Electoral Registration and Administration Bill Debate
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Sadiq Khan
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Electoral Registration and Administration Bill
Sadiq Khan Excerpts(11 years, 10 months ago)
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Mr Lansley
I was right to give way to my hon. Friend; he has made a good point. That votes should be of equal value is a fundamental principle that we should seek. We voted for that in legislation earlier in this Parliament, and it is now our task to see it through. This must be fair, equitable and democratic. It is wholly wrong that these measures should be overturned by an unprecedented device in the other House. I therefore ask Members across the House to disagree with the Lords. Having done that, we can go on to decide whether positively to settle the boundaries today by voting for the amendment in lieu or to let the proposal come back as planned on the basis of the boundary commissions’ reports later this year. In the interests of democracy and equality, I urge the House to disagree with the Lords in their amendment.
Mr Speaker
No, I do not; no, I could not; and no, it would not be right for the hon. Member for Lichfield (Michael Fabricant), who is a decent fellow, to seek to embroil me in partisan politics. That would be unworthy of him, and I feel sure that he would not knowingly behave in an unworthy way.
Sadiq Khan
May I begin by congratulating the Leader of the House on the sheer audacity of his speech? His criticism of the House of Lords is breathtaking. Only six months ago, he and his party were saying that—I paraphrase—the House of Lords was so perfect that it did not need any reform, yet here he is today, arguing that it is so inept and incompetent that it cannot be trusted with this issue, despite all the Lords’ experience and the impartiality that the Conservatives claim comes from being unelected. You really could not make it up.
Sadiq Khan
The hon. Gentleman will know that the Leader of the House is in charge of the timetabling of legislation in Parliament, and that it is for the Government to decide whether to proceed with a Bill. The Government chose to abandon that Bill, not the Opposition. The chairman of the Conservative party has now left the Chamber, but I have never known him to be a scholar of political and constitutional matters. We know why he was here. It is his job to ensure that the largest possible number of Conservative MPs are returned at the next general election. That is why he was here, taking an interest in this matter. It was not because he is interested in political and constitutional reform or because he is trying to reduce the cost of politics.
The House of Lords is a self-regulating Chamber. The Clerk’s advice on the admissibility or otherwise of an amendment is non-binding. By voting in favour of the amendment, the Lords have made clear their view that it is within the scope of the Bill. I am afraid it is hard luck if the Conservative part of this Government does not like that. When it comes to House of Lords reform during this Parliament, the ship has sailed.
Before us today are two groups of amendments made in the other place to the Electoral Registration and Administration Bill. I want to put on record our recognition of the work done by colleagues in the other place, from all parties and none, who spent four days debating, revising and improving the Bill.
Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)
Is not the relationship between the two Houses based on convention? Every so often, the House of Lords breaches a convention, one of which is that we should have primacy in our own affairs and should therefore decide how elections should be carried out and how boundaries should be determined. It was a breach of convention over the 1909 Budget that led to the Lords having their powers curbed before. This is a much more serious constitutional issue than the right hon. Gentleman is suggesting.
Sadiq Khan
The hon. Gentleman will be aware, because he sat through my superb speech during the debate on the House of Lords Reform Bill, that I made a point in that debate about the importance of function, of looking at the powers of the second Chamber and of convention. He will recall that, although the Second Reading was voted for by a huge majority, it was the Government who chose to drop the Bill from the legislative timetable. That was their decision, and it is the Government whom the hon. Gentleman should be lobbying.
Chris Bryant
Is it not a generally accepted principle that the House of Lords has a special relationship in that it is a guardian of the constitution in a way that those who are elected might sometimes not be?
Sadiq Khan
Absolutely. I have to say to those who have a grievance against conventions or against House of Lords reform that I am afraid the ship has sailed. They had their opportunity, but it passed them by.
