Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Natascha Engel Excerpts

Monday 18th October 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Brady]

I think the amendment as it stands would do that. I am entirely open to the right hon. Gentleman’s point and I know that my hon. Friend the Minister, in working hard to accommodate these reasonable concerns, could take steps to deal with that point, too, if he wanted to at a later stage of the Bill. The crucial point—the point of principle—is that it is even more important in a referendum on our constitution than in the franchise for a general election that we should have a rational franchise that we can all defend and explain to citizens of this country and that we should celebrate the importance of the right to vote. We should understand that the right to vote in a British election is a privilege that has been hard fought for over generations and that is fundamental to what it is to be a British citizen. It is time that we limited that right to those who are British citizens.

[Natascha Engel (North East Derbyshire) (Lab)]

I rise to speak to amendment 332, which is in my name. The amendment would have the effect of lowering the voting age for the referendum to make sure that all people who are aged 16 on the day of the referendum can have their say on something that will affect them when they are 18 and eligible to vote in the general election. All those who are aged 16 on the day of the referendum, whenever it is, will be 18 or over by the time we get to the general election, if it is in May 2015, so the provisions will absolutely affect them.

I have a slight interest to declare. I speak as a former trustee of the UK Youth Parliament—

[The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr Jeremy Browne)]

And as a former 16-year-old.

[Natascha Engel]

I was coming to that; that was my joke. [Interruption.] All right, I will say it again in a moment. I am a former trustee of the UK Youth Parliament, honorary president of the British Youth Council, a former chair of the all-party group on youth affairs and—are hon. Members ready?—I speak as a former 16-year-old. [Laughter.] I thank hon. Members for laughing at that. I could not vote when I was 16, and although it was almost 30 years ago I remember how deeply frustrating it was not to be able to take part in something as important as voting was to me then.

[Mr Mark Field]

Surely the logic of the hon. Lady’s position is to say that everyone who was born before 6 May 1997 should be entitled to vote in the referendum, if that is to be relevant on the day of the now-fixed election in May 2015. Why does she not have that date in mind? Is it the absurdity of people being entitled to vote in the referendum at age 14 years and eight months that dissuades her from going down that route?

[Natascha Engel]

I think that falls outside the scope of the amendment. It is important to establish that we are arguing that the voting age should not be raised. Referendums are very rare in this country and this referendum is specifically about voting reform and changing the system under which we vote in parliamentary elections, which are open to participation by anyone who is 18 or over on the day of the election in question. My argument is that we should not raise that voting age above the age of 18. Someone whose 18th birthday happens to fall a day after the election might be knocking on 23 before they get a vote, especially if we set in stone the five-year voting period. The almost unique opportunity presented by the referendum will affect people who will be 16 and over on the day of the referendum and it is very important for them to be able to participate in the referendum because it will affect the voting system in which they will be asked to vote on the day of the general election in 2015. We should therefore allow them to participate, as we have already told them that they will be allowed to participate in the election at the age of 18. This is an almost unique opportunity to lower the voting age to 16.

[Mr Mark Williams (Ceredigion) (LD)]

The Liberal Democrats share the hon. Lady’s passion for reducing the voting age, but does not her amendment risk looking dangerously isolated against the mission that she wants and we want: a much broader package of votes for everyone at 16? It looks very isolated and perhaps this is not the Bill in which to pursue this issue.

[Natascha Engel]

I would love the opportunity to table an amendment for, and to debate something much broader on, lowering the voting age to 16. This amendment gives us an opportunity to demonstrate that when 16-year-olds take part in an election, democracy does not crumble and the sky does not cave in; indeed, it might strengthen democracy. This is a good opportunity to demonstrate to the doubters that giving young people the vote at 16 is a good thing to do.

[Mr MacNeil]

Does the hon. Lady agree that if we can send 16-year-olds into our armed services and demand that they pay tax, they should be allowed to vote at 16? The Scottish National party and, I recall, the Liberal Democrats have been very strong advocates of having the franchise at 16; we are still of that mind and I hope that in the Lobby the Liberal Democrats will be, too. Is she optimistic about that?

[Natascha Engel]

I have it on good authority that I should be very pessimistic about the Liberal Democrats joining us in the Aye Lobby tonight, but they would be very welcome to do so.

[Stephen Williams (Bristol West) (LD)]

I think that the hon. Lady was one of the sponsors of my Bill in the previous Parliament to reduce the voting age to 16, which was defeated by just eight votes. I suspect that there is now a majority in the House to achieve that historic change, but we cannot do that in this Bill. A much wider debate is needed to tease out all the issues. Does she agree that another private Member’s Bill is the way forward?

