, which is not helped by a lack of investigatory and prosecutorial lead capacity, especially for UK-wide offences. Other similar regulators in the UK can bring criminal proceedings in areas under their auspices, so there is a real question: why not the Electoral Commission?

I note that Philip Rycroft dealt with that question in his report and recommended an alternative approach. I have tabled the new clause as a probing amendment to ask the Government to provide more clarification. If we are not going to give these powers to the Electoral Commission, who should take the lead? The status quo is clearly not working. There is an alarming lack of prosecution in this space, going back quite a number of years. The net effect is essentially that people can escape from prosecution. If it is not going to be the Electoral Commission, we need much more investment in the capacities and powers of the police. I understand that we have a situation where the police might not feel that investigations are necessarily in their interest, because the fines that can be charged are not proportionate to the huge amount of police time that might be required to investigate the issues.

I would like to hear from the Government how they will address the clear gap in the capacity of the system overall to initiate criminal proceedings on breaches of electoral law. An obvious solution would be to put it through the Electoral Commission. I recognise that Philip Rycroft has a somewhat different view. Will the Government please explain their view?

[Samantha Dixon]

New clause 66 would remove the prohibition on the Electoral Commission bringing criminal proceedings in England, Wales and Northern Ireland that was introduced in the Elections Act 2022. To be clear, the Electoral Commission has never brought criminal prosecutions, even prior to the changes introduced by the Act. It has a wide range of investigatory powers and is able to impose a variety of civil sanctions for certain offences. The Bill already extends and strengthens those powers to promote more robust and proportionate enforcement.

Where criminal investigation and prosecution is required or thought appropriate for certain offences, the Commission refers those cases to the police and the relevant prosecuting authority, who are experts in this domain. The Government recognise the importance of ensuring that electoral law is enforced effectively, and that there is there is public confidence in the system of regulation governing political finance. That is why we commissioned the Rycroft review.

As the hon. Member for North Herefordshire pointed out, the review looked specifically at criminal enforcement arrangements and concluded it entirely appropriate that criminal investigations are handled by the police, the Crown Prosecution Service and the Public Prosecution Service for Northern Ireland. The review noted that it would be unnecessary and potentially counterproductive for the Electoral Commission to have a prosecutorial role; it would require significant investment in specialist expertise that might be deployed only sporadically.

Furthermore, although the Electoral Commission must enforce electoral law without fear or favour, it must also engage constructively with campaigners to help them to comply with the rules. Rycroft noted that it would be difficult for the Electoral Commission to maintain that constructive regulatory role with political parties if it were also pursuing criminal prosecutions.

Given the review’s findings on this issue, we do not think that any changes are needed to the Electoral Commission’s role. We will respond fully to the Rycroft review in due course and consider whether any other legislative changes are necessary in line with its findings. I request that the hon. Member for North Herefordshire withdraw the new clause.

[Dr Chowns]

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 75

Power to make consequential provision

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Clauses 76 to 81 stand part.

Government amendment 21.

Representation of the People Bill

Ellie Chowns Excerpts

Report stage & 3rd reading
Wednesday 2nd September 2026 Commons Chamber

[Chris Curtis]

Before I turn to the substance of the Bill, may I take a moment to put on record how much I enjoyed serving on the Select Committee under the chairship of my hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall and Camberwell Green (Florence Eshalomi)? I am proud of the work we did together, including on tackling rough sleeping and confronting Britain’s housing crisis. I know she will take that into government as she takes on her new role.

New clause 56, standing in my name, concerns the implementation of automatic voter registration. It is hopefully slightly less controversial than some of the other topics we have covered today, and I hope the Minister will support it, given that the new clause stood in her name until just a few weeks ago. Fundamentally, if we want high participation in our elections, we should make it as frictionless and easy as possible for eligible citizens to take part.

