Parliamentary Constituencies Bill

Lord Lexden Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 8th September 2020 Grand Committee

Clause 1 agreed.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Lexden) (Con)]

My Lords, we now come to the group beginning with Amendment 6. I remind noble Lords that anyone wishing to speak after the Minister should email the clerk during the debate. I should inform the Committee that if Amendment 6 is agreed to, I cannot call Amendment 7.

Clause 2: Orders in Council giving effect to reports

Amendment 6

Moved by

--- Later in debate ---

It is of great importance that it should not be felt that Parliament in its wisdom or unwisdom has left it open for a degree of political interference—or worse, from my point of view, that anyone should think that this Government have any kind of ulterior motivation in this. We most certainly do not. With the assurance that I will reflect further on the points made and that I am ready to meet colleagues in the Committee and outside between now and Report, and that I have listed carefully to the arguments put forward today, I hope that I may be able to persuade my noble friend to withdraw his amendment.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Lexden) (Con)]

My Lords, I have received no requests to speak after the Minister, so I call the noble Lord, Lord Cormack.

[Lord Cormack (Con)]

My Lords, first, I thank all those who took part in this interesting debate. Rarely do I hear a debate that has as its hallmark such unanimity on the essential issue. There was a little disagreement on the exact time—that is, whether it should be my noble friend Lord Young’s three months or my six weeks. I have slightly firmed up on six weeks, but I have not made my mind up; it would be stupid so to do because although I could not see the Minister’s body language, I heard his language. I thank him very much for what he said. I know that, in saying that, I speak for my noble friend Lord Young, to whom I am very grateful. He told me that he had done a bit a work on this subject and that he must have the opportunity to reveal it to colleagues. He did so brilliantly; I am grateful to him.

Further discussions should be held. We must seek to persuade the Government—the Minister is clearly persuadable—that thou need not block and thou should not stop. We need to make sure that the Government are properly constrained by a workable timetable that Parliament has devised.

With those words, I am delighted to withdraw the amendment. I hope that I do not have to return to this matter on Report. I hope that there will be on Report a government amendment to the Bill that meets what we have asked for today.

--- Later in debate ---

Clause 4 agreed.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Lexden) (Con)]

My Lords, we now come to the group consisting of Amendment 10. I remind noble Lords that anyone wishing to speak after the Minister should email the clerk during the debate.

Amendment 10

Moved by

Parliamentary Constituencies Bill

Lord Lexden Excerpts

Report stage & Report stage (Hansard) & Report stage (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 8th October 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Janvrin (CB)]

My Lords, I too—alongside the noble Lord, Lord Wills, who has just spoken—was a member of the Select Committee on the Electoral Registration and Administration Act 2013 so ably chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Shutt. I have added my name to this cross-party amendment, as I continue to believe that the Government should address the issue of the completeness of the electoral registers as a matter of priority, and certainly in the context of this Bill.

As has been made clear, the amendment has evolved since Committee, with its focus on completeness and on attainers. I want to make three brief points on Report. First, I entirely accept that the Government recognise the importance of the issue of completeness, and that they are well aware of the missing millions, and of the evidence that we do not perform well by international standards. In Committee, the Minister said that they were not complacent, and that there was work in hand to address some of the issues. If that is so, it would be a very small step for the Government to agree to a deadline for bringing forward further proposals, particularly in the light of the committee’s recent report. It would show a sense of urgency, which is important.

Secondly, the focus in the amendment on doing something about attainers is worth highlighting. Attainers are in a different position, and this has always been recognised, in that their names can be considered for entry on the register before they attain the right to vote. As the noble Lord, Lord Wills, said, there is significant evidence that registration rates for attainers have dropped markedly in recent years. Therefore, there is real cause to focus on them.

Thirdly, my reading of the amendment is that it is compatible with the Government’s position on automatic registration. I understand the Minister’s position that, in principle, registering to vote and voting are civic duties. The amendment does not seek to challenge the Government’s view, in that it would be perfectly possible to accept it while holding firm to that principle. I hope that the Minister will be able to accept this modest amendment as a way of working towards fairer constituency boundaries based on better data. It may be modest, but it is important in the wider context of the integrity of our democratic process.

[Lord Lexden (Con)]

My Lords, I back this amendment with some vigour as the last of a cross-party group of colleagues who worked together in great harmony as members of the Select Committee established under the genial chairmanship of the noble Lord, Lord Shutt of Greetland, to consider the impact on our electoral system of the Electoral Registration and Administration Act 2013.

I note in passing that, when the legislation that became the 2013 Act was going through this House, I pressed for the swift abolition of the 15-year limit on the right of our fellow citizens overseas to vote in our elections. Though that has been promised in three successive Conservative manifestos, seven years have passed without action.

It has to be said that other members of today’s cross-party group behind this amendment worked much harder than I did on the recent Select Committee. However, lazy though I was, I quickly came to share their conviction that there was no more important issue in electoral affairs today than the need to improve—and improve substantially—the completeness of the electoral registers. It is a theme that runs throughout our report, published in June. Like my colleagues, I was struck by the extent to which we compare unfavourably with some other major democracies.

This simple little amendment would help not insignificantly to make our registers more complete. It is universally acknowledged, as we have heard in this debate, that not nearly enough of tomorrow’s voters aged 16 and 17 are being brought on to the registers in readiness to cast their votes when they become 18. I have always been keen to support an intensification of the ways in which electoral registration officers can fulfil this part of their duties. As I have mentioned on a number of occasions in this House, Northern Ireland has set a fine example in this respect, giving EROs ready access to schools and colleges.