[Natascha Engel]

Oh no! I am a great fan of private Members’ Bills, and I do not want to do them down, but this Bill, rather than just a private Member’s Bill, is a really good opportunity to change the law.

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

It is obvious that there is a certain degree of wriggling on the Liberal Democrat Benches as they try to find a reason not to support votes at 16 in this context, despite having been very strong advocates of it in another context. I urge my hon. Friend to push the amendment to a Division, because we have not had a vote on this matter since the new Parliament was convened and it is important to test the opinion of the House.

[Natascha Engel]

I shall indeed, and I thank my hon. Friend for urging me to push the amendment to a vote. I shall seek to catch your eye later, Mr Gale, to divide the Committee.

[Mr Charles Walker]

The hon. Lady will know that the Liberal Democrat Benches are full of independent-minded people and I am sure that some of them will demonstrate an independence of mind and support her in the Division Lobby.

[Natascha Engel]

I hope so too, and I hope to see the hon. Gentleman there as well. I would be delighted if as many people as possible joined us in the Aye Lobby—I am just getting used to being on the wrong side.

The United Nations convention on the rights of the child, to which the UK is a signatory, is very straightforward: it grants every child and young person the right to express their views “freely” and to have those views “given due weight” in “all matters affecting” them. That goes to the crux of the matter. Our 16-year-olds will be excluded by what we do here tonight unless the amendment is accepted. Their voices will not be given due weight regarding something that will fundamentally affect their democratic rights two years after the referendum. Anybody who is aged 16 on the day of the referendum will be 18 at the general election and eligible to vote. We need to be careful about contravening people’s human rights.

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[The Temporary Chair (Mr Roger Gale)]

Order. I should like to curtail interventions to intervention length.

[Natascha Engel]

But they are so worth it!

[Mr Harper]

If the Government get their way, the referendum will take place on 5 May 2011, so based on the logic of her case surely the hon. Lady should be arguing that people who are 14 next year, who will be entitled to vote at the general election on 7 May 2015, should also be enfranchised. That is the logical conclusion of her argument, so why is that not the amendment she has tabled?

[Natascha Engel]

I tabled the amendment because the campaign to lower the voting age to 16 is well established. The argument we are making is that 16-year-olds are perfectly able to take responsibility and to have a well thought-out and well argued opinion. We need to focus on that. Personally, I would have no problem with allowing 14-year-olds to have a say, but that is not what we are arguing for today, although I know plenty of 14-year-olds who are very capable of making responsible decisions. The reason we have a limit at 16 is the same as the reason for having a limit at 18—it is arbitrary. I argue that we need to lower the age, because people can take responsibility. As has been said, 16-year-olds are allowed to go to war, and with the consent of their parents they are allowed to get married. They can do any number of things. Although the limit may be arbitrary, the campaign is well established and we need to draw the line somewhere. At present, it is being drawn at 18, but I would like it to be 16.

[Mark Durkan]

Perhaps I can help my hon. Friend. Currently, registration details are taken from people who are 16 and 17. They are not eligible to vote, but they are eligible to register, subject of course to having achieved that age. The registration details of many people aged 16 and 17 are already available.

[Natascha Engel]

That is absolutely spot-on. I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention.

[Mr Harper]

I shall limit myself to this point, or we shall be in danger of not moving on, but I want to nail it because it is driving me round the bend. The hon. Lady correctly said that 16-year-olds could not join the armed forces without their parents’ permission, but she also knows that we do not deploy to conflict people aged under 18. If she makes such arguments, she should at least make sure that they are factually accurate.

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[Natascha Engel]

I should have been more particular about that point, and I apologise. My argument was that 16-year-olds are allowed to do any number of things—

[Mr MacNeil]

Such as paying tax.

[Natascha Engel]

Indeed. At 16, people are allowed to do many things over which they have no say. The argument I am trying to make is that, as we are proposing a fundamental change in the voting system for a parliamentary election, at the referendum—and referendums are rare—that will happen only a few years before the general election at which we propose to change the voting system, it is only right that the people who will be affected by it should have a say in whether they want that system changed.

[Graham Jones (Hyndburn) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that as well as the principled reasons why the age for taxation and for voter registration is 16, there are also some practical reasons? Sixteen is not just an arbitrary number; it is quite sensible and there is a fundamental principle behind it.

[Natascha Engel]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

The hon. Lady has been generous in giving way.

[Sammy Wilson]

She probably will, because I am a bit confused about the argument for the amendment. It started off as an argument that, as people would be using the system to vote at the next election, they should have some say about it. As has been pointed out, that ought to mean reducing the age to 14, because 14-year-olds will be using the system. Then the argument changed and we heard that we had to choose an arbitrary age, and it was 16. What is the central point that the hon. Lady is making? Is it that people should have a say about the system that will be used when they first have a vote at a general election? If that is the case, why is the age not 14? Why not choose any number at all and put it in the amendment?

