UK Elections: Abuse and Intimidation

Simon Hart Excerpts

Wednesday 12th July 2017 Westminster Hall

[Simon Hart (Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered abuse and intimidation of candidates and the public in UK elections.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hanson. I should start by saying that since the election the Conservative Whips Office has been dealing with at least three credible threats to colleagues every week, including death threats, criminal damage, sexism, racism, homophobia, anti-Semitism and general thuggishness around and after the election. For all I know, other parties’ Whips Offices may be having similar experiences, and I look forward to hearing cross-party contributions on that score. It is for that reason, and a few others, that I thought it was appropriate to call this debate now.

When I first entered the House seven years ago, it never crossed my mind for one minute that I would end up making a speech like this. As far as I was concerned, elections were four or five weeks of robust banter followed by a shake of the hand and a pint in the pub, yet now it all seems so different, with swastikas on election boards and offensive slogans and language on posters.

[Paula Sherriff (Dewsbury) (Lab)]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for securing this important debate. I have been an MP for just over two years, and I cannot remember a single day that has gone by without me receiving some sort of abuse, whether that is death threats or a picture of me mocked up as a used sanitary towel and various other things. The last election was the most brutal I can imagine. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that we have to look at this issue with a non-partisan view and accept that in all our parties, as much as it hurts us, there are people who do not represent our values? For some to suggest that it is only one party doing it is wrong.

[Simon Hart]

I absolutely recognise that point, and I will come to it later in my speech. There will be individual contributions from Members who might have had particular experiences that defy that challenge, but I agree with the hon. Lady, and I am grateful to her for making that point so early in proceedings.

[Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way so early in his speech, and I congratulate him on securing the debate. While I understand why he has brought forward a debate with particular regard to general elections, does he not agree with me that the recent research done by BBC Radio 5 Live—it found that half of British female MPs have been threatened with physical abuse, nine out of 10 have been abused online and 80% have been verbally abused—shows that the issue is not restricted to election time?

[Simon Hart]

I thank my right hon. Friend for her timely contribution. One thing that has struck me—I know it has struck people in our Whips Office, too—is that when I started uncovering this topic, I found out about stuff that I simply did not think existed. I have been astonished by the quantity of evidence I have received from all sides. As she said, I had assumed that the issue might just be around election times, when we are perhaps a higher profile community, but it is not. Actually, it seems to be going on all the time, and a number of colleagues are suffering in silence. I hope that they do not have to suffer in silence.

I mentioned swastikas on election boards, offensive slogans and language on posters, but there have also been scratched cars, broken windows and posters of the bleeding heads of some of our political leaders on stakes at marches and demos. There has even been the occasional police officer or teacher joining the overall fray. That is not the rule, but it is occasionally the exception.

Retailers and hoteliers have felt that they cannot support a candidate publicly or make a donation to the party or candidate of their choice, because they are worried that they might be attacked on online review sites or, even worse, in person. There are elderly voters who will not put up a sign in their windows. There are volunteers who worry about handing out leaflets and having abuse hurled at them. There are colleagues whose sexuality or religion has resulted in them being spat at—not once, but regularly. We will hear more on that later in the debate. These people form the core of democracy and our election effort, yet they are being steadily put off getting involved in politics at a time when their contribution has never been more important.

Of course, the abuse is online, too, and we will probably spend quite a bit of the debate talking about that. For Government Members—I am sure it is similar for colleagues in other parties— #toryscum is a regular feature of our lives, and that is just the bit I can repeat in the Chamber. I chose my words carefully. I do not know how many colleagues have read the report from BCS—the Chartered Institute for IT—and Demos. It contained a survey showing that over a three-month period MPs received 188,000 abusive tweets. That is one in 20 tweets received by MPs.

[Tulip Siddiq (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)]

The hon. Gentleman will be aware that legislation already exists to protect those who are abused online, but that legislation is often ignored or not enforced. Will he join me in putting pressure on the Government to launch a review to see why that is the case?

[Simon Hart]

The hon. Lady is psychic, among many other things. What she said was going to be my next comment. I absolutely agree with her. There is another element with the existing laws, which is how few people know that they exist. Indeed, some law enforcement agencies do not know that they exist. The questions I will be putting to the Minister in a few minutes are partly intended to get a greater understanding of what legislation is there, where the gaps are and what we can do to fill them.

