Overseas Electors Bill

Mike Gapes Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Friday 23rd February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Glyn Davies]

I will give way after I have made one point.

This is something that was quite dramatic for me. About three weeks ago, a gentleman named Harry Shindler—some Members here may have met him—came all the way from Italy to Britain to talk to me about this Bill. Harry Shindler is an incredible man. He is 97 years old and the longest-serving member of the Labour party. He is still an activist—in fact, he left the deputy leader of the Labour party unable to speak for about half an hour in the Tea Room, which is quite an achievement. He came all the way to talk to me because the one thing that he wants to do before he dies is to vote again in a British election. That is how important it is to some UK citizens living overseas to be able to vote in our elections.

[Mike Gapes (Ilford South) (Lab/Co-op)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Glyn Davies]

I will; I have already mentioned the hon. Gentleman in my speech.

[Mike Gapes]

I am very sorry that I was slightly late for this debate. I was in the Library and did not notice the screen, showing that the previous debate had finished. My friend—I can call him that for various reasons—mentioned Harry Shindler. He knows that I was also at the meeting with Harry Shindler. I have known Harry Shindler for many years. He has taken legal action against the Government, taken the issue to the European Court and has resolutely done so because he represents not just people in the Labour party, but the whole community of people with British heritage who are living all over the world.

[Glyn Davies]

I thank my friend for that intervention, and I agree absolutely with his point. If everybody in this House were to meet and talk to Harry Shindler, there would not be a single person who was not a supporter of my Bill.

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[Sandy Martin]

No, I am not suggesting that: I am suggesting that if someone lives within a polity in which a taxation level is being set, they should have the opportunity to make decisions about how it is set. I will come to that point later on.

[Mike Gapes]

Is my hon. Friend saying that somebody who has worked and contributed taxation in this country for 20, 30 or 40 years, and who then retires abroad and lives there for the next 20 or 30 years, is somehow disenfranchised even though they have paid taxes here?

[Sandy Martin]

I am saying something fairly similar, yes. If someone is living, paying taxes and working in a country, they are also accruing pension rights and contributing to the society in which they live, and that society then has some obligations towards them if they decide to move abroad. That is a very good point, and I will come on to it later. However, I am not prepared to accept that somebody living in a country other than the country that they are making decisions for can set a level of taxation in the country that they are not living in.

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[Sandy Martin]

I entirely agree. In 2016, we had a vote—it did not go in exactly the direction that I would have supported, but it was a vote none the less—on taking back control of our own country. I do not think that when people were voting to take back control of their own country, they were voting to allow someone who had lived in the Caribbean, Australia or South Africa, and who intended to continue to live there, and who had been there for more than 15 years, to take back control of this country. I think that the majority of the population of this country would not believe that people who clearly would not be living in this country in the future should vote in elections in this country.

As I said earlier, if a British citizen moves abroad for two, three or four years and will then be coming back, it makes perfect sense to allow that person to vote in elections for a national Government who will affect their lives when they do come back. There has to be a cut-off point, and I note that the cut-off point is currently 15 years. That is not necessarily the cut-off point that I would choose, but given that all these arguments were gone through at the time when it was set, it would probably make sense to keep it that way.

There is a clear sense among those on the Conservative Benches that the Bill is designed to deal with an injustice, so let me now address the idea of injustice and, in particular, the idea of injustice in respect of pensions. This relates to part of what was said earlier by my hon. Friend sitting behind me, my hon. Friend the Member for Ilford South (Mike Gapes). If somebody has worked for the majority of their life in this country and has contributed to our economy and society and in particular has contributed through the national insurance system, it is perfectly legitimate and right that they should collect the same pension irrespective of whether they happen to be living in this country or another country.

We have a deeply unjust situation about the level of pensions people can collect across the world. Most people, apart from the people who live in those countries, do not realise how unjust the situation is. I am sure that Conservative Members will accuse me of simplifying or being simplistic about this, but it basically boils down to the fact that if people have retired to a Commonwealth country, the value of their pension diminishes away to almost nothing, whereas if they have retired to the United States or several other non-Commonwealth countries, their pension continues to be upgraded to match what it would have been if they had stayed in this country.

I will repeat that for those who did not hear it the first time or think I might have got it the wrong way around, because it is so counterintuitive and so clearly and manifestly unjust that it deserves repetition. If somebody moves to a Commonwealth country, the value of their pension diminishes away to nothing, whereas if they move to the US or some other non-Commonwealth countries, the value of the pension continues to grow alongside the value of pensions in this country. That is manifestly unjust; it is clearly discriminatory against other members of the Commonwealth. It is a bizarre situation, and I have no idea how it arose. It should have been dealt with years ago, and it is time that it is dealt with now. Why is that not the issue being addressed by this Bill? Why is this Bill addressing a manufactured injustice about voting rights, when it should be addressing an injustice about the pensions people ought to receive when they live in other countries?