[Natascha Engel]

I shall stop taking interventions now.

The argument, which I shall now try to make without taking too many interventions, is that a limit at 18, 16, 14 or 12 is quite random. Individuals mature at different times—I shall not make personal assumptions—so when we draw the line under any voting age, there will be some people who are more mature and others who are less mature, but there are lots of reasons why 16, and not 18, is a good age at which to draw the line. Although I should love to see votes at 16 for every election—parliamentary, local government and referendums—the Bill offers us our only real opportunity to lower the voting age in a referendum, because referendums come up very rarely. The change could be quite easily made; as my hon. Friend the Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan) has pointed out, 16-year-olds are already on the electoral register, so the process will not be difficult for local authorities. Sixteen is a good age at which to draw the line, because it has to be drawn somewhere. All those 16-year-olds will be 18 by the time of the general election, at which point the new voting system will be in place—or not. All I am arguing is that those people need to have a say.

[Mark Tami (Alyn and Deeside) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is right to say that the proposal offers a good way to test the water for 16-year-olds. If Members on the Government Benches are right and no 16-year-olds are interested and none of them takes part, we can learn from that, perhaps by engaging further with them. The proposal offers a good test-bed for us to engage with younger people, which everyone in the House supports.

[Natascha Engel]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point. Since 2002, and the glorious days of the Labour Government, all secondary schools have given citizenship education. All young people who will be 16 by the time of the referendum will have had some citizenship education, and they will have some knowledge and understanding of participation in the voting process. We talk about engagement, but if we are really serious about engaging young people in democracy we need to allow them to participate.

[Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

To expand on that point, a lot of young people’s first contact with politics on a serious level comes when they start their A-levels and do politics A-level. There is a huge amount of interest among the A-level politics groups in my constituency. When an election comes, and they are not allowed to vote, it does seem that we are excluding a group of people who have become engaged with the subject for the first time. For reasons that have been pointed out by my hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire (Natascha Engel) and the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr MacNeil), the age of 16 is established as the point at which many of us move into adulthood in a whole raft of ways. A 16-year-old can get married, have sex legally, start paying tax and join the armed forces.

[Natascha Engel]

I thank my hon. Friend and neighbour for that intervention; he is absolutely right. By a happy coincidence of timing, on Friday week—on 29 October—the UK Youth Parliament will, for the second time, have its annual sitting on these Benches. Last year, when the UK Youth Parliament so controversially sat on these Benches, it debated four subjects and had a vote at the end to decide which subject was the most important to it. The subject that came out on top by a long way was lowering the voting age to 16. Those are 11 to 18-year-olds who are democratically elected through their youth services, and who have a lot to say on the issue. A lot of us who were here and who heard them speak were very impressed, but the issue has not gone anywhere.

The Youth Parliament is about to return, and it would speak volumes if we said to them, “We heard what you said last time round. We know that this matters to you, and we have today voted to ensure that 16-year-olds can take part in this unique referendum. We will give people the vote at 16, at least partially, on this one-off occasion.” The 16-year-olds can then demonstrate themselves that the move strengthens democracy, rather than undermines it.

To end on a positive note, I really hope that we all vote for the amendment, especially those parties which had votes at 16 written into their manifesto and campaigned on the issue at the general election. I hope that those people, at least, will find their way into the Aye Lobby. I hope that they understand how important the issue is to those who are 16 on the day of the referendum, and who really care about the issue and about having their voices heard on that day, so that when they take part in the general election at the age of 18, they will have voted for the system in which they are taking part.

Ms Primarolo, I hope that you understand how important the issue is. We are in a new Parliament, and we have lots of Members who are much closer to the age of 16 than Members were in the previous Parliament. It would be great to test the mood of the Committee, just to see where people stand on the issue, because it really matters. This is the last act of discrimination that we really need to get rid of. We need to widen the franchise, and this is a fantastic opportunity to do so.

[Mr Shepherd]

This is an important group of amendments, and I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale West (Mr Brady) and those who signed up to them. It seems extraordinary to most people when one says, “But you don’t have to be a British citizen to vote in a national election in Britain.” It is, by and large, a remarkable thing. It may be a post-imperial legacy, or there may be other reasons, but that is what this issue is about.

We are holding this debate on the Floor of the House of Commons because it is a constitutional debate, and it therefore affects our rules and our sense of self-governance. I am particularly grateful for the amendments because in his remarks my hon. Friend mentioned the various criteria that enable people to vote in very important elections in this country.