[Ms Nusrat Ghani (Wealden) (Con)]

My hon. Friend might be aware of the Home Affairs Committee’s report from last year that looked at the online abuse MPs have to suffer. There was an issue about the threshold we have to endure as Members of Parliament, which is different from that of members of the public. If abuse is persistent and falls over into real-life activities, surely social media companies have to be held accountable, too.

[Simon Hart]

I am sure that a number of colleagues would agree with that contribution; I certainly do. I will be coming to some proposals and thoughts on social media in just a moment.

I want to take a moment to describe the example of our former colleague Byron Davies, who until recently was the MP for Gower. During the election campaign he was subjected to a sustained attack on Twitter that contained absolutely unfounded allegations about a criminal investigation for electoral fraud. That was not an embellishment or exaggeration of a story; it was simply made up. Whether Members supported him or not, he was a colleague defending a majority of 27, and he had to do that against a constant drip-feed on social media of people simply making things up as they went along. Could it have contributed to the loss of his seat? I do not know. It was certainly blatant defamation—that much we do know. The Electoral Commission could not help, social media platforms would not help, and the police investigation, like all police investigations, will take time. It is grinding slowly on, but our former colleague Mr Davies is having to do all that himself, and he is bearing the cost. When that inquiry eventually reaches its conclusion, what remedy will he really have?

I could mention my hon. Friends the Members for South East Cornwall (Mrs Murray), for Ribble Valley (Mr Evans), for Plymouth, Moor View (Johnny Mercer), for Eddisbury (Antoinette Sandbach), and for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy), the hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Luciana Berger) and the many others who have suffered similar or vaguely intimidatory experiences during the election campaign. Almost more worrying than that is the number of colleagues I have spoken to in the past few days who do not even want to come to this Chamber to make a contribution, lest it compound the intimidation and abuse they have been receiving in recent weeks. I hope that we are all in a sense making our contributions not to ease our bruised egos, but on behalf of colleagues who have put up with a lot of this nonsense over quite a long time, and are looking, as the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq) said, for a lead from the Government.

Having said all that, I want to make the point that this debate is not about thin-skinned politicians having had a bit of a bruising time and feeling rather sorry for ourselves. Nor is it, as the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Paula Sherriff) mentioned, about left versus right or right versus left, or whatever it might be—the right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) made an interesting contribution on that particular score in her speech to the Fabian Society at the weekend. It is actually about families, staff, helpers and volunteers. For those of us who have teenage children who might follow us on Twitter and Facebook, it is about being able to say to them, “Don’t worry about the death threat; don’t worry about the abuse and the false accusations.” It is also for them that we speak.

[Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)]

I have had death threats for a number of years—I now have panic buttons and a restraining order against somebody. What is different about what happened at this election—in which I was subjected to anti-Semitic abuse, my staff were spat at and my boards and property were attacked—is that the abuse has been politically motivated. The elephant in the room is that it has been motivated by the language of some of our political leaders, when they accuse people of one political side of murder, and when they dehumanise them in the way that is happening at the moment. There is something more sinister to this. Yes, it affects left and right, but we have to deal with the issue of what is happening on our side of politics.

[Simon Hart]

One of my most important recommendations is about the role of political leadership and what political leaders need to do, rather than what they need to say.

I wanted to mention the example of our former colleague Charlotte Leslie in Bristol, whose parents became victims of abuse. Their entire oil heating supply was drained into their garden by somebody who had an objection to Charlotte’s position on fracking—a slightly ironic way of dealing with an environmental consideration, but none the less one that caused enormous distress, as did the scratching of “Tory scum” into her elderly parents’ car. That is not something that anybody in this House should condone. As my hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy) has just pointed out, when it comes to leadership, it is exactly such an example that should trigger a robust response from everybody who has the benefit of a high profile in politics.

It is about religion, sexuality, social background—it is about people who might have been to public school and sound a bit posh. It is about anybody who might have a political leaning one way or the other, and who might be thinking of becoming a local councillor, or of a career at some future stage in some branch of politics, not even necessarily as an MP, an Assembly Member or a Member of the Scottish Parliament—whatever it might be. We have to ask ourselves: why would they want to take that step when they see what Members of this House have to put up with and, worse still, what Members’ families, friends, relations, campaigners and donors also have to subject themselves to?

