[Relevant documents: Fifth Report of the Joint Committee on Human Rights, Legislative Scrutiny: Elections Bill, Session 2021-22, HC 233;Seventh Special Report of the Joint Committee on Human Rights, Legislative Scrutiny: Elections Bill: Government Response to the Committee’s Fifth Report, Session 2021-22, HC 911.Fifth Report of the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee, The Elections Bill, HC 597,and the Government’s response, HC1133; Oral evidence taken before the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee on 7 September 2021 and 14 September 2021 on the Elections Bill, HC 597; Oral evidence taken before the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee on 1 March 2022 on the work of the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, HC 1066; andCorrespondencebetween the Chair of the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee and the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities of 12 April 2022 and 25 April 2022.]
The Bill has returned to the Commons after wide-ranging and often intense debate in the other place. I am grateful to my colleagues there, Lord True, Baroness Scott and Earl Howe, for their efforts in ensuring that the Bill was able to benefit from that scrutiny. The Bill delivers on key manifesto commitments to protect our democracy as well as a range of recommendations from consultations, parliamentarians, Select Committees, international observers and electoral stakeholders.
I will come to the more positive highlights of the Bill’s passage shortly, but I must, with regret, begin with the areas where the Government cannot agree with the changes made. We disagree with Lords amendment 86, tabled by Lord Willetts, Lord Woolley, Baroness Lister of Burtersett and the Lord Bishop of Coventry, which suggests a long list of new documents that could be used as a form of identification at polling stations, including non-photographic documents such as a bank statement, a council tax letter, a P45 or P60 form. The Government have been clear that the most straightforward and secure way of confirming someone’s identity is photographic identification. The Electoral Commission found this to be the best approach to pursue in the pilots undertaken by the Government in 2018 and 2019.
Does the Minister share the concern raised by Mencap that the introduction of voter ID could result in another barrier to people with a learning disability participating in elections?
The answer is no, we do not share that concern. We have conducted extensive pilots and we recognise that many people are concerned about the Bill, which is why we carried out extensive engagement explaining why there need not be any concerns about additional barriers on voter ID.
We also have the experience of Northern Ireland, where photographic identification has been required since 2003, following its introduction by the last Labour Government after the non-photographic model that had been in place since 1985 was deemed insufficient to stamp out fraud. A free voter card will be available for voters without suitable photographic identification and we are working closely with the Electoral Commission, which will deliver a clear and comprehensive communication campaign on the new requirements. While the list of acceptable identifications in the Bill is wide-ranging, I wish to reassure this House that, should further forms of photo identification become available and be sufficiently secure, the powers in the Bill are such that additional identification can be added or removed as necessary without the need for further primary legislation. For these reasons, the Government cannot support this amendment.
I ask the House to disagree with Lords amendments 22 and 23, which seek to remove clauses 14 and 15 from the Bill. The purpose of clause 14 is to make provision for the introduction of a strategy and policy statement setting out guidance to which the Electoral Commission must have regard in the discharge of its functions. Some parliamentarians have claimed that this duty to have regard to the strategy and policy statement will weaken the commission’s operational independence, which is not correct. This duty will not allow the Government to direct the commission’s decision making, nor will it undermine the commission’s other statutory duties or displace the commission’s need to carry out those other duties. Clause 15 simply expands the role of the Speaker’s Committee on the Electoral Commission and empowers it to examine the commission’s performance of its duty to have regard to the strategy and policy statement.
It is a pleasure to speak for the Opposition in these proceedings. We have said from the outset that this is a bad Bill. Rather than opening up our democracy, it closes it down and puts up barriers to participation, apart from for foreign donors, who will now have an unfettered ability to flood our democracy with donations from the comfort of an offshore tax haven.
