Elections Bill Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateMaria Miller
Main Page: Maria Miller (Conservative - Basingstoke)Department Debates - View all Maria Miller's debates with the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
(2 years, 7 months ago)
Commons ChamberI have nothing further to add to what we discussed in Committee. I understand the hon. Lady’s point—we want our legislation to be as rigorous and robust as possible. I hope that the open relationship that she and I had when she was shadowing me is one that I will be able to continue with her successors. That is how we will get very good legislation on the statute books.
As I was saying, that commitment is being honoured here with the tabling of amendments to provide powers to introduce an online absent vote application service. That will include a process by which the identity of absent vote applicants can be verified. The identity verification process will be made to apply to paper applications as well as to applications made online.
I thank my hon. Friend for going through the implications of new clause 11, which I very much welcome. Does it at all affect the Government’s position on the length of election campaigns, which she will be aware has been a point of debate within this Bill and the Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Bill? Will the measure help to shorten election campaigns in the long term?
I think it is very possible that this measure will assist people in speeding up the process by which they can register, which will of course have a positive impact in terms of the length of time people have to get ready for elections. I know that my right hon. Friend has other concerns about the length of time required to conduct elections, and those matters are separate from what we are discussing today, but I am very happy to continue discussions on that with her.
New clause 11 and new schedule 1 also include powers to enable identity verification of partially completed voter card applications, making the process more efficient and minimising unnecessary delays in processing applications. I am pleased to say that these new clauses will support our aim to ensure that voter identification works for all eligible voters.
I know that the detail of voter identification remains of great interest to hon. Members. The Government have always committed to being open about our plans. I wish to use this opportunity to highlight to the House the policy statement on voter identification published on gov.uk on 6 January that sets out in more detail our implementation plans for the policy.
Today, we are introducing a group of clarificatory amendments on voter identification that support those plans. Amendments 53 to 56 and amendments 62 to 65 will ensure that any elector who does not possess one of the wide range of photographic identification documents accepted under our proposals would be able to apply for a voter card or anonymous elector’s document when registering to vote, thus simplifying and making the system more accessible.
For electors who are registered to vote at multiple addresses, such as students, amendments 57 and 66 clarify that it will not be mandatory to make an application to each electoral registration officer with whom they are registered—only one would be needed. It is also important that voter cards and anonymous elector’s documents are designed appropriately, and amendments 61 and 70 provide some additional flexibility around how to ensure that.
With respect specifically to anonymous electors and the anonymous elector’s documents, amendments 71, 80, 83, 85 and 88 will ensure that an anonymous elector’s identity can still be verified effectively at the polling station without risk of their anonymity being compromised, and that they can be provided with an anonymous elector’s document in a convenient way.
This debate is about important changes to one of the pillars of our democracy: the way we run free and fair elections. May I commend my hon. Friend the Minister for her diligent work listening to the debate and deliberations, and for making the changes that she has put before us?
I will speak in particular to Government new clause 11 and new schedule 1. In September, in the earlier stages of the Bill, the then Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich North (Chloe Smith), stressed the importance of an elections system that works for voters. Making that system work for voters is where I will focus my remarks.
New clause 11 is linked to absent voting and a power to make regulations, and it paves the way for new schedule 1. New schedule 1 includes verification evidence needed to register, but also, importantly, the opportunity to introduce online absent-voting application services. I think that is a really important step forward because those provisions potentially give us an opportunity to absolutely make the system better for voters, particularly those who are absent, who in the past have had to take many days, or even weeks, to make an application to vote. This system of online applications could well improve things significantly.
Will the right hon. Lady explain how what she has just said will encourage people from right across the political piece to participate in the democratic process?
Because it will enable people to be part of the system, to register online and to have confidence in what is going on in our election process.
I want to probe the Minister on the length of election campaigns, which have, I believe—this is to the hon. Gentleman’s point—not served us well in helping to engage people in the election process. Many hon. Members who took part in debates on the Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Bill made the point about the continual lengthening of our election campaigns being not a benign act, but an act that has potential consequences—consequences we are not that aware of. Emerging research suggests that longer election campaigns are potentially disengaging for electors. They mean that the interest of electors wanes over time—perhaps all of us who have knocked on doors have seen that over the last two decades, when election campaigns have increased significantly in length.
Will new schedule 1 and new clause 11, tabled by the Government, provide some sense of opportunity that at least the length of election campaigns will not increase? The former Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich North, spoke about her understanding of the importance of potentially shortening election campaigns as well. Hon. Members will remember that in law at the moment election campaigns are currently 25 working days, and amendments that I and my hon. Friends tabled the last time these matters were discussed in this place considered shortening campaigns to 25 days.
Will the Minister update the House on the undertaking to consider research into the length of election campaigns, in conjunction with new clause 11 and new schedule 1? That could provide an opportunity for us to understand better how election campaigns affect voter participation, and how the length of campaigns may be shortened in a realistic and sensible way as a result of her new provisions. Will she help the House to understand how she will take that forward to ensure that our democratic process is as strong as it can be? The lack of consideration about the length of campaigns should be something that is of the past, and the issue should be central to the thoughts of the Government in the future.
I rise to speak in support of new clause 1, as well as new clauses 3 to 8, tabled in my name and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow North (Patrick Grady). I welcome the hon. Member for Nottingham North (Alex Norris) to his place. It is a pleasure to see him.
Before addressing the new clauses, I wish to put on record my sincere thanks to my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow North and the hon. Members for Lancaster and Fleetwood (Cat Smith) and for Putney (Fleur Anderson), who, day after day in Committee, went through the Bill forensically and exposed the fundamental threat to our democracy that is contained in almost every line of it. From restricting the franchise through the introduction of voter ID cards, to giving the Government power to set the strategy and policy of the Electoral Commission, abolishing a progressive, proportional voting system, and constraining how whole sections of civil society are allowed to campaign, this Bill has it all.
This Bill, which—let’s be honest—would not be out of place in the hands of Viktor Orbán or Jair Bolsonaro, should not be seen in isolation and has to be viewed in the wider context, as it includes plans to criminalise peaceful protest and to allow the Home Secretary to strip someone of British citizenship with the stroke of a pen. It places onerous legal constraints on journalists and whistleblowers. Ministers will be allowed to ignore legal rulings made under judicial review and there are plans to abolish the Human Rights Act. It was Peter Geoghegan, writing in openDemocracy just before Christmas, who said:
“This is what democracy dying…looks like. And we need to act now before it’s too late.”
That is why we opposed the Bill on Second Reading, why we sought to amend it radically in Committee, and why, unless Government Members wake up to what they are about to do and fundamentally amend the Bill today, we will oppose it this evening as well.
We in the SNP fully support new clause 1, which would simply bring the age at which people can vote in Westminster elections into line with what already happens in Scotland and in Wales. The SNP has advocated this for a long time—indeed, the legendary Winnie Ewing, when she made her maiden speech from these Benches 55 years ago during a debate on lowering the voting age from 21 to 18, said:
“There are moral and intellectual reasons why it is good sense to make people responsible at the age of 18 if not sooner… I am absolutely on the side of youth.”—[Official Report, 20 November 1967; Vol. 754, c. 980.]