The amendments have been made in addition to the improvements made here in the Commons during the progress of the Bill. We managed to secure a commitment that an annual canvass would still take place in 2014, that the option of a rolling opt-out was removed and that a civil penalty would be created for those who refused to respond when requested to register to vote. The Bill still left this House with serious problems, however, which is why we voted against it on Third Reading when it was last before us.
I would like to use this opportunity to place on record our appreciation of those who tabled the amendments in group 2: Lord Hart of Chilton, Lord Rennard, Lord Wigley and Lord Kerr of Kinlochard. This amendment received support from across the other place, and a Labour peer, a Liberal Democrat peer, a Plaid Cymru peer and a Cross Bencher tabled it. It was passed by a majority of 69. We welcome the amendments made to the Bill in the other place. We shall not, therefore, be supporting the motion before us today to disagree with the Lords in their amendments.
The effect of the amendment we are debating will be to postpone the review of parliamentary boundaries by one electoral cycle.
Mr Stewart Jackson (Peterborough) (Con)
Let us focus on the practical ramifications of the right hon. Gentleman’s vote today. Is he really prepared to tell his constituents in Tooting that it is appropriate, fair and equitable that, by the time of the general election after next, in May 2020, the enumeration data on which the electorates are based will be 20 years old? Some of the constituencies in my county of Cambridgeshire are the fastest growing in England, and they will have well over 100,000 electors by then, while some in Wales will have fewer than 40,000.
Sadiq Khan
It is a bit rich for a Conservative Member to lecture us on equality and fairness. I will come to those issues later in my speech.
The amendment will also similarly delay the reduction in the number of MPs by 50 to 600, as a result of which the next general election will take place on the current boundaries with the number of MPs at 650.
Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)
Does my right hon. Friend agree that this is not about having fairer constituencies—that can be accomplished by a periodic redistribution—nor about saving money? It is a highly political Bill aimed at the Labour party and at the Liberal Democrats who were naive to support it in the first place.
Sadiq Khan
The House has heard what my hon. Friend has said.
Should the amendment be supported, it would mean having more time to address the deficiencies in the current electoral register, particularly against the backdrop of the move towards individual electoral registration. The reason why that is so important is that the electoral register is the very basis on which boundaries are drawn and redrawn. It is the raw material from which the Boundary Commission constructs parliamentary constituencies. If that raw material is of poor quality, the subsequent output from the Boundary Commission will also be of questionable quality.
It is not necessary to take just my word for it or that of the House of Lords. The Electoral Reform Society said last year:
“A depleted register has major implications for political boundaries. A substantial fall off in registered voters, weighted towards urban areas, would require the Boundary Commission to reduce the number of inner-city seats. This will create thousands of ‘invisible’ citizens who will not be accounted for or considered in many key decisions that affect their lives, yet will still look to MPs to serve them as local constituents.”
Mark Tami (Alyn and Deeside) (Lab)
Does my right hon. Friend agree that we need only look at what happened in Northern Ireland to see some of the dramatic effects and the drop in the number of those registered?
Sadiq Khan
My hon. Friend is right to remind the House of the lessons we can learn from Northern Ireland. A recent report by the Electoral Commission recorded its concern about the record drop in the number of people on the register.
Chris Ruane
A few moments ago, my right hon. Friend said that thousands of people will be missing from the register. The true figure is that there are 6.5 million people missing from it—and these are often among the most marginalised people in the country. I believe that it is wrong to go ahead with the boundary review without having secured these missing millions back on the register.
Sadiq Khan
As ever, my hon. Friend makes a very good point.
The Lords amendment has two main principles, the first of which concerns the shift to individual electoral registration. We need time to allow for the switch to the new system to bed down.
Sadiq Khan
I need to make some progress but will give way later.
We need to be sure that the completeness and accuracy of the register has not been damaged by the move. As has been said, the Electoral Commission estimates that about 6.5 million eligible voters are currently missing from the register—a truly startling figure. That is enough for almost 90 parliamentary constituencies. The current situation in which we find ourselves is bad enough; it should be imperative on us to do all we can to rectify it.