We will get to some of the criticisms shortly, but I want to recognise, as the Minister did, some of the progress that has clearly been made in the other place. I pay tribute to my colleagues and teammates Baroness Hayman and Lord Khan for their work in this area. First, I come to Lords amendments 15 to 19, on assistance with voting for persons with disabilities. We raised this issue in Committee and during consideration of the remaining stages. I did not then and do not now believe it was the Government’s intention to make voting harder for disabled people, particularly those who are blind or partially sighted. But those who have been concerned about this matter have campaigned well and made their case strongly, and I am glad that it is has been recognised in the Bill. Like plenty of right hon. and hon. Members, I will be keeping an interest in this area, to make sure that returning officers continue to make voting accessible for everybody, regardless of disability, at every polling station.
Lords amendment 50 would remove clause 27, deleting the provision on joint campaigning that meant that spending by one entity in a joint campaign had to be counted by all entities. That never made sense to us and we are glad to see it dispensed with entirely. In his letter to his colleagues in the other place, Lord True paid tribute to the campaigning efforts of the TUC and of the Trade Union and Labour Party Liaison Organisation. He was right to do so, as their campaign was a brilliant one and I, for one, am glad it succeeded. Of course we will be supporting that this afternoon. Also, I am pleased to see that addition made via Lords Amendment 80 to wire in post-legislative scrutiny of this Bill. I would have such a provision in every Bill, as it is a good way of doing business. Beyond that, we do not have an issue with the tightening of provisions relating to secrecy, undue influence, candidate names, expenditure or electronic material. However, I will finish this section of my speech with a minor whinge, which I hope the Minister will address in her summing up. Lords Amendment 21, a Government amendment, deals with home addresses on ballot papers. Currently, as the Minister said, we or those who challenge us in elections to this place have a choice of having our home address or the constituency where we live on the ballot paper. For security reasons, that is a very good idea. Not only is it important for safety, but it allows voters to have a sense of where we are from. This provision adds a third option: we could specify which local authority we live in. That does not develop the original intent, because I do not think there is a case for safety there; I think this is there more for candidate vanity, and I am not sure what problem it is solving. So I am keen to learn from the Minister what needs to be addressed with that provision. It is not egregious enough for us to divide on, but I am keen to understand a bit more about why it is necessary.
Does the hon. Gentleman share my concern about the disproportionate effect that evidence suggests photographic voter ID might have on ethnic minority voting rates?
I do have concern about who will miss out as a result of this. We know from the Government’s own figures that there are 2 million people without the right sort of photo ID. I see some shaking of heads from Conservative Members who are still listening to the debate, but it is not us making this point—the Joseph Rowntree Foundation has said that the poorest are six times more likely than the best off to miss out under the Government’s proposals. The key thing is: when all of us who can vote next Thursday stand in line to vote—and we hope the lines will be long—we are more likely to be hit by lightning three times than to be queuing behind someone who is committing an act of voter personation. Once again, this is a solution in search of a problem.
We have seen this in the pilots as well. As the Minister mentioned, the Government have done pilots in this area and if what happened in those were replicated across the country, 184,000 people who wanted to vote would be unable to do so. Again, that is a demonstration of why Lords amendment 86 is so important and why this is such a bad idea. This amendment does not delete the voter ID provision, as would be my preference and as we have sought to do in Committee and on Report. Instead, it just makes things a little easier by expanding the list of accepted ID at polling stations. That is a worthy compromise, and I am surprised that the Government have not sought to take it.
The Minister has talked about the provision of a voter card from the local authority, but she has not yet said who is going to fund that. May we have a concrete assurance that that will come from central Government funding and it will not be put on the rate payers? Will she also assure us that thoughtful consideration has been given to the pressures on our electoral administrators, since the demand for these voter cards will peak at the same time as demand for postal votes, voter registration and proxy votes? Our electoral administrators, who do such a great job, are already overburdened, so I would love to know what assessment had been done of the capacity to deliver those things. The Lords amendment would ameliorate many of those challenges.
It is a pleasure to speak in this debate, as I have at every stage of this Bill, and I am sure the Minister will agree that it is nice to be on the home stretch after so long, especially as she very bravely took over halfway through. I know today could potentially be quite a long one and we are all keen to get to Prorogation so that those of us with candidates can get out on the doorsteps campaigning in the local elections, so I will not take too long.