[Mike Gapes]

May I say as honorary president of Labour International that Labour party members all over the world will be outraged that my hon. Friend is referring to this as a manufactured injustice? It is an injustice, and there might well be other injustices, many of which he is referring to, but it is wrong to say this is a manufactured issue.

[Sandy Martin]

I apologise if I have upset my hon. Friend, who has done a lot of work with Labour voters and potential Labour voters in other countries. Clearly, if people are living in other countries for limited periods, it makes perfect sense to enable those who are allowed to vote up to the time limit—at present, we have a 15-year cut-off—to vote for the party they want to vote for, and I honour and applaud the work my hon. Friend has done in encouraging those who are eligible to vote within that 15-year period to vote.

However, there must be a cut-off point. It does not make sense—it would not do so if there was a Labour or Conservative Government or a Labour or Conservative voter, and if they were living in Spain or South Africa—for us to assume that once somebody has moved abroad and it appears likely that they will live in another country for the rest of their lives, they should continue to vote in this country until the end of their life.

For example, a doctor who might have come to this country from Jamaica and has worked all her life and put an enormous amount of money into her pension who then decides on retiring to move back to be with her family in Jamaica will see the value of her pension dwindling into nothing, whereas someone who retires to Florida with a large sum of money of their own will see the value of their pension uprated year on year in line with pensions in this country. If there were any injustice that needed to be addressed, this is surely one that should be addressed first.

We also need to consider the security of the poll. The Government want people to show security ID when they go to vote, and that makes a lot of sense, although I would like them to do more to ensure that everyone who goes to vote is enabled, encouraged and shown how to carry that ID. We want to ensure that everyone who is eligible to vote is able to do so. However, I fail to see how we can ensure that anyone living in another country does not register or vote more than once. Also, how can we ensure that they show their ID if they are not actually in this country? If we are to ensure security of the poll, we need to ensure that all the polling districts and electoral authorities are joined together on a central register, to ensure that there is no double voting by overseas voters.

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[Sir Roger Gale]

No. The hon. Gentleman spoke for far too long; I shall not give way an inch. The idea that he put forward is a discourtesy to many of his colleagues who support this cause, including the hon. Member for Ilford North, whose constituency he apparently could not remember.

[Mike Gapes]

South.

[Sir Roger Gale]

I beg the pardon of the hon. Member for Ilford South (Mike Gapes)—I could not remember, either. We are all fallible.

The hon. Member for Ipswich referred to the fact that people who live in Commonwealth countries did not have their pensions uprated. I happen to be the chairman of the all-party group on frozen British pensions. I do not recall the hon. Gentleman attending any one of the meetings we have held to try to redress the injustice to which he referred—and yes, it is an injustice. Had he attended, he would have got his facts right, because there are Commonwealth countries—of which Jamaica is one, to pluck an example out of the sky—in which pensions are uprated. We want to see them uprated across the board. I mention that not to score points but to demonstrate how very wrong the hon. Gentleman was in virtually everything that he said.

I do not need to say any more. I want Harry Shindler, and the millions of expats like him who are proudly British, who take a keen interest in this country and regard it as their mother country, who have children and grandchildren living here, and who may well want to return to vote but wish to vote while they are overseas as well, to have that right. I do not believe that any part of this House will find any favour, not only with those people but with their very many UK-resident family members, by disagreeing with that. I hope the House will remember that, if and when we get the chance to vote on the Bill. It is a good measure that redresses an injustice and its time has come. We should let it pass.

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[Layla Moran]

I am very grateful for that intervention. I was not aware of that. I would also have presumed that, had they not been on the register at all, we certainly could not have included them. At least this perhaps gives us the constitutional option.

[Mike Gapes]

For the hon. Lady’s information, some of us tried to extend the franchise for the European referendum to the local government base, but we were defeated. Unfortunately, it was therefore simply based on those eligible to vote in a general election.

[Layla Moran]

I am grateful for that intervention. As the hon. Gentleman is probably aware, the Liberal Democrats would have supported that, because we believe that European citizens, as this affected them, should have had a say in that referendum.

Ruth in Spain goes on to say:

“Recent events obviously highlighted the injustice of the current situation, in that many were denied a vote in the EU referendum—and also last year’s general election (an election largely based around Brexit)—the outcome having life-changing ramifications for British citizens who had chosen to move from one part of the EU to another on the basis that their rights to freedom of movement and all that this entailed were guaranteed.”

That was the basis of so many emails, but it is not just that.