Oliver Colvile (Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport) (Con)
Does the right hon. Gentleman recognise that if he is successful today, he will be re-creating rotten boroughs, which were got rid of in the 1830s?
Sadiq Khan
I think that the Electoral Commission, the Boundary Commission and electoral registration officers will be quite offended by the hon. Gentleman’s comments. I am sure that, on reflection, he will want to withdraw those remarks.
Mr Kevan Jones
Does my right hon. Friend agree that this Bill has nothing to do with fairness, saving money or the cost of democracy, but is actually about pure party political advantage for the Conservative party? Is it not straight out of the Karl Rove book of how to rig elections to the advantage of a sitting party?
Sadiq Khan
We have seen that the general election co-ordinator for the Conservative party has left the Chamber. The fact that he was in his place earlier speaks volumes about the motives of the Conservative part of the Government.
The move to individual electoral registration risks even greater numbers falling off the register.
Mr Nigel Dodds (Belfast North) (DUP)
The right hon. Gentleman will know that on the Northern Ireland Benches, we are concerned about the maximum representation for Northern Ireland in this House. As well as that, however, there is the issue of the impact, not mentioned so far, on elections to the Northern Ireland Assembly, because reductions in seats for Northern Ireland here also impact on the representation in that Assembly. Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that that is an important aspect, which has not so far been properly addressed?
Sadiq Khan
The right hon. Gentleman makes a very good point. Northern Ireland not only loses 17% of MPs to the Westminster Parliament, but the consequences for the Northern Ireland Assembly are very serious, too. Supporting this amendment would give us the time— another electoral cycle—to get it right, which is why right hon. and hon. Members of all parties should support it.
Harriett Baldwin
I am really struggling to follow the right hon. Gentleman’s argument. He is arguing that he would forfeit at least £70 million-worth of savings to the taxpayer by delaying this matter for five years, while also arguing that it is right to fight the 2015 general election on constituencies that have not been looked at since 2000—15 years out of date.
Sadiq Khan
I can reassure the hon. Lady that I am just warming up. If, during the course of my speech, I have not addressed the points she raises, she can intervene again later, once I am in full flow.
Mr Lansley
The right hon. Gentleman is trying to make a link between the electoral register and the Electoral Registration and Administration Bill and the boundaries review—but that is a completely false connection. The 2015 election will be based on a register in its current form, not on individual electoral registration, either way—whether done through the boundaries review as planned or whether done without it. The Bill does not impact on that.
Sadiq Khan
The Leader of the House must be a fantastic poker player, as he said that with a straight face. I will give him a mini-lecture on why he is so wrong, on this issue as well, in a few moments. If he is still not persuaded, he can intervene and explain it to me again.
I have explained why we have sought to amend the Bill—both in this Chamber and in the other place—to include further mechanisms for maximising voter registration, particularly for the harder-to-reach sections of our communities. The importance of doing all in our power to avoid a sharp drop-off in registration levels was brought home by the experience of Northern Ireland, recently re-emphasised in the Electoral Commission report.
We know that those most likely to fall off the register are not sprinkled uniformly across the country. Each constituency does not have its equal share of missing voters. Instead, it is generally accepted that the missing eligible voters are likely to be from black, Asian and ethnic minority communities, the more transient residents who live in rented accommodation such as students and young people, the elderly and the disabled and those in more deprived communities. The Leader of the House and his Back Benchers talked about equality and fairness, but the Electoral Commission has reported that
“under-registration is notably higher than average among 17-24 year olds (56% not registered), private sector tenants (49%) and black and minority ethnic British residents (31%)”.
It also found that
“the highest concentrations of under-registration are most likely to be found in metropolitan areas, smaller towns and cities with large student populations, and coastal areas with significant population turnover and high levels of social deprivation.”
These millions missing from the register would not count in the calculations for the setting of parliamentary boundaries. Any boundaries produced would be skewed and would be open to questions about their legitimacy. That should worry us all.