I spoke previously about my psephological exuberance, and I am afraid that today I will expose my psephological exasperation at some of the amendments that have come back from the Lords. I am, as we would expect from the Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Leader of the House of Lords, a keen advocate of the upper Chamber and the excellent work it can do in refining legislation, as has been the case here. As such, I do not intend to speak to the amendments the Government are accepting; I think they speak for themselves, but I do welcome the refinements they present. Instead I shall touch briefly on Lords amendments 22 and 23 in the name of Lord Judge and then on amendment 86 in the name of Lord Willetts.
On amendments 22 and 23, clauses 14 and 15 will allow the Government, with the approval of Parliament, to clearly articulate the principles and priorities for the commission to be guided by when discharging its duties, especially where primary legislation is not explicit and where the commission enjoys a great degree of latitude in priorities and approach. Fundamentally, we should have confidence that there is a clear framework underpinning the role and duties of the commission in its work. At present, just three of the sitting commissioners have any electoral history of their own and, however august their CVs may be— and I absolutely accept that they are—they are not experts in elections or electoral law, nor do they have any lived, practical experience that informs their decision making.
Does the hon. Gentleman therefore accept that turning up with a polling card proves that we are who we say we are, and if that is the case why does he reject the long list from the Lords? If he accepts that a polling card says who we are, why not the list from the Lords?
No, the hon. Gentleman was not listening to what I said. I said people turn up with a polling card; I did not say that that is an appropriate form of ID. People already assume they have—[Interruption.] No, I did not; I encourage the hon. Gentleman to read Hansard because he clearly was not listening. [Interruption.] No, he was not. An appropriate form of ID is something that will definitively prove who we are.
I can give a perfect example of this. I share an office with my hon. Friend the Member for Eastleigh (Paul Holmes). His surname is the same as my stepfather’s. I could go and vote on behalf of my stepfather by taking something that demonstrates that I am him, because I can just take it off his desk. That is how unrobust this approach is.
My hon. Friend is correct: we do share an office and I enjoy doing so. He has made a completely acceptable point. Opposition Members keep saying that there is no proof of electoral fraud. Does my hon. Friend agree that I can pick up an electoral card from anyone’s doorstep and claim when I turn up at a polling station that I have their name and address with no proof? [Interruption.]; yes, I can. [Interruption.]; yes, I can. I can do that with no proof that that is not me, which exactly shows why we need to introduce voter ID in this Bill.
My hon. Friend is entirely correct, and if the Opposition are saying that there is no proof of this, I can tell them now in relation to Rochdale Borough Council’s election this coming month that a member of the Labour council accepted a caution for electoral fraud—he voted twice. So do not spin the line that this does not happen.
Is that not therefore evidence that the current system works? The kind of behaviour the hon. Gentleman’s party colleague, the hon. Member for Eastleigh (Paul Holmes), has just described is already against the law and will be identified by the polling clerks if someone turns up and tries to vote twice.
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In the other place, technical amendments to these clauses were made in Committee before the clauses were removed on Report. If this House disagrees with Lords amendment 22, the series of amendments we have proposed to the words so restored to the Bill will reinstate those technical amendments to clause 14. Amendments (c) and (f) to (h) reflect the parliamentary consequences of recent machinery of government changes. The other technical changes to the words so restored to the Bill, amendments (a) and (b), will ensure that the strategy and policy statement must not relate to the devolved functions of the Electoral Commission. Consequently, amendments (d), (e) and (i) provide that Scottish and Welsh Ministers are no longer statutory consultees on the strategy and policy statement. For the reasons I have set out, I ask the House to disagree with Lords amendments 22 and 23 and to agree to amendments (a) to (i) and to the words so restored to the Bill.