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[Mr Harper]

I would say two things to my hon. Friend. First, money is provided to local authorities as part of their normal funding, and it is a matter for the local authority to decide on priorities. In his own case, if he is dissatisfied with how the electoral registration officer is conducting himself, I suggest that he speaks to the chief executive of his local authority and makes those strong representations.

Secondly, given our proposals to move to individual voter registration in 2014, we will be improving the registration system and making it much more difficult for people who are not entitled to be on the register to be on it. I have written to local authority chief executives to ask them to take part in data-matching pilots in which we can, first, identify those who are more likely not to be on the register who should be, enabling authorities to target their resources on them and, secondly, target voters who should not be on the electoral register, to enable authorities to ensure that the register is not just complete but accurate. So there are two avenues there that my hon. Friend can pursue.

I want to address the argument made by the hon. Member for North East Derbyshire (Natascha Engel), whose amendment 332 would extend the franchise to 16 and 17-year-olds. As I said, our approach has been that the people voting in the referendum should be those entitled to vote in a Westminster election. She, perfectly reasonably, is continuing her long-running campaign, supported by a number of hon. Members, to lower the voting age. As I said to my hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale West, I do not think that experimenting with the franchise in this Bill is the right way to go.

Many hon. Members will know my views on lowering the voting age, but—on a note of agreement—my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol West (Stephen Williams) is right. He is a firm advocate of lowering the voting age in elections in general, but he acknowledges that trying to do that in this Bill, for one specific referendum, is not the right thing to do.

[Natascha Engel]

I do not want to sound rude, but the Minister’s general views on lowering the age are neither here nor there. My amendment concerns this one-off referendum. It seeks to change how the voting system will work at the next general election, when those who are 16 at the time of the referendum will be 18. This is a completely different situation from normal elections.

[Mr Harper]

As I said in my intervention on the hon. Lady, she has not thought through her argument. She has tried to make two different arguments for her amendment, and they do not really make sense. Her argument that people who will be voting at the next general election, on 7 May 2015, should have a say in the referendum would imply logically that people who are 14 next year—four years before the election—should be able to vote in the referendum too. Even she, with her campaign to lower the voting age to 16, has not proposed that, because she knows perfectly well that a proposal to allow 14-year-olds to vote would get laughed out of court, even by those who propose lowering the voting age to 16.

The hon. Lady’s argument does not stack up or make any sense. If we take her argument to its logical conclusion—picking up on the point made about a new voting system kicking in in perpetuity—we should enfranchise everybody alive today, because at some point in the future they will be voting in a general election based on the voting system bought in by the referendum next year. That simply does not make any sense. So we have adopted the usual position in this country, which is that to be able to vote in an election, one must be an adult, which in our system means being 18.

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[Natascha Engel]

I want briefly to correct the Minister on that point. That was not the argument I was making; the only argument I was making was that 16-year-olds on the day of the referendum will be 18 on the day of the election.

[Mr Harper]

But my point is that 14-year-olds on the day of the referendum will be 18 on the date of the next general election, so that argument simply does not make sense.

Also, the hon. Lady may not like this—I am happy about it, although she might not be—but I should point out that under the coalition Government’s proposals, referendums are likely to be more frequent rather than less, as we have proposed bringing them forward under our referendum lock. They might be referendums on European matters, local referendums or mayoral referendums. Therefore, those young people who are not yet 18 who miss out on voting in the referendum next year will find that there will be many referendums in the future on which they can vote, once they are 18.

My final point to the hon. Lady is that this issue is not a small one, because if all 16-year-olds on the date of the referendum were able to vote, that would mean electoral registration officers having to register those who are 15, which is a significant change to the way that they collect data. The hon. Lady said that the change would not cause much trouble, but it would actually cause a significant amount of trouble. I therefore hope that she will not press her amendment 332 to a vote, but if she does, I urge hon. Members on both sides of the Committee—and particularly those on the Government side—to vote against it. I also hope that those who are otherwise in favour of lowering the voting age can be happy that this is not the place to do so, because as my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol West said, he can bring forward a private Member’s Bill on the issue, which would be the place to have that debate. I urge hon. Members not to press their amendments to a vote.

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[The Second Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means (Dawn Primarolo)]

Natascha Engel, do you wish to respond to the debate?

[Natascha Engel]

I will be seeking your permission to press my amendment 332 to a vote when the time comes, Ms Primarolo. It is a shame that the Minister has focused on a technicality, rather than looking at the important point behind the principle of extending the franchise to 16-year-olds. That is a shame; therefore, I shall seek to divide the Committee on my amendment.