Overseas Electors Bill (First sitting)

Debate between Layla Moran and Chloe Smith

Wednesday 17th October 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Chloe Smith]

No, I will not. I will be brief. The hon. Gentleman has had ample time to put his arguments. The Bill is not a moment for a “democratic experiment”, to quote the hon. Gentleman further. It is also not the moment to fracture the franchise; it is a moment to extend the franchise. It is not right to make the franchise one thing in one sense and another thing in another sense.

I address that argument directly to the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon, who has rightly brought the argument here today in a spirit of wanting to explore the issues, and I applaud her for that. She said at the outset that she wanted this to be an exploratory debate, and I am grateful that we have had that today. The bottom line is that the Bill seeks to do something different. It is about extending the franchise geographically; it is not about the age at which the franchise starts, and I do not think that it would be a wise course to have two different age starting points for the franchise within the democracy that we hope to sustain for UK parliamentary elections. I hope that the hon. Lady will feel able to withdraw the amendment on that basis. I look forward to making progress through the Bill.

[Layla Moran]

I thank everyone who has contributed to this debate. I do not agree that this is not the time to discuss this matter, or that we should not vote on it. It may well have been voted down in the past, but let us face it: the shifting sands of politics are moving so fast that I do not even know what happened yesterday, let alone what will happen tomorrow. What I do know, though, on behalf of many of the young people I speak to day in, day out, as I have done for the whole of my career, is that this is absolutely the time to press such an amendment to a vote, and that is what I intend to do.

Question put, That the amendment be made.

--- Later in debate ---

[Chloe Smith]

This is a very interesting amendment. My understanding of what the hon. Member for Nottingham North is trying to do developed slightly as he made his comments, and I am grateful for the way in which he explained what his amendments seek to do. I will take them in two halves and respond to some points in relation to amendment 33 before coming on to the other two amendments.

On amendment 33, I am grateful that the hon. Gentleman recognises the challenge of the residency test. At the moment, there is no way for a person to join the register if they had been resident in the UK, as opposed to previously registered. Those are the two different concepts that we are dealing with, and I think the hon. Gentleman recognises that in what he is trying to do with amendment 33. I welcome that, because the residency issue aims to put right an injustice that, for example, could apply to the children of British citizens who moved abroad. I believe that the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon might have been such an example. Having left the UK at such a young age, she could not possibly have been registered in this country, but of course, she had been resident here.

[Layla Moran]

I was resident here, but my brothers and sisters were not. They were born after me, and were born abroad. Are they less British than I?

[Chloe Smith]

There we go. It is very helpful to have such personal experience of the issues raised in the Bill. However, I feel duty bound to say that the Bill might not help in the instance of the hon. Lady’s brothers and sisters, although it would help in her own instance.