Given the strength of feeling, although the Government strongly reject the characterisation that clause 14 will weaken the commission’s operational independence, we have heard the concerns and tabled amendments (a) to (k) in lieu of Lords amendments 22 and 23. Amendment (a) will require the Secretary of State, when preparing a statement, to have regard to the duty placed on the commission by section 145(1) of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 to monitor and ensure compliance with the rules set out in that Act. Further, the amendment will prohibit the statement from including reference to specific investigatory or enforcement activity. That provides further reassurance on the commission’s operational independence.
On the parliamentary approval procedure in relation to the statement, the Government’s view is that the affirmative resolution procedure will provide both Houses of Parliament with appropriate opportunities to debate and scrutinise the statement in full before determining whether to approve or reject it. However, we have listened to the concerns raised and, to provide further reassurance, the Government tabled amendments (c) to (h), (j) and (k) in lieu of Lords amendments 22 and 23. These amendments provide for enhanced parliamentary scrutiny of a statement that has been subject to statutory consultation under new section 4C of the 2000 Act by providing both Houses with a supplementary opportunity to consider the draft statement and make representations before it is laid for approval. The amendments also make consequential changes to clause 14.
Amendments (b) and (i) in lieu of Lords amendments 22 and 23 will require the Secretary of State to publish a response to the statutory consultation on the statement, and to respond to requests from the Speaker’s Committee on the Electoral Commission for the statement to be revised.
Taken together, these provisions, in addition to those already built into clause 14 relating to parliamentary approval and consultation, should provide significant reassurance to Members of both Houses on the concerns about the strategy and policy statement. In particular, the amendments put beyond doubt the question of whether the statement could be used to unduly influence individual enforcement activity or to give guidance without the Secretary of State considering the commission’s monitoring and compliance duties.
On clause 25, the Government have listened to the concerns raised by parliamentarians and by representatives of civil society organisations in recent meetings. Lords amendment 44 means that any order to remove or vary the description of a category of third-party campaigner can be made only where it gives effect to a recommendation of the Electoral Commission, which will provide a necessary safeguard against any future Government who potentially seek to misuse the clause.
The Government have also carefully considered the concerns relating to clause 27. These measures were not designed to disproportionately affect any particular group. Given the strength of feeling on this issue, the Government tabled Lords amendment 50 to remove the clause from the Bill. I ask the House to support this amendment.
It is standard practice for the Government to conduct post-legislative scrutiny of Acts following Royal Assent, but we took on board the desire to ensure in the legislation that that scrutiny took place. Lords amendment 80 supports the joint aim on both sides of the House that the operation of these measures is assessed following the implementation of the Bill, while ensuring sufficient time has passed and processes are embedded enough for the scrutiny to be meaningful and effective. For these reasons, I commend the amendment to the House.
Lords amendments 1 to 5 make changes to clause 7, narrowing its scope so that the provisions do not unintentionally prevent legitimate campaigning by candidates outside the time that a person completes their postal ballot or legitimate opinion polling activity. Lords amendments 112 to 116 make the same changes in relation to Northern Ireland.
Lords amendments 9 to 12, 45, 64 to 79, 81 to 85, 87, 105 to 110 and 118 to 124 are technical and clarifying amendments. As the House will be aware, the Bill represents an extensive and ambitious portfolio of work in a complex and detailed body of law. The amendments ensure the measures are fit for purpose and operate as intended.
Following extensive engagement with the devolved Administrations in the preparation and drafting of the policy, the Scottish and Welsh Governments unfortunately declined to consent to applying certain measures to devolved polls. It was therefore necessary for the Government to table Lords amendments 6 to 8, 13, 14, 24 to 28, 30 to 33, 37, 38, 40 to 43, 46 to 48, 51 to 63, 88 to 102, 117, 125 and 126 to ensure the measures apply to reserved matters only. I therefore ask the House to agree to these necessary amendments.