The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office (Miss Chloe Smith)
Does the right hon. Gentleman think those people were on the register in 2000?
Sadiq Khan
Let us follow the logic of the hon. Lady’s argument: there are 6 million people missing from the register at the moment, but if we cannot ensure that we get them back on the register and stop further falls, we should be happy with the status quo. She is wrong: we should not be happy with the status quo; we should try to get these 6 million people on to the register and stop the cliff fall.
We should also bear it in mind that we are losing seven constituencies in Scotland, three in Northern Ireland and 10 in Wales. Although the latest census confirms that our population has risen, there will be fewer Members representing constituencies which will, as a result of inaccuracy, have fewer people on the electoral roll. That raises real concerns about whether the interests of all four of our nations will be properly protected by the Westminster Parliament.
Pete Wishart
The right hon. Gentleman is right to point out that Scotland will lose seven constituencies if the boundary review goes ahead. We will be supporting the amendment, not because we feel that its proponents have a great case but because it would end the prospect of further Conservative government in Scotland. However, given the current boundaries, will the Labour party not have a start of up to 30 seats at the next general election?
Sadiq Khan
I am always happy to discuss voting systems. If the hon. Gentleman is arguing for proportional representation rather than first past the post, that is a debate that we can have—although not, I hasten to add, during the short time that remains to us today.
Toby Perkins
My right hon. Friend’s point about the number of people who are not on the electoral register is one of the most fundamental in the debate. If Government Members had given us some sense that they were taking the position seriously—if they had paid attention to some of the reasoned amendments tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant)—it would have been much easier for us to take them seriously today.
Sadiq Khan
The Government’s complacency on the subject of the missing 6.5 million is breathtaking, and we should see it in a wider context as well. At the same time as the size of the elected legislature is being reduced through the cutting of 50 MPs, the number of unelected peers is increasing by about 50 a year. Since 2010, 117 new peers have been created at a cost of £18 million a year. The amount that will be saved by the cutting of those 50 MPs is £13.6 million. We understand from No. 10 briefings—and the Leader of the House has confirmed today—that the creation of more peers will be announced shortly.
However, it is not just the cost that should worry us. The Government are becoming more powerful. We have more Government special advisers that at any time in our history. Moreover, these changes will reduce the size of the legislature while leaving the Executive untouched, thus making Governments more powerful at the expense of elected MPs representing their constituents. Accepting the Lords amendment would enable the reduction in the number of MPs to be delayed, which would have the added advantage of giving us time to consider the right balance between Executive and legislature.
Sadiq Khan
I will give way to the hon. Lady, who has been very patient and has risen several times.
Dr Wollaston
The right hon. Gentleman mentioned students. Does he think it reasonable that the MP who represents a student in, say, Bristol West represents more than 82,000 people, while just across the road in Bristol East the MP represents 13,000 fewer? It is not necessary to be a student of maths to realise that a vote there will carry far less weight. That cannot be right; it goes against all the basic Chartist principles that we would expect the right hon. Gentleman to support.
Sadiq Khan
I agree with the hon. Lady, as do the Electoral Reform Society and the Electoral Commission. She should join me in ensuring that those invisible citizens who should be on the register are put on the register. Let us not rush ahead with partisan boundary changes.
Sadiq Khan
I have been very generous, as the hon. Lady knows. I will make some progress, and if I have time after that, I will give way.
Labour legislated for individual electoral registration in 2009. The timetable and safeguards that we proposed at the time received cross-party support, but there was a general recognition that risks would be involved in the transition, which is why it was spread over a number of years. However, the Bill in its unamended form has watered down some of the safeguards that we introduced, thus failing to take account of risks that could mean the loss of millions of eligible voters from the register.
