Elections Bill

Jerome Mayhew Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 17th January 2022 Commons Chamber

[Alex Norris]

I confess that I had hoped the hon. Gentleman would ask me that. I have been a Labour party branch secretary, branch chair, constituency secretary, constituency chair, councillor, Member of Parliament and shadow Minister, and I have never once been asked for voter ID at a meeting. That has only ever happened in cases where certain Labour parties were in special measures and it was seen as a proportionate protection. It is proportion that we are talking about.

The hon. Gentleman said in a previous contribution that there is enthusiasm in Swindon for the measure to tackle that one solitary aspect of personation. In fact, if we were to replicate the findings of the pilots he relies on across the country, 184,000 people who wanted to vote would be turned away and would not return. That makes it 184,000 to one; this is racking up faster than Downing Street parties. The Cabinet Office itself says that that approach will exclude 2% of the electorate without the right form of ID, but according to the Electoral Commission the actual figure of those without the right ID will be between 1 million and 3.5 million.

In addition, the people excluded will not be evenly spread and that goes to the heart of the Government’s problems with inclusivity in the Bill. Some 77% of people in the UK hold a full driving licence, whereas the figure for black people is 53% and the one for Asian people is 61%. Similarly, according to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, the poorest are six times more likely than the best-off to miss out under these proposals—the measure is not inclusive.

[Jerome Mayhew (Broadland) (Con)]

Does the hon. Gentleman not accept that the Bill also includes provisions for totally free and suitable photographic ID for anyone who needs it, so the poor are protected?

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[Brendan O'Hara]

The hon. Lady makes an extremely good point, which I will address specifically as I continue my speech.

What is different now from 1967 is that, with two nations of the United Kingdom already having this provision in place, new clause 1 does not ask the UK Government to take a step into the unknown. We can see how well it is working in Scotland and Wales, where the change has been both seamless and uncontroversial. Any concerns that we might have had about 16 and 17-year-olds not being interested in politics or being unable to understand the issues have been shown to be without any foundation.

[Jerome Mayhew]

I once met Winnie Ewing when I was at school and she came to talk to a politics class I was attending. However, on the new clause, I rise to ask what is the rationale for choosing the age of 16, when people are not considered to be responsible enough to decide whether to buy cigarettes, rather than some other age—say, 15 or 14?

[Brendan O'Hara]

I think the hon. Gentleman is confusing private rights and public rights. There are public health issues around the consumption of alcohol and the purchase of cigarettes. These are exactly the same debates as we had in 1967, when there were fears about taking a step into the unknown. What is different now, as I said, is that it is not a step into the unknown. It has been proven to work. Why should young people in England and Northern Ireland have different rights from those in Wales and Scotland?

When we had our referendum in 2014, 90% of 16 and 17-year-olds registered to vote and 75% of them turned out to vote on the day. As the hon. Member for Nottingham North said, studies showed that young people had investigated the issues and had multiple sources of information, and many were far better acquainted with the issues than were their parents or grandparents. To go back to the point made by the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse), if we look at the age of the people leading the fight against climate change and the demonstrators at COP26, we see that overwhelmingly they were young people making their voices heard above everybody else’s. That tells us all we need to know.

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[Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)]

Over 180 years ago, starting in Blaenau Gwent, thousands of Chartists marched on Newport. From across south Wales, they demanded reforms to elections so that common people could have their voices heard in Parliament. Since then, elections in our country have got more transparent, fair and open, but I am worried about voter suppression, and at stake is the very integrity of our elections.

We all know what is going on in America. Despite the highest election turnout in 120 years, the big lie has been amplified that Trump actually won in 2020. Since then, ordinary Americans are facing higher hurdles to vote in too many states. Raising the bar to lower voter turnout is what the Republican right is up to, and similar tactics here trouble me.

I am particularly concerned about the introduction of voter ID, so I am supporting amendment 1 tonight. Asking for voter ID seems reasonable: someone shows who they are to get a ballot paper. However, it is an old cynical trick: insert an administrative hurdle, dress it up as improving security, watch voter turnout go down—job done, the fix is in. Of course, voter fraud should be stopped, but impersonation is hardly an issue in the UK, and our independent Electoral Commission says the same.