To the social media platforms, to the left, to the right, and to groups such as Momentum, which has been mentioned, rather than taking the lazy way out and saying that they are responsible for this, I say, “Help us. If you are on the left, help us. If you are on the right, help us. If you are a social media platform, help us. Help us identify what has triggered the increase in abuse, the smear campaigns, the intimidation, the harassment, the thuggish behaviour on and offline, and the general criticism of people simply because of an inability to match or contest their arguments.”

[Jeff Smith (Manchester, Withington) (Lab)]

The hon. Gentleman is quite right: this behaviour is reprehensible. He is right to identify social media. Does he also think that the traditional print media, particularly newspapers such as The Sun, has had a role in creating a climate in which it is okay to abuse politicians? Perhaps we need to look at the traditional print media as well.

[Simon Hart]

The hon. Gentleman makes an interesting point. Of course, print media is governed by a rather different and more visible level of regulation. There is a line between robust challenge, the cut and thrust of politics and the sort of stuff that we know we are letting ourselves in for when we take on this job—some papers would argue that they are on the right side of that line—which is a mile away from the stuff we are talking about. People being made to feel a little shamefaced or guilty because they have cocked up—if I can use that expression—their particular contribution to politics is one thing. If there is an example of a newspaper inciting racial hatred, anti-Semitism and that sort of thing, the regulators ought to be looking at that, without impinging on the free press.

[Ms Ghani]

My hon. Friend is making a strong case. I am a little concerned that this debate might blur the lines between criticism of the performance of a Member of Parliament or a stance they take and actual abuse. My concern is that the abuse particularly stops women entering politics. I will give the example of a candidate who stood in Ealing and was unfortunately not elected. Candidates have to declare their addresses when they stand for Parliament. She said that she started becoming nervous during the election campaign when opponents started standing outside her door, spitting in her face and following her. That is the threatening behaviour that she wants to highlight. This is not about criticism in the press.

[Simon Hart]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that contribution. Legislation of course already exists to deal with such incidents but, as we touched on before, it is not always easily accessible. It is not always entirely advantageous to be distracted by that during an election campaign.

[Angela Smith (Penistone and Stocksbridge) (Lab)]

The hon. Gentleman and I have been sparring partners on many occasions, but on this one I congratulate him on raising this issue. I agree that all it takes for evil to prosper is for good people to do nothing. On the other hand, it is very easy for us in this place to make the case and put the arguments down—we are protected by privilege and have the means of putting our views on the record—but there are councillors and ordinary people out there volunteering for political parties and charities up and down the country who are not protected in anything like the same way as we are in Parliament.

[Simon Hart]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for that contribution, which touches on the reason we are here: the degree of collateral impact from which we may fairly visibly suffer, and the knock-on effect on people who want to do good things for their community, charity or cause, but who are beginning to ask themselves whether it is worth the effort. What plans do the Government have to assess the extent of the issue, because I do not think that any of us here know what it is?

It almost seems that the age of reasoned argument in elections is under threat. All of us, in our own particular way, have experienced situations in which we mention immigration and are instantly labelled a racist, or we mention welfare and are instantly labelled as having some extraordinary dislike of the disabled, or we want to talk about complicated and sensitive issues around the economy, which is interpreted as simply wanting to starve the poor. Absurd, extreme, ridiculous, lazy and trite comments are assigned to Members who simply want to tackle a complicated social problem in the way we were sent here to do. The fact that there is no room for reasoned argument any more is a cause of this debate. It seems that it is not really about winning votes or arguments anymore.

The manner in which some of those campaigns are conducted—I am obviously trying to steer a careful, non-partisan line here—is about driving people out of politics altogether. It is not about votes and arguments; it is about the single-minded determination to do away with anybody who happens to hold a contrary view. That is a big difference between 2015 and 2017, and it is an unattractive development that will simply reduce the gene pool from which we recruit our politicians and volunteers. I cannot believe that any member of the public, however vociferous they might be online, actually thinks that reducing the number of people from which we choose our representatives is a good thing.

What is all this doing to society? How is it impacting on candidate recruitment? What is it doing to the retention of good people in the House? Have we reviewed the recommendations that the Law Commission made 18 months ago? I am hopeful that the Minister has views on that. Are we doing enough to bring the existing provisions to the knowledge of the enforcement agencies and, indeed, to candidates? I hope that when the Minister gets to his feet in a few minutes he will be able to give us some indication of the Government’s view on an independent assessment of the extent of the problem—what is going on out there, what is the cause and what is the remedy.