Today’s cross-party amendment would enable attainers to get on to the registers more readily than ever before. It would bring them directly to the gateway of democracy. Two alternative routes are proposed. Under the first, attainers would be brought automatically on to the register where EROs were satisfied of their eligibility. Under the second, attainers would be notified about the process for acquiring the precious right to vote. The first route would take attainers through the gateway of democracy. The second would bring them to the threshold and leave them to decide for themselves whether to cross it and secure for themselves participation in our democracy. For those who believe that registration should be a matter of individual choice, the second route will seem preferable. But within the Conservative Party, there are many who regard registration as a matter of duty that everyone should be obliged to fulfil, as my noble friend Lord Cormack has pointed out in this House many times.

Finally, might I be permitted a brief historical comment? When election registers were introduced in the 19th century, the political parties fought tooth and nail in the courts to get their supporters on to them and keep their opponents off. Today, the supporters of this amendment from all parts of the House want to see the registers become as complete as possible. Is that not a cause for some rejoicing?

[Lord Rennard (LD)]

My Lords, in the debate on this Bill in the other place on 14 July, the Minister Chloe Smith spoke about

“what we are doing to ensure that the registers are as accurate and complete as possible”

and said:

“We should encourage more people to register to vote.”—[Official Report, Commons, 14/7/20; col. 1466.]


This amendment does nothing more than ask the Government to say how. It requires them to set out proposals for doing what they say they want to do in relation to young people and makes suggestions. It asks the Government to consider two different ways in which we could easily, and without cost, ensure that more young people are added to the electoral registers by the time they are first entitled to vote.

The Government say that the completeness of the electoral registers is back up to the levels that predated the introduction of individual electoral registration. However, as my noble friend Lord Shutt pointed out, the Electoral Commission showed in 2019 that while 94% of over-65s are registered to vote, only 66% of 18 to 19 year-olds are registered to vote. Those who will attain the age of 18 in the next year or two are supposed to be included in the electoral registers for the purposes of the Boundary Commissions. However, as the noble Lord, Lord Wills, pointed out, the registration rate for this group has fallen dramatically. According to the Electoral Commission, only about 25% of attainers are currently registered, compared to about 45% in 2015. It is therefore perfectly reasonable for this House to insist that the Government lay proposals before Parliament to implement their declared policy of improving the completeness of the electoral registers and recognising the problem with young people in particular.

Parliamentary Constituencies Bill

Lord Lexden Excerpts

Consideration of Commons amendments & Ping Pong (Hansard) & Ping Pong (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 26th November 2020 Lords Chamber

That is why we should free the Lord Chancellor from any suggestion of political involvement in the appointment of the deputy chairman of the Boundary Commission. Put that safely in the hands of the Lord Chief Justice, who is not a political officeholder and is not subject to the same pressures. I wait with interest, but not, I am afraid, a great deal of optimism, to hear what the noble Lord, Lord True, says about the position. Expressions of confidence that people would never do things that they have not done in the past can no longer be relied on.

[Lord Lexden (Con)]

My Lords, I support the amendment proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Woolley of Woodford. Like him and other noble Lords on all sides of the House, I deeply regret that the amendment cannot be moved by the noble Lord, Lord Shutt of Greetland, who so effectively made the case for action to get more young people on the electoral registers just a few weeks ago on Report. Lord Shutt of Greetland will be remembered vividly and affectionately by all his colleagues, of whom I was one, who worked with him on the all-party Select Committee that considered the state of our country’s electoral system in detail, seven years after the passage of the Electoral Registration and Administration Act 2013. It would be a fine tribute to his memory if what might be termed the Shutt-Woolley amendment was incorporated in the Bill. If it is not, I hope that something like it wins parliamentary approval before too long.

When I spoke on the earlier Shutt amendment, I asked Members of the House to bear in mind that it provided two alternative routes by which tomorrow’s voters could be brought on to the electoral registers, at the ages of 16 and 17, in readiness to cast their votes when they turn 18. The first, as we have heard, proposed automatic registration if electoral registration officers were satisfied of their eligibility when national insurance numbers were issued. The Shutt amendment offered a second way to the goal, which all supporters of democracy surely must share—that of ending the grave under- participation of young people aged 18 and over in our country’s elections. The second method, as we have heard, involved no more than providing them with information about the process by which the precious right to vote can be acquired.

In responding to the amendment, the Government chose to ignore the second part altogether. Not one word was said about it from the Government Front Bench. Its supporters were called on to vote against it, on the grounds that automatic registration was objectionable in principle—an objection that many Conservatives do not share. The same thing happened when the Shutt amendment was debated in the Commons.

The new version before us omits the provision for automatic registration on which the Government based their entire opposition to the original amendment. The amendment proposes, in modest terms, that it should be permissible for young people, on whom the future success of our country depends, to be notified of what they should do to gain the right to cast a vote and play their part in our democracy. Can there really be a serious argument for not informing our country’s youngsters, who stand at the gateway of democracy, about what they need to do to pass through it, when information can be supplied to them readily and at very little cost as a result of today’s electronic miracles?

[The Deputy Speaker (Lord Duncan of Springbank) (Con)]

For noble Lords’ information, the next three speakers will be the noble Lords, Lord Adonis, Lord Blencathra and Lord Cormack.