We know that participation is too low. Turnout at the 2024 general election was a little under 60%, which was the lowest figure since 2001. However, that does not tell us the whole story, because the published turnout figure is the percentage of registered voters who go out to vote in the election. It excludes the estimated 8 million people, according to the Electoral Commission, who are eligible to vote but do not do so, because they are not on the electoral register. That could be because they are registered incorrectly, they have moved home or they did not get around to registering. Meanwhile, research from the University of Manchester showed us that we make it harder to register to vote here in the UK than almost any other democracy.

This problem is not evenly distributed across our constituencies or across demographics. Young people, private renters, disabled people and those who are more transient are all less likely to be registered to vote. For too long, we have operated a slightly absurd system whereby the British state can know where you live, your age, your demographics and whether you are eligible to vote, and yet you still have to fill out a separate form to be registered to vote.

The Bill creates a new process through which electoral registration officers can register eligible voters without requiring them to make that separate application once the necessary commitments are met. It allows existing registrations to be updated without requiring somebody to submit a fresh application, and it creates a data sharing and piloting framework needed to move towards a genuinely modern system of electoral registration. These are all brilliant things that really move automatic voter registration in the right direction.

The purpose of new clause 56 is simply to ensure that we now turn that legislative framework into a reality. At the moment, the Bill gives us the architecture for automatic registration. What it does not yet give us is a clear public timetable for when the different parts of that architecture will actually be implemented. It would be good to hear from the Minister something on that timetable in her closing remarks today. We should have a clear pathway to delivering substantial change during this Parliament, which the Electoral Commission says is possible. New clause 56 asks for just that. Within two months of the new clause coming into force, the Government would have to publish a plan setting out the steps needed to implement registration without an application, the dates by which those steps would be completed, when they expect regulations for the registration pilots to be laid before Parliament, and how many additional people they expect to be registered by 15 August 2029 as a result of implementing part 2.

I will just make one very quick point on the pilots. I mentioned it on Second Reading and I still think we need a response. The fear about piloting automatic voter registration projects is that if they are done on local authority boundaries, as they would be, because local authorities are responsible for voter registration, there might be constituencies—Vauxhall and Camberwell Green is a perfect example, given that it is in both Lambeth and Southwark—where one part stands under the new scheme being piloted and another part of it does not. That can create a problem if part of one party’s votes come from a system where the registration has gone up and another part does not. So, may we please get a commitment from the Government or the Electoral Commission that when they are running pilots they will consider that point and preferably not run them in places where constituency boundaries do not line up?

Finally, I completely understand the Government’s arguments that reform cannot happen overnight and that we need to do it securely, accurately and carefully, especially when it comes to ensuring that only those who are eligible to vote, go out and vote. The Government have made the right decision to put a legislative framework in place for automatic and direct voter registration. We just need to know when it will be implemented.

[Dr Ellie Chowns (North Herefordshire) (Green)]

I would like to speak to amendment 15 and new clause 30, tabled in my name, and to new clauses tabled by other colleagues from across the House. First of all, I welcome the new Minister to her place and I welcome the Bill. I always like to start where there is common ground. It is certainly true that there are steps forward in the Bill: the implementation of the Rycroft recommendations to tackle foreign influence in our politics; movements towards automatic voter registration; and dealing with crypto to some extent, although not enough. Those are all positive steps forward. I also warmly welcome the introduction of votes at 16, which is a long-standing Green party policy.

But—there is a big but, I am afraid, Minister—the Bill could and really should do far, far more to clean up our politics. There are three big things that we need to do: get rid of the influence of dirty and big money in our politics; eliminate the poison of disinformation in our politics; and fix the fundamental structures of our politics that disenfranchise so many people. It is therefore frankly ridiculous that in a Bill about elections called the Representation of the People Bill we are not even allowed to discuss new clause 31 on a national commission on electoral reform. This is fundamentally important to our politics. The fundamental principle of democracy is that everybody’s vote must count equally.