[John Mann (Bassetlaw) (Lab)]

Four years ago the all-party parliamentary group against anti-Semitism produced a detailed set of recommendations on an all-party basis about conduct in elections and asked every political leader to endorse it. To date, none has. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that if the political leaders themselves drew up a code of conduct and a way of addressing behaviour during elections, that would go a considerable way towards dealing with the most difficult period? If there is a transgression by a candidate or their supporters, they face the issue of votes at that time, and therefore there is a tendency to try to dampen it down or ignore it during elections. That is precisely why we produced that report.

[Simon Hart]

I could not have put it better myself. In fact, I would expand it to outside election times, too. As we have heard today, this problem is not limited to that four or five-week period every three or four years.

My second question to the Minister is about reviewing existing laws and seeing which work and which should work but are not being enforced. Where there are gaps, we should recommend how to fill them. Then, as the hon. Member for Bassetlaw (John Mann) said, we should ensure that there is cross-party support for legislation to achieve that aim.

We need to look at the responsibilities of the social media platforms, which, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller) and I discovered not long ago, all too often wring their hands and say, “It’s all too difficult.” Actually, it is not all too difficult. It is all too important that they now adopt the same responsible attitude to what they publish in their name— although they deny they are publishers—which is, on occasion, the sort of material that is completely unacceptable. Earlier I raised the example of Byron Davies and the Gower, who asked a social media platform—I think it was Twitter—to remove an outright lie that was possibly going to affect the outcome of the election. It refused and said that what was going on was within the guidelines. It cannot be with the guidelines simply to sit back and allow people to publish utter nonsense with the aim of artificially disrupting the outcome of an election. I suspect that everybody in this Chamber is of that view.

When the then Minister responded to a debate on online bullying last year, he said:

“There needs to be partnership, and I do not rule out regulation…We need to work with the companies, and we need clear guidelines on, and definitions of, online abuse. Even more importantly, we need very quick reactions, so that all of us as constituency MPs do not have to sit in surgeries with people who are clearly utterly distressed because of online material”.—[Official Report, 7 July 2016; Vol. 612, c. 1107.]

That applies just as much to electoral behaviour as to behaviour outside that time.

Finally—thank you for your patience, Mr Hanson—we need a political lead, as other colleagues have said. That means that the leaders of all parties and groups need to stand up and not just send out warmly worded tweets about bad behaviour or transmit mealy-mouthed messages of condemnation, but take a “not in my name” approach. All of the groups we have talked about overtly and by insinuation need to say, “Not in my name. Nobody who is a member of this party or this group should engage in online or offline abuse, either during an election or at any other time.” The leadership of those organisations have the opportunity today to stand up and say that they will deal with this robustly. If they do not, they are complicit in the problem. That is why there have been rumours and this whole thing has gathered momentum—with a small “m”—over the past few months and years.

Thirteen months ago our colleague Jo Cox paid the ultimate price for this kind of stuff. It shook the nation and sent a message that I hoped people would listen to, whether they are in a position of political leadership or just able to vote at elections. One year on, the problem seems every bit as bad as it was back then. Unless we have joined-up, co-operative leadership from the Government—I hope we will hear about that now—and from all the Opposition parties and the groups that support them, all of the extraordinary work that has been done in Jo Cox’s memory will have been wasted.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

--- Later in debate ---

[Simon Hart]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Cat Smith]

I cannot—I am really short of time.

I want to stress the responsibility for social media as well. As my hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq) said on “Daily Politics” yesterday, it is not right that Facebook can remove a picture of a woman breastfeeding within minutes, but it takes it two weeks to remove a fake social media profile.

I see you urging me to draw my remarks to a close, Mr Hanson.

[Simon Hart]

rose—

[Cat Smith]

I therefore urge the Minister to work on a cross-party basis. We would like to see a code of conduct by way of which we can work together to ensure that this abuse is not accepted.

[David Hanson (in the Chair)]

The hon. Member for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire (Simon Hart) will get a chance to wind up at the end for one minute.

[Simon Hart]

I’m already wound up! [Laughter.]

[David Hanson (in the Chair)]

I call Chris Skidmore.

