Elections Bill

Lord Mann Excerpts

Lords Hansard - Part 2 & Committee stage
Monday 21st March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

My Lords, I beg to move Amendment 118A on behalf of the noble Lord, Lord Holmes of Richmond, who cannot be in his place today. I am doing this to allow for debate at this time on Amendment 122A, which is on the same topic. Amendment 118A is a retabled version of Amendment 120 and this has been done in order to place it in the correct part of the Bill. As the noble Lord, Lord Holmes, has already spoken to his amendment on an earlier day, he has nothing further to add.

[Lord Mann (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 122A, on an issue that I do not think has received sufficient attention for a long time: the significant group of voters who lose their votes at each election because they inaccurately fill out the verification forms to be enclosed with their postal vote forms. The problem is that, depending on the whims of a particular returning officer, a voter could be doing this, year in and year out, at every election, without realising that the vote they thought they had cast has not actually been validated because of an error—perhaps on the voting paper itself but, in my experience, it is far more likely to be an error on the verification form required to go with it.

I have listed certain categories of voters in my amendment—for example, those with failing eyesight or those with limited or no literacy. To fill in the paperwork that allows one to complete a postal vote form can be incredibly complex. There is a range of options open to returning officers. My own personal experience of filling them in is that some are straightforward and some are mind-bogglingly difficult. Those voters who are particularly vulnerable ought to have an automatic right, whereby an agent of the returning officer should, if requested, be able to visit them and assist them in the completion not of the voting paper itself—the experience I have is that that is rarely spoiled—but of the verification form that goes with it.

The percentages are very high indeed. In a local election in the area I once represented, one could easily see 300 postal votes that were lost because of this. In a general election, one is multiplying that, and anything up to a thousand votes could be lost, purely because people have been unable to accurately complete the paperwork. Some will do that carelessly, but there is a whole range of more vulnerable voters who, given the opportunity for assistance, would complete the verification form accurately and then vote and have their vote counted.

It seems to me that, whether it requires legislation or clearer guidance to returning officers, this is a rather important point in ensuring that maximise the actual turnout in elections, rather than the theoretical turn out of those who have returned postal votes but do not have them counted. The numbers are significant if we multiply across the country those that I have seen locally. It is a significant group of voters, and it is through no specific fault of their own—other than, for example, their literacy or their failing eyesight, which is the example I am most familiar with.

Better advice from returning officers would be appropriate. I put this forward as an option, and I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.