The Government, of course, do not need to legislate on a national commission on electoral reform. They could kickstart one anyway. I really hope that the Minister will take that back to the Prime Minister—who, after all, is supposedly a supporter of electoral reform—and strongly encourage him to put his action where his mouth is on this issue and demonstrate that, if he is serious about problem-solving, he needs to work to solve the problems in our democracy.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)]

Order. Will the hon. Member please remember to keep her speech within the scope of what is currently before us?

[Dr Chowns]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I was speaking in relation to the title of the Bill.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

Order. I ask the hon. Member please to take my comments as they were made, and stick to the scope of the Bill.

[Dr Chowns]

I will move on to my amendments, Madam Deputy Speaker.

Amendment 15 seeks to ban all corporate donations. Donations from companies are banned in France and Canada, among many other countries. According to research conducted by CenTax, about a quarter of donor companies are so opaque that it is not possible to identify who controls them, and almost £1 in every £10 given by companies comes, indirectly, from people who could not make donations themselves. This is a loophole in our politics. The Bill already accepts that a company has no independent right to donate, as it depends on the individuals who own it being on the electoral register, so it makes sense to complete the step and ban corporate donations altogether. If the House is not willing to go as far as a ban, it can still strengthen the Bill by strengthening clause 60.

I have also tabled new clause 30, which calls for

“a review of how campaign expenditure limits could apply on an annual basis”.

The new clause would deal with another huge loophole. We recognise that money skews politics; that is why there are spending limits during the short campaign; but we know that politics does not happen just in that short period before an election. Politics happens all the year round, especially now that the online world is such a big part of our politics. Long gone are the days when elections were fought only in those short weeks. Political campaigning happens throughout the year, not just on doorsteps but also online, and it is therefore imperative to place limits on annual campaign expenditure to prevent our politics from being skewed out of all proportion by big money. That is why I support new clause 70, tabled by the right hon. Member for Oxford East (Anneliese Dodds), which would lower limits for campaign spending altogether.

In her new clause 120, the hon. Member for Walthamstow (Ms Creasy) makes a clear case for a cap on all donations. Big money has been allowed to skew our politics for far too long. I would prefer the cap to be much lower, perhaps at £50,000 a year, and that view is supported by the majority of the British people, but any move in that direction would be an improvement.

Moreover, some donations simply should not be allowed. I welcome new clause 22, tabled by the hon. Member for Leeds East (Richard Burgon): there is no place for fossil fuels in a sustainable future, and no place for dirty fossil money in our politics.

I also welcome the new clauses tabled by the hon. Member for Milton Keynes Central (Emily Darlington), particularly new clause 43, which calls for

“a repository of digital political advertising”.

This is absolutely crucial: we have to guard against the use of AI to fuel disinformation. We have to take big money out of politics, take the poison of disinformation out of politics, and fix our political system once and for all.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds Central and Headingley) (Lab/Co-op)]

As chair of the all-party parliamentary group for fair elections, the largest APPG in Parliament, I am delighted to welcome the Bill as a significant culture shift for our democracy and a generational step towards fairer politics. I also welcome the Minister to her place, as she is a trusted friend and ally on fair elections. The APPG’s loss is certainly the Government’s gain.

It is fitting that the Representation of the People Bill is the first piece of legislation to come to the House under the Government’s new leadership. The Prime Minister’s long-standing commitment to free and fair elections, support for young people and commitment to cleaning up our politics is well known, and I look forward to this being the first of many steps that he will take to make our politics fit for the future and reflective of the United Kingdom in which we live today.

The Labour party is the party of change: system change, culture change, democratic change. I am proud to be part of a party that has always fought to strengthen our democracy. We must now do that for a new generation, by facing up to the triple threat that disinformation, dark money and a failing electoral system pose to our politics. Westminster is unfortunately becoming dangerously outdated. A five-party electorate can no longer be represented by a two-party system. “Business as usual” and low voter turnout are changing everything.

I am sad that my new clause 31 has been ruled out of scope today.