--- Later in debate ---

[Simon Hart]

Thank you very much, Mr Hanson, for your role this afternoon. I also thank colleagues from both sides of the House for such useful contributions and the Government for taking such immediate action on this. We even got a letter from the Prime Minister before the Minister had got to his feet, so things are working well.

I apologise for going on too long at the beginning, particularly to my hon. Friend the Member for Gillingham and Rainham (Rehman Chishti), who was making a really moving speech. I hope he will have an opportunity to complete those comments, perhaps in the other Chamber. If I had had a chance to intervene on the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood (Cat Smith), I would have asked how many people the Labour party has already sanctioned for offences in this area. Perhaps she could write to me with that information.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered abuse and intimidation of candidates and the public in UK elections.

Advisory Committee on Business Appointments/Ministerial Code

Simon Hart Excerpts

Monday 20th March 2017 Commons Chamber

[Ben Gummer]

I share the hon. Lady’s concern; she raises something that we are going to have to rebuild together. Genuinely, if we conduct politics in a way that is disrespectful just so that we get headlines the next day, we will only continue to undermine the politics that we all seek to serve. That is why we need to understand this matter calmly and dispassionately and to make sure that we come to the right decision. On the concerns about the north, we are devolving power to Manchester precisely so that we can get the kind of representation the hon. Lady is calling for. That is why Conservatives are so keen to see that devolution happen. I hope she is happy with the result when it finally comes to pass in the next few months.

[Simon Hart (Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire) (Con)]

Will the Minister seize this moment to congratulate all those colleagues from both sides of the House who serve as reservists, or who practise as doctors or dentists, or in other important trades? Does not the fact that they do so illustrate how the Opposition are sometimes more concerned about the nature of the employment than the employment itself?

[Ben Gummer]

My neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for Central Suffolk and North Ipswich (Dr Poulter), is a practising doctor, and my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes (Maria Caulfield) is a practising nurse. They bring particular expertise and skills to our Chamber that would not otherwise be here. There are good reasons and arguments in favour of that, but there are also reasons and arguments to the contrary—they are balanced. We need to have that discussion and then come to a conclusion, because whatever decision we reach will have profound implications for the way in which our democracy functions.

Oral Answers to Questions

Simon Hart Excerpts

Wednesday 6th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Lady is completely wrong about the funding figures. As I have explained in great detail, they have gone from £1.5 billion to £1.7 billion to £2 billion. What this Government have put in place is funding under Bellwin of not 85% of what a council spends, but 100%, so what I said absolutely stands good.

[Simon Hart (Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire) (Con)]

Q10. The Prime Minister has always been a staunch supporter of the Welsh TV channel S4C, which was set up under the Thatcher Government. Will he use this opportunity to reinforce his support for the channel and the commitment that we made to safeguard its funding?

[The Prime Minister]

I am very happy to do that. S4C is a very important part of our broadcasting structure. It is very popular and well-liked in Wales. I want to ensure that we meet both the wording and the spirit of our manifesto promise to make sure that it continues to be a very strong channel.

Oral Answers to Questions

Simon Hart Excerpts

Wednesday 12th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Jones]

The Welsh Minister for Education and Skills has apologised for the failings of the Welsh Government, and that is a good start. However, they ought to examine the reforms we are implementing in England and give serious consideration to emulating them.

[Simon Hart (Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire) (Con)]

6. What discussions he has had with Ministers in the Welsh Government on waiting times for mental health support for combat veterans in Wales compared with those in England.

[The Secretary of State for Wales (Mr David Jones)]

It is essential that our veterans receive the best support and medical treatment, including mental health care, available to assist them to rebuild their lives.

[Simon Hart]

A military veteran living in Carmarthenshire has been told by NHS Wales that he has to wait up to eight months for urgent mental health treatment. The Veterans Association tells me that in parts of England the wait would be seven to 10 days. Will the Secretary of State sort out this problem on behalf of Welsh veterans?

Oral Answers to Questions

Simon Hart Excerpts

Wednesday 30th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

What the hon. Gentleman’s constituents will understand is that Labour’s price freeze is a price con. Prices would go up beforehand, prices would go up afterwards and as the Leader of the Opposition himself has admitted, Labour would not be able to keep its promise because it does not control gas prices. That is why everyone knows that it is a con.

