Electoral Administration Bill

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. It is relatively easy for us to pass these regulations in response to legitimate concerns, but out there in the real world, they have an impact. I suspect that if the 650 agents out there knew what we were cooking up, they would be marching on Parliament to say, ““What on earth are you up to? You’re making things even more burdensome for us.”” We are aware of that possibility. On reporting, in regard to submitting electoral expenses, there is no doubt that the three-month/one-month period effectively creates an additional bureaucratic hurdle. As well as merely accounting for the election expenditure, the agent will have to account for the three months prior to that period. I hope that we can keep this as simple as possible—perhaps by using just one form, for example, so that the account is simply a continuation of that of the previous period. In reality, I would imagine that this will not be that much of an issue in the vast majority of constituencies, because there will not be a huge amount being spent in any given three months.