Lords amendments 15 to 19 strengthen the provisions in clause 9 that seek to expand the provision for voters with disabilities from a narrow and restrictive provision specific to blind and partially sighted voters to one that supports the needs of a wider range of voters with disabilities, increasing the overall accessibility of our elections. For too long, we have had a requirement in law to provide a single device, which has hindered innovation in this area. We are grateful for the work of Lord Holmes, who worked with both the Government and external organisations to strengthen these measures in the Bill by specifically highlighting the importance of supporting electors’ ability to vote independently and secretly, all while maintaining our policy aim of moving away from a limited prescriptive approach to more flexibility and innovation. These amendments will also enable the support for disabled voters to be monitored effectively through Electoral Commission reporting, and will require in law that there is guidance to promote consistency, for which returning officers must have regard. That guidance will be developed in consultation with organisations representing people with disabilities. For those reasons, I commend the amendments to the House.
The Government also support Lords amendments 20, 21, 103, 104 and 111 tabled by Lord Hayward. These amendments make sensible changes to the rules for candidates standing in elections, which were first raised in this House by my hon. Friend the Member for Bosworth (Dr Evans). Lords amendment 21 will allow candidates the additional option of citing their local authority area on the ballot paper for UK parliamentary elections, as they already can for local elections. That will make it easier for candidates to demonstrate locality while preserving protection for their personal safety. I particularly thank my hon. Friend for raising this topic and I hope he is pleased with that outcome.
Lords amendments 20, 103, 104 and 111 widen the scope of the current provisions concerning the use of commonly used names to allow candidates to include on their nomination paper any name they commonly use as a forename or surname, such as their middle name. This is already facilitated in practice by returning officers, but it is not provided for in existing electoral law, so it is right that the Bill is amended for consistency. I commend these amendments to the House.
Lords amendments 34, 35 and 36, tabled by Baroness Noakes, are technical amendments that bring this clause into line with more standard accounting practices, so I commend them to the House. Finally, Lords amendments 49, 29 and 39 were brought forward in the other House by Lord Hodgson. I am pleased to confirm that the Government are supporting them. They will introduce a duty on the Electoral Commission to produce a statutory code of conduct, providing much-needed certainty for third-party campaigners on how to comply with the rules related to third-party campaigning.
I move on to the points of greater difference—the outstanding issues facing us. This Bill is littered with various things we have voted against throughout the process, in relation to voting, to political finance and to electoral systems, but today we are really down to just two issues: voter ID, as set out in part 1 of the Bill; and the independence of the Electoral Commission, as set out in part 3. The other place has done important work to help save the Government from themselves in this area, and it is sad that the Minister is not minded to accept that salvation, particularly on Lords amendments 22, 23 and 86. We have opposed and continue to oppose the introduction of voter ID. It is a solution in search of a problem; there is scant evidence of voter personation. In 2019, there were two major sets of elections—council elections in the May and a general election in the December—and in that year there was precisely one conviction for personation.
We always seek to be helpful to the Government, and Conservative Members will know that their manifesto pledge on voter ID was that they intended to introduce simply voter ID, not photographic ID—the word “photographic” was not mentioned. So the solution proposed in the amendment is very much in line with what they have committed to. We know that the alternative, which is forcing through photographic ID, is about a form of ID that more than 2 million voters lack, according to the Government’s own figures. This was an opportunity to do better and the Government should have taken it. We certainly will be pressing that point.
Lords amendments 22 and 23 remove clauses that undermine the independence of the Electoral Commission. It is worth saying, although it is staggering that this needs to be said, that it is not for this Government or any Government, be they Labour or Conservative, to dictate the priorities of an independent watchdog, especially one that regulates our own elections. One would think that that would be axiomatic, but we have seen this creeping culture of the Government trying to put their thumb on the scale, whether in the scandal with one of our former colleagues at the end of last year or in the debacle last week relating to the privileges motion. This very much sits within the same family, and although the public do not necessarily take interest in the granular details of particular bits of legislation such as this one, they are starting to pick up on this constant pattern of injustice and unfair play. This really is another example of it.