[Simon Hart (Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire) (Con)]

Q7. My 20-year-old constituent Liam Burgess, from Llansteffan in Carmarthen, left school involuntarily at 16 and was told that the only choice ahead of him was in which prison he might end up. Four years later, he runs and owns one of Wales’s best chocolate brands, nomnom. Does the Prime Minister agree that the record number of new business start-ups and the positive economic signs are as much down to people such as Liam Burgess as they are to the excellent work of the Chancellor?

[The Prime Minister]

I certainly join my hon. Friend in paying tribute to his constituent for how he has turned his life around and is contributing to our economy. We see 400,000 more businesses up and running in our country—[Interruption.] Of course Labour Members do not want to hear about success stories. They do not care about enterprise; they do not care about small businesses. It is this enterprise and this small business that are turning our country around.

Oral Answers to Questions

Simon Hart Excerpts

Tuesday 9th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Miss Smith]

The hon. Gentleman will have been eagle-eyed and read my written ministerial statement last week announcing £4.2 million to deal with exactly that.

[Simon Hart (Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire) (Con)]

4. What assessment he has made of the work of the Commission on Devolution in Wales.

[The Deputy Prime Minister (Mr Nick Clegg)]

The Government are grateful to the commission for its hard work and for engaging widely across Wales. We have been carefully considering its recommendations on the financial powers of the Assembly, and we intend to respond shortly. The commission is now undertaking a thorough review of the broader devolution settlement for Wales, and I look forward to seeing its report next year.

[Simon Hart]

The Chief Secretary to the Treasury has said that funding improvements to the M4 are largely connected with the recommendations of the Silk commission. Given that Welsh businesses have already suffered two delays, will the Deputy Prime Minister ensure that they do not suffer a third as a result of delayed negotiations?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

As my hon. Friend knows, the Chancellor recently confirmed that we would respond to part 1 of the Silk commission’s report shortly. It is a complex area of work. There are 33 recommendations that touch on various complex areas of fiscal and taxation policy. We are endeavouring to respond as soon as possible, including on the issue of infrastructure investment that he raises.

Oral Answers to Questions

Simon Hart Excerpts

Wednesday 27th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Simon Hart (Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire) (Con)]

13. What plans his Department has to support Wales tourism week.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Wales (Stephen Crabb)]

Wales Office Ministers will undertake a range of visits to attractions across Wales to celebrate Wales tourism week and to raise awareness of the tourism industry’s vital importance to the Welsh economy.

[Simon Hart]

The Minister will know that catering and hospitality are vital parts of the Welsh tourism industry. With that in mind, will he welcome the creation of the Tenby hotel school and all the good it will bring to the whole of Wales? When he is next in the county, will he pay us a visit?

[Stephen Crabb]

I welcome that question from my hon. Friend. I will next be in the area this weekend—he and I have the pleasure and privilege of representing the most beautiful part of the United Kingdom. I very much welcome the new development he has announced; it will be a major boost to tourism not just in Pembrokeshire but across Wales.

Oral Answers to Questions

Simon Hart Excerpts

Tuesday 20th November 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I am grateful for a carbon-copy question of one asked earlier. I would suggest a little liaison—[Interruption.] The hon. Lady is waving a piece of paper provided to her by her Whips, but I suggest that she cross-checks against the questions asked by the right hon. and learned Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman) from her Front Bench. As I said, there were PCC elections, a mayoral election, local by-elections and Westminster parliamentary by-elections. There will be more Westminster parliamentary by-elections in a couple of weeks’ time. Is she really suggesting that when the clocks change we should stop elections? I do not think that she is, and that would not be a realistic way of proceeding.

[Simon Hart (Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire) (Con)]

T3. The Deputy Prime Minister will know that we have dozens of different deposits for elections, ranging from £500 to £5,000. In this post-PCC world, would now not be a good time to review that, as some of them have not been looked at for about 30 years?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

That is not something that we have considered, but I am more than happy to ask officials to provide information about whether there is something erratic or illogical about the levels of deposit in different electoral contests.

Oral Answers to Questions

Simon Hart Excerpts

Wednesday 17th October 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Shailesh Vara (North West Cambridgeshire) (Con)]

7. What discussions he has had with ministerial colleagues and others about foreign direct investment in Wales.

[Simon Hart (Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire) (Con)]

9. What discussions he has had with ministerial colleagues and others about foreign direct investment in Wales.

[The Secretary of State for Wales (Mr David Jones)]

I have regular discussions with ministerial colleagues about attracting foreign direct investment to Wales. I was delighted that my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister, during his visit to Turkey earlier this month, announced that a Turkish steel company is to open a new factory in Cardiff.

