Oral Answers to Questions

Sheila Gilmore Excerpts

Tuesday 8th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

As the hon. Gentleman will know, the legislation on the statute book will lead to a further review in the next Parliament, ahead of the 2020 general election, and it sets out the basis on which those decisions are made. There is an interesting discussion, not least in the academic survey published recently— just last week, I think—about precisely how such a review will be conducted in future so that communities are not split up and the integrity of wards is maintained.

[Sheila Gilmore (Edinburgh East) (Lab)]

Will the Deputy Prime Minister commit to look again at further boundary revisions? If, at a time when individual voter registration is being introduced, it turns out—it might or might not—that there has been a substantial fall in registration, will he commit not to press ahead immediately with further revisions?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

As the hon. Lady knows, we are confident that we are doing everything we can—we are taking a belt-and-braces approach—to ensure that registration levels do not fall. We have learned from the experience of Northern Ireland and have worked on a consensual, cross-party basis to get this right, because all parties accept that we need to move to individual voter registration. I do not anticipate that the situation she predicts will arise.