Overseas Electors Bill

Maggie Throup Excerpts

Friday 22nd March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Philip Davies]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. I am not a lawyer and I do not know the answer, but I am sure that we have plenty of qualified people in this place—we tend not to be short of them—who may be able to offer an opinion. However, new clause 1 is not limited to the registration officer finding out from a third party. It will apply if they find out from the person themselves, so my hon. Friend might be right about that circumstance and he might be wrong—I do not know; that might need to be tested by the courts—but the new clause is not limited to that group.

[Maggie Throup (Erewash) (Con)]

I appreciate the sentiment behind the new clause, but I have moved house on numerous occasions and have never found a way to tell anybody in authority where I was moving to, nor would I have wanted to. Will my hon. Friend explain a bit more how the new clause would work in practice?

[Philip Davies]

I am sure that many other people are like my hon. Friend in that regard. It is not a question about how the new clause will work in practice. It seems to me that it is self-explanatory, in that it says:

“If the registration officer receives information that leads him or her to believe that a registered elector has moved, or is going to move, outside the United Kingdom, the registration officer shall contact that elector to prompt him or her to register as an overseas elector.”

How it would work in practice would seem self-explanatory. If the registration officer finds something out, he will contact the person concerned and say, “Will you register as an overseas elector?” I am not sure that I can add much to what the new clause already says.