Julian, who is a foreign correspondent, has lived in many countries as a Brit, and the soft power mentioned by the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire is very clear in his career. Julian contacted me some months ago, saying:

“Expatriates are not all pensioners sipping cocktails on the Costa del Sol. Many of them are useful contributors to the British economy and to the image of Britain abroad. Only this month, for example, a French food magazine chose a rural bistro in the Auvergne owned and run by a British chef as its cafe of the year. Britons abroad are often popular and useful members of their adopted communities.”

I agree that expatriates should be allowed to vote in some elections in their current countries of residence, just as it is right for us to continue to allow EU citizens to vote in local elections here.

We live in an increasingly globalised world. It is ridiculous to suggest that some families even have a choice to move back. House prices in some parts of the UK are expensive not just for the UK, but compared with house prices across the world. Ian in Canada says:

“Sadly, I’m retraining as an MD after a career as a neuroscientist, and have been out of the UK since 2004. I say ‘sadly’, because as you’ll be aware, that means the period under which I’m able to cast votes in UK elections is drawing to a close under the current 15 year rule…I may not have been able to afford to continue living in the UK on a post-doctoral scientist’s salary”—

that is why he had to move—

“but I haven’t given up on the old country yet, and would like to continue trying to shape things for the better.”

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[Mike Gapes (Ilford South) (Lab/Co-op)]

I will try to be brief, because I want this Bill to get through.

I believe that there is an injustice in the arbitrary 15-year rule, but there are also many other injustices in the way many British citizens living overseas are treated. My hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich (Sandy Martin) was right to highlight some of them. What is not right, however, is whataboutery and the best being the enemy of the good. What is not right is using false hares and arguments in order to discredit this Bill and imply that all the people supporting it are against, for example, votes at 16. I voted for the private Member’s Bill that proposed that, and it will come. Within our parliamentary procedure, we cannot have an all-encompassing electoral reform Bill. Our only opportunity to deal with this injustice is to support the Second Reading of this Bill to allow it to make progress. The hon. Member for Montgomeryshire (Glyn Davies) has done an excellent job in bringing it forward.

For some months, I have been pressing the Government, on behalf of Labour International and in response to communications I have had with Harry Shindler, who has already been mentioned, on why they were not bringing forward the commitment they made in their manifesto. When I asked questions about that last October, I was referred to answers given in September to my hon. Friend the Member for Halifax (Holly Lynch), who had also been raising this issue from the Labour Benches. There is a bipartisan interest—in fact, a cross-Parliament, all-party interest—in these matters. All of us, even those who have only a few constituents who have gone to live in other countries, will have had communications about them from people in Spain, France, Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada or wherever.

There are international organisations within the political parties that represent our party members living abroad. I have the honour of being the honorary president of Labour International, and I want to convey a few words from an email from Lorraine Hardy. She was not registered to vote in Oxford or Westminster, but was a Labour party activist in Leeds before she went to live in Alicante with her husband many years ago. She says:

“‘Votes for Life’ will be even more important post Brexit, as we will have no opportunity to vote for a national representative in the UK nor in our country of residence as there will no longer be an option to vote for an MEP.”

Frankly, it is an outrage that a large number of British people whose future in Europe was affected by the referendum were not able to vote in that referendum because they had been living abroad in a European Union country for more than 15 years. That democratic outrage was not manufactured; it was a fact. This is an opportunity to make sure that we remedy that outrage and take a small step towards allowing those people to express their views at the next general election on whether their parliamentary representatives were right to damage their position in Europe. I think that many of them might have some things to say about that. I will not get into that, but the view that this is one-sided is completely and utterly wrong. None of us knows what the views are of people living in other countries who have not expressed positions and are not registered to vote. That idea is just made up and manufactured.

[Sir Oliver Heald (North East Hertfordshire) (Con)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mike Gapes]

I will take one intervention and then I will conclude, because I want this debate to end.

[Sir Oliver Heald]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the opinions of people in a country such as Canada or America could inform our political discourse? Those countries have service animal protection—something I am calling for—and people there could inform our debate, so that we can see how well it works there.

[Mike Gapes]

Given that we have Skype, WhatsApp, Facebook and all the other means of communication, those people already inform the debate in many ways.

There is a democratic principle here. We should recognise what the Labour International co-ordinating committee said in the motion that it passed, which it asked me to bring to the attention of the House:

“Many of the concerns about voting are related to fears and anger about the loss of rights normally associated with citizenship such as pensions, health care and the right to family life. This should be dealt with by the government allocating these issues to…a…minister and by establishing a forum for the concerns of overseas UK citizens.”

Reference has been made to France. There are Senators in the French system who represent overseas French territories, and there are Members of the Assemblée Nationale who represent French citizens living in other countries in Europe. We need to address that issue as part of the wider question of the reform of our second Chamber, but that is not for today. Today is to remedy problems, to right an injustice and to say to British people, wherever they are in the world: you have equal rights in our democracy.