[Jerome Mayhew]

The hon. Member makes the point that if we put an administrative hurdle, by which he means photographic ID, in the way of the voters the turnout would go down, but that specifically is not the evidence we have seen from Northern Ireland, where the Labour Government put in the requirement for photo ID, and it has been widely accepted and is a general part of voting there.

[Nick Smith]

I thank the hon. Member for intervening, but those were exceptional times, and I will answer his case in my speech.

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[Tom Randall (Gedling) (Con)]

Like my hon. Friend the Member for Heywood and Middleton (Chris Clarkson), I served on the Bill Committee. It was my first time on a Bill Committee on a major piece of legislation. I do not know how often there is a change in Minister, PPS and Whip during a Bill Committee, but I congratulate my hon. Friend the Minister, and my hon. Friends the Members for Devizes (Danny Kruger) and for Castle Point (Rebecca Harris), on getting up to speed on the Bill so quickly and taking us through the Committee.

Bill Committees can sometimes be sleepy affairs, but that one, like this debate, certainly was not. We had vigorous debates on various parts of the Bill, including the measure on voter ID, which I fully support, as it closes a vulnerability in our electoral system. We discussed a number of points surrounding voter ID, including many examples from abroad—countries such as Ireland and the Netherlands. We are now, through this Bill, introducing a form of legislation that will make us more European, in many ways, than we were. It is interesting that the Opposition parties that would have had us remain members of the European Union are so resistant to a system that is more in line with our continental friends than what we have at the moment. It will be a more secure system. I accept that there is a lot of work for Government to do in order to popularise and inform voters of these measures, and also to roll out the electoral ID card that will be introduced, but if the measures are introduced properly, there is no reason why anybody should be left out.

It is said that these are solutions in search of problems, but problems have been identified in places such as Tower Hamlets, Slough, Wycombe and Birmingham, among others, and this Bill will finally address them.

[Jerome Mayhew]

In an earlier speech, reference was made to an electoral judge suggesting that personation was neither here nor there, but does my hon. Friend recall the evidence to the Bill Committee where that electoral judge, in a judgment during the Labour Administration of 2005, said, “If you don’t look for fraud you won’t find it”, and described the Government as “having its head in the sand” on this issue?

[Tom Randall]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. One of the key problems is not only not looking for it—it is a matter of training. There is a big problem that needs to be addressed in terms of making sure that the police are aware of electoral law issues and getting them out there to go and investigate. He is completely right that a lot of this goes undetected.

I am pleased to see that the clauses on undue influence remain. I spoke on Second Reading about having to run the gauntlet of people trying to use intimidating behaviour on election day by thrusting leaflets into people’s faces. The central thrust of many of these measures is to protect the security of the ballot. I appreciate that I may be slightly testing the limits of what I am allowed to say on Report, but I have seen today an email from Scotland Yard to somebody I know who has reported an alleged breach of the secret ballot, but advice from the Electoral Commission and the local authority concerned is that the onus is on the individual who cast their vote to claim that secrecy has been breached. I would suggest that that is contrary to section 66 of the Representation of the People Act 1983, which says that every returning officer, presiding officer, clerk, candidate, election agent and polling agent

“shall maintain and aid in maintaining the secrecy of”

the vote. So if this legislation is to be reformed further in the other place, it should not be by removing the parts that we have introduced, but by giving some consideration as to whether the need to maintain a secret ballot is restated in primary legislation.

We have heard the argument for votes at 16, which I will not support. We have raised the age of marriage to 18, we have raised the age at which people have to be in education or training from 16 to 18, and the age at which you can smoke was raised by the Labour Government to 18. We have raised the age at which people can buy a lottery ticket from 16 to 18, I am sure with the Opposition’s support, as well as the age at which people can buy alcohol. Voting is an adult activity; it is something that adults do—if we want to encourage younger people to vote, I see no reason why we cannot introduce votes at 12. I think all the arguments advanced by Opposition Front Benchers could also apply to 12-year-olds.

I support the measures in this Bill. I look forward to its going on to Third Reading and the other place, and to seeing those measures come on to the statute book as soon as possible.

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[Margaret Ferrier (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Ind)]

Although I do not wish to repeat in detail the excellent points made by so many colleagues, I want to put on record my unequivocal opposition to the Bill in its current form.