Let us do a useful thought experiment: if something like this happened in a nearby democracy, or perhaps a country where we were concerned about the future of its democracy, and it said that it wanted its Executive to be able to direct its electoral commission, would we not say that that did not feel right? I do not think that it feels right in this case. Although he is not in his place, I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Hazel Grove (Mr Wragg) and the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee, which he chairs, and to the Electoral Commission, which has made persuasive arguments for the protection of the commission’s independence. The Minister said that the Secretary of State would not have broad-ranging powers or interest in directing the work of the commission. In the annex to his response to the hon. Member for Hazel Grove, the Secretary of State said:
“The Strategy and Policy Statement (clause 15) will provide an opportunity for the Government, with the approval of the UK Parliament, to outline a clear articulation of principles and priorities for the Commission to have regard to when going about their work—particularly in areas where…the Commission are exercising the significant amount of discretion they are afforded in terms of activity, priorities, and approach.”
I do not think that quite chimes with what the Minister says: it is clear that the Government do fully intend to use these powers significantly and we should be very concerned about that.
I want briefly to reference the Government amendment in lieu. It is better, and it is welcome to hear that the Secretary of State’s statements will need to pass both Houses; that greater degree of scrutiny for Parliament is good. Similarly, the point around individual investigations is a welcome clarification, but it does not change the basic question: why are we doing this at all? There has been no clarity from the Minister previously or in her opening remarks today about what the problem is for which a solution is sought. We strongly believe that the regulation of elections must be independent, impartial and free from political control, and the Government’s proposals, whatever might be said, challenge and compromise this principle, so I think it is very surprising that we are having this conversation.
I will finish there. The problems boil down to two points: voter ID and the Electoral Commission. We will continue to push those points and defend the very good amendments made in the other place.
Setting appropriate thematic guidance is wholly appropriate and clauses 14 and 15 give the power to the Speaker’s Committee on the Electoral Commission to approve that guidance. Despite some of the alarmist talk about this part of the Bill from those on the Opposition Benches, this does not take away from the independence of the commission, and I think if anyone were to be truly honest they would agree that the commission has not steered entirely clear of controversy or perceived bias in its past. We know at least of one recent case where its decision was overturned, in relation to the referendum; in fact, a former head of the commission was actively campaigning in that referendum. I want a robust commission, not one that plays fast and loose with the rules and gives itself carte blanche to do as it pleases. That said, I will be supporting Government amendments (a) to (k), which refine the Government’s approach.
Amendment 86 seems, I am afraid, to be another attempt to override the voter ID provisions of the Bill. The specified list of IDs, including the freely available Government ID to be introduced, provides a wide-ranging yet robust range of options to validate the right to vote. We have heard some disgraceful attempts to paint voter ID as a form of voter suppression against certain minority groups. I was told by a member of the Labour party in the Bill Committee that I, as an LGBT Member, would not be able to vote because of this new provision; it was absolutely disgusting. This is dog-whistle politics at its worst and Opposition Members should be ashamed.
In fact, just yesterday the Supreme Court ruled on this matter and I will read from the judgment:
“I consider that if persons have confidence in the electoral system by the elimination or reduction in voter fraud then they might be encouraged to vote by virtue of their increased confidence in the electoral process.”
In other words, the Supreme Court thinks this makes it more likely that people will vote.
According to work conducted by the Electoral Commission, two thirds of voters support voter ID, just 4% of people surveyed did not have any of the qualifying ID in the Bill, and just 17% of those people said they would not take up the freely available ID. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Nottingham North (Alex Norris) is chuntering from a sedentary position; if people choose to absent themselves, that is their choice.
Opposing or undermining this measure is at very best to turn a blind eye to the problem. I asked in Committee and on Third Reading and will ask again: what is an acceptable level of fraud? How many votes is it okay to steal before we feel we have to act in legislation? [Interruption.] Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence; I am sorry, but I have heard this argument several times and it is spurious. We should want to be the envy of the world by having the most robust electoral system, and that can be achieved by doing what Northern Ireland voters have been doing for a very long time, and what most voters who turn up to the polling station with their polling card think they already have to do: prove who they are and that they are eligible to vote where they are trying to.