The complexities of the move are enormous. It involves the carry-over of existing registered voters for periods of the transition, the simultaneous piloting of data-matching schemes, a drive to show the public how to register, and changes in the way in which local authorities seek to register voters and how they should deal with a refusal to co-operate. As the Government themselves admit,
“Individual Electoral Registration (IER) is the biggest change to our system of electoral registration for almost a century and it is essential we get it right”.
Sadiq Khan
I want to make some progress first.
I agree wholeheartedly with that statement. “Getting it right” means that we must allow sufficient time to check that the transition does not result in millions of eligible voters dropping off the register, and rectifying that if it does occur.
Sadiq Khan
I want to make some progress. I have only a short time left.
The second principal purpose of the amendments is to deal with the uncertainty about the boundaries on which the next election will be fought. That uncertainty has left the process of redrawing boundaries on the basis of the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Act 2011 in a state of limbo. The current boundary review is wasting public resources, and risks creating a degree of confusion in the minds of voters about which constituencies they live in and who their MPs are.
I will not rehearse the statements made by the Deputy Prime Minister last August about the proposals for boundary changes, but, needless to say, he has made it clear that his party will not now support the new boundaries, on which both Houses are due to vote in the autumn. Rather than our having to wait until the autumn, however, the amendment gives us an opportunity to bring an end to all remaining elements of uncertainty about this issue, as well as improving the move to individual electoral registration. We do not want voters not to know which constituencies they live in, or to be confused about whether those constituencies will change at the next election.
Chris Ruane
Currently, 6.5 million people are missing from the register. According to the Electoral Commission, if the IER arrangements had gone ahead as originally proposed by the Government, the number of unregistered voters could have risen to 16 million—16 million of the poorest people. Is that the way to run a democracy?
Sadiq Khan
One would think that rather than heckling in a snide and partisan manner, Ministers would be expressing concern about the millions of invisible citizens who are missing from the register.
The next general election is nearer than the last. We want the public to have more certainty about the constituencies in which they live and about who will be the candidates in the election, but if the amendment is rejected, they will know neither of those things until 2014. If we are to reinforce the connections between MPs, candidates and their constituents, we need to know the facts sooner rather than later. We need an end to the impasse, and that is what voting for the amendment would provide. Ending the impasse would bring clarity and certainty. It would also halt the work of the Boundary Commission, which would save significant amounts of money that might otherwise be wasted on a review that will not be implemented.
Agreeing with the amendment would allow us to monitor, check and rectify any deficiencies that emerge from the transition to individual voter registration. In the event of a dramatic slump in the number of eligible voters on the register, it would allow time for that to be corrected without a severe undermining of the legitimacy of parliamentary boundaries redrawn on the basis of a depleted electoral register. It would allow the next general election to be fought on the current boundaries, and would allow us to engage and register the missing millions in the meantime. It would prevent the wasting of any further money by the Boundary Commission, and it would bring certainty. That is why we will not be supporting the motion to disagree with the Lords amendment, and I hope that Members in all parts of the House will join us.
John Thurso (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross) (LD)
I rise to ask the House to agree with their lordships in the amendment, and to disagree with the motion to disagree. Let me, however, begin on a note of agreement with my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House. It is important for us to deal with this matter, and to deal with it today. It is before us now, so let us deal with it.
I want to touch briefly on what I consider to be the three main questions that confront us: the admissibility of the amendment, the substantive issues surrounding it, and what I might euphemistically refer to as the wider issues for the coalition.
Let me start with the question of admissibility. The other place is self-regulating; it is completely different from this House in that regard. Because it is self-regulating, all matters of order reside with the House collectively, not with any individual. The Clerks give advice, and it is given on the understanding, and in the belief, that it will be accepted. That is the convention, but it is a convention, not a rule. The rule is that anything their lordships decide collectively is in order. As they have so decided, that settles the matter as far as order is concerned. If anyone wants to revisit the debate, however, may I suggest they look in particular at the remarks of two Cross Benchers, both of whom served this House well as Speaker? They made very plain their reasons for voting for this amendment.