On the issues that this Bill does not cover, last week I tabled new clause 10 that would amend the Representation of the People Act 1983 by removing the current requirement for public notice of the address of election agents, including where candidates are acting as their own election agent. Instead, it would allow for the general area in which the address is situated to be published, and would apply to parliamentary and local elections across the UK. Why is that important? Where a candidate is a lone election agent, the law could very well lead to their home address entering the public sphere.

Politics, by its very nature, can be divisive—look at the anger that this Bill alone has triggered. When we stand for election, we know that that comes with associated risks. Sadly, it becomes essential for us to be hyper-vigilant about our personal safety. Those who are privileged enough to win a seat are afforded some support in that respect, but those who do not win do not get the same support, despite the increased profile that even standing for elections will bring in the local community in many cases.

For me, there is an even more vital consideration. Many of us do not live alone, so we are not taking a solely personal risk. If a successful candidate acted as a lone election agent and were suddenly thrust into a very bright national spotlight, their home address would be out there for anyone to find. Our families do not sign up for the personal safety risk that our jobs bring them—we do. Our husbands and wives, children and, in some cases, parents and siblings, could be at risk, too. That is not acceptable.

I hope that the Minister and the Government see the value in new clause 10 and will consider including it in the Bill. I thank the hon. Member for Nottingham North (Alex Norris) for tabling amendment 2 to strengthen the accessibility requirements for blind and partially sighted voters.

This year marks the 150th anniversary of the Ballot Act 1872, which gave citizens the right to vote independently and in secret. It is absolutely essential that any new legislation does not limit that right, even unintentionally.

[Jerome Mayhew]

The right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) said that there was too little time for this debate, but those of us who sat on the Bill Committee will not recognise that feeling, because we had days of seemingly interminable debate, much of which has been repeated this evening.

[Patrick Grady]

I am afraid that I completely disagree. I sat on the Bill Committee, which the Government rushed through with two days left. As none of the Back Benchers participated, the entire Committee collapsed. I entirely agree with the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael): the way the Bill has been rammed through this House is a complete and utter disgrace.

[Jerome Mayhew]

We will have to agree to disagree on that because there was very lively debate in Committee.

I have made a number of interventions, so I will keep my comments short and on only two points. First, on new clause 1 and voter ID, others have spoken movingly—both in evidence to the Bill Committee and this evening—about the impact of voter fraud and the need to take reasonable steps to minimise it. The first step is voter ID, and I fully support what the Government suggest on photographic ID, but for that to be effective, the second step is to have prosecution where evidence is established that a crime has been committed. Much of the evidence that the Committee heard was frustration that the police or the Electoral Commission did not take allegations of fraud sufficiently seriously and bring them before a tribunal.

That brings me to clause 13, which deals with the Electoral Commission’s assumed power to become a prosecution body in its own right. I am very glad that the Government have taken this opportunity to re-establish the status quo, which should be that the police and the CPS are the relevant prosecuting authorities, in part because of the obvious conflict of interest. The Electoral Commission is the body that provides advice and guidance on electoral law. If it then takes off its regulatory hat and puts on its prosecuting hat, it is marking its own homework, which is a clear conflict of interest.

A wider point about the prosecution of crimes in this country, and one that was picked up by the Law Commission recently, is about a move away from what are described as “private prosecutions”, including by the Post Office—we need only mention the Horizon scandal to see why it is clearly wrong for the Post Office to be its own prosecuting authority—and, in my submission, the Care Quality Commission, which I know the Law Commission is looking at. We should move the power of prosecution and responsibility of prosecution away from those private prosecuting bodies and to the CPS and the police.

There is one message that I would like the Minister to take away and think seriously about. It is all fine and well for us to make the laws in this place, but if they are not taken seriously and investigated seriously by the police, leading to prosecutions where the evidence passes the evidential test, we are on a hiding to nothing.

In much of the evidence that came out in the evidence sessions in Committee, and in the experiences of hon. Members on both sides of the House, there was a huge degree of frustration that allegations of electoral fraud were not taken seriously by the police, who seemed embarrassed and unwilling to get into what was seemingly a political area. Instead, the police should realise that the full implementation of our electoral rules is incredibly important and that the defence of our democracy requires them to take those rules seriously.