[Mr Jones]

UKTI has global reach, with its officials embedded in every British mission around the world, and I am delighted that it is seconding two officials to the Welsh Government.

[Simon Hart]

The Secretary of State will know that one reason foreign companies do not invest in west Wales is the over-burdensome planning restrictions. Will he use his influence in the Welsh Assembly to sweep away those obstacles?

[Mr Jones]

I am sure that my hon. Friend was pleased to hear that the Welsh Government have designated an enterprise zone in Milford Haven. Planning is indeed extremely important for the development of enterprise zones. It is being streamlined in England and I very much hope that the Welsh Government will follow suit.

Electoral Registration and Administration Bill

Simon Hart Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd May 2012 Commons Chamber

[Siobhain McDonagh]

I think that that intervention is the result of the hon. Gentleman’s embarrassment at some of his earlier contributions on people who should not be on the electoral register—that gets to the nub of it.

I accept that I am out of step and that individual registration is going to happen. Given that it is, what can we do to make sure that as many people as possible are on the register?

Our democracy depends on the fullest electoral register, and that is why I introduced a ten-minute rule Bill, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts) referred, and which suggests that anybody who receives a service from the state, gets a library ticket and a driving licence or claims a benefit should have to be on the register. It would be a social contract, whereby the state—the Government—had a connection with people, who were able to vote if they chose to do so. In that way, we would also bring about a connection that people understood—that there was not something called Government money, but an individual’s money, which they gave to the Government or the state to spend.

The police are not against a comprehensive electoral register, because it is one of the country’s most effective crime databases, so their job will be made much harder if the register becomes less complete. Banks and credit companies will find it harder to tackle fraud, and councils will also find it harder to investigate benefit fraud.

If millions drop off the register because individual registration is introduced too rapidly and with too few safeguards, there will be trouble ahead. The Government have made some concessions, but, as the Bill stands, the number of people on the electoral roll and electoral participation will decline.

[Simon Hart (Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire) (Con)]

The hon. Lady may be aware that people gave evidence to the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee on this topic, but not a single one of the organisations that she mentions raised the concerns that she mentions, so will she explain the basis of the evidence on which she makes her point?

[Siobhain McDonagh]

I am not sure that I understand the hon. Gentleman’s intervention, but the Association of Chief Police Officers and the police are concerned about the problems of under-registration because they use the electoral register, and many people are concerned about what is going to happen. If he looks throughout the world, and at America, where about one in six under-25-year-olds is not registered and one in six people who earn less than $20,000 a year is not registered, he will find plenty of evidence, quite apart from that provided by those who I am sure gave very good evidence to the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee.

I am worried about the position of those individually registered people who would still be allowed to vote by post or by proxy in 2015, but I am not concerned for my own electoral benefit, because in the London borough of Merton far more postal voters vote Tory than vote Labour. I am defending the opposition’s vote, rather than my own, but it is the right of people who are unwell, disabled, work away or find it easier to vote by post to have the chance to do so.

If anybody here went to sign a postal vote today, they would be asked to tick a box, and they would be able to choose to have a postal vote indefinitely—not until December 2015, but indefinitely. That is the contract which, at the moment, the Bill is going to break. According to ACPO and the Electoral Commission, no electoral result has ever been affected by over-registration, but if postal voters lose their vote en masse that will be a very different matter.

I am concerned that people will not register. The detail of the measure—the fact that we are asking every person in a household to fill in their own form and to put in their own NI number and date of birth—is, practically, an extraordinarily difficult process to go through. As I said when I intervened on the Minister, I am concerned that when the person from the council canvasses they will not be able to fill in the form there and then, even if the individual is able to provide their NI number and date of birth. If the canvasser could do so, that would cut out a lot of bureaucracy.

I hope that my party will allow me to sit on the Public Bill Committee, because I am interested in allowing people to participate and to become involved. If 20% of the electorate can fall off the register in Northern Ireland when individual registration is introduced, then in a constituency such as mine, where a third of voters move every year and there are highly disadvantaged and disfranchised groups, the number who may fall off the register is absolutely huge, and that is in no party’s interest.