Elections Bill (First sitting)

Tom Randall Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 15th September 2021 Public Bill Committees

[Nick Smith]

Q Thank you for that. My second question is this. Mr Mawrey, one of our earlier witnesses, said something like, “Voter ID at polling stations isn’t necessary because there is very little personation.” What is the incidence of personation at polling stations, do you know?

Assistant Chief Constable Cann: I think it is right to say that we have relatively small numbers of those offences coming through to us so, in that sense, it is not a major issue in terms of workload or demand for policing at election time. I imagine that in any case, part of the motivation behind the proposal for voter ID is an element of deterrence. In that regard, if it were to be brought in, we would see some value in that and would broadly welcome that proposal, notwithstanding the fact that, as I say, we do not tend to prosecute or get asked to investigate a significant number of personation allegations.

[Tom Randall (Gedling) (Con)]

Q Councillor Golds, you gave some examples earlier today about behaviour in polling stations. Had there been a voter ID regime in place in Tower Hamlets previously, do you think the behaviour that you saw in polling stations might have been different?

Councillor Golds: I certainly think it would have improved. We had a byelection as recently as 12 October, where in one polling station—the Sundial Centre in Shipton Street—the police were called on two occasions to disperse unruly crowds outside the polling station intimidating voters. That is one polling station in one byelection held this summer. I have to say that Assistant Chief Constable Cann’s description of the police activity is positively Panglossian in its optimism; I just wonder whether any of this has percolated through to the Metropolitan police.

[Tom Randall]

Q In Mawrey’s judgment, he described —possibly unkindly—the behaviour of polling staff and the police as taking the three wise monkeys as their role models. Do you feel that after the Rahman trial, the police picked up the issues that arose from it?

Councillor Golds: Frankly, no. There was an inquiry organised by the police called Operation Lynemouth, which said in one of its closing descriptions that

“The policing of the election and the subsequent investigation was deficient in too many areas. There was a lack of corporate responsibility, a lack of training and insufficient resources for the SET investigation. In essence, the MPS did not consider the election and investigation a priority.”

Of course, at the time when they were supposed to be dealing with Tower Hamlets, they were also involved in the infamous Operation Midland, which was another subject. Indeed, one or two officers involved in the Tower Hamlets fiasco drifted through Operation Midland, much to my lack of surprise.

One thing about the police that is truly concerning me, as recent as this year, is the need to defend the secrecy of the ballot. The fundamental Act dealing with balloting in this country is the Ballot Act 1872, which says that you vote in secret. That Act has never been repealed. I have before me an email—a complaint—from a resident. They say that upon their visit to their polling station,

“I noticed 2 separate occasions where 2 people were in the polling booths together with the male member ‘influencing’ the female member’s vote.”

That is one person at midday at the polling station where, incidentally, I vote.

This has travelled to the police and is now in the hands of one Trevor Normoyle, who is the detective inspector of the special inquiry team and, to my horror, informed us that he will be in charge of Tower Hamlets next year. He seems to be completely unaware of the requirement for secrecy of the ballot, because he writes to this resident to say, “In relation to the concerns you have raised, inquiries were carried out”—incidentally, the elector reported this to the presiding officer—“and cannot substantiate any allegation that any influence was being exerted within the polling station, nor are any other electoral laws being broken. The reported matter is now closed”. So nothing will be done, but here we had two people effectively instructing others how to vote inside a polling station in London in 2021, which the police are ignoring—

[The Chair]

Order. Can we move on? We are very short of time.

Councillor Golds: Okay, but it is an example of the police’s utter failure to look at electoral malpractice in London.