Electoral Administration Bill

I wonder if I am one of the few Members of the Committee who intended speaking on this group of amendments—and now I feel I am interrupting a rather amusing conversation about bank signatories, reminiscences and ages of wives etcetera. I really want to speak to what I think is the heart of the Bill and the most controversial area. It is the most important thing that we ought to try to agree among ourselves as far as we possibly can. I particularly want to speak to my Amendment No. 58 and the other amendments in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Goodhart. Essentially, they provide for the transitional arrangements, as the commission described them, for moving towards individual voter registration. The assumption the commission and I make is that we are all genuinely trying to work towards the achievement of a very significant anti-fraud device in relation to postal voting. I accept that no form of individual voter registration may be a panacea for dealing with postal vote fraud—it is something which all parties and all parts of the House supported two years ago when we were otherwise at severe loggerheads over the issue of pilots for compulsory postal voting. We were not going to have the alternative of polling stations in four regions of the country. People from all parts of the House spoke in support of the principle that individual voter registration would alleviate many of the genuine concerns about potential postal voting fraud. Since that time, however, a number of concerns have been raised about the effect on the electoral registration totals if a system was introduced. The biggest concern was something on which I believe a significant compromise has already been made between the parties. There was, I think, a genuine fear that a household with, say, four adult voters could register fewer than that number of electors if four different forms were required for them each to register personally. But the principle of individual voter registration with personal identifiers never seemed to me to mean that all members of a household could not provide personal identifiers on the same form if they wished to. There has of course been a model in Northern Ireland. While the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, says it was a successful experiment, there is still some concern about the drop in the total number of people registering, perhaps as a result of fraudulent entries before—and perhaps it is a good thing that the numbers are down somewhat. But the drop still is, I would suggest, relatively small and modest. However, there are a number of differences between what has happened in Northern Ireland and what these various amendments propose. First, there is the requirement for national insurance numbers to be included. I personally think that goes too far, as does the Electoral Commission. While people may forget their age or date of birth and may have different signatures, it seems to me that it is rather hard for many people to find, locate and write down their national insurance number. Perhaps the problems in Northern Ireland are more severe than they are here. There are other differences. Following up doorstep canvassing in parts of Northern Ireland is a difficult thing to do. Here I think the problems of fewer people filling in the forms and registering should not be quite so great as the doorstep canvassing, which we all advocate, can be conducted rather more easily and not in the climate of fear which still exists in some parts of Northern Ireland. The commission’s transitional proposals require that you make your personal identifiers if you might require a postal vote or a proxy vote at some point in the future. These proposals are very elegant in that they require only personal identifiers from those people. Those voting by post have to provide their signature twice in the process of doing so, however their signature may appear. They have to provide it once when applying to vote by post and once when signing a certificate accompanying their ballot paper. So, it should not be too onerous to provide a signature on the form which provides for them to be included on the electoral register in the first place. That provides a significant safeguard against postal voting fraud. It is not a perfect solution, and of course people can still provide their signature at a later date with these amendments, when they may apply for a postal vote. But, as many people will provide their signature in the first instance on the form on which they apply to go on to the voting register, there will be a signature to compare. That can be compared with the signature on the application to vote by post and on the subsequent declaration of identity. While signatures vary from person to person, we are dealing here with possible investigations of fraud and criminal activity. The police have a history of investigating handwriting and signatures and detecting fraud. The different sets of signatures, with handwriting experts if necessary analysing them should there be a court case, would enable us to detect, prevent and deter—perhaps more importantly than anything else—fraud. The noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, makes a witty contribution about his personal different signatures. Somebody contemplating a fraud with a postal vote has to go on the voting register, sign to apply to vote by post and sign again to say that they are the person they say they are when voting by post. Realising that they could be subject to a police investigation, that handwriting experts may be called in and that they may be subject to cross-examination in a court of law with the evidence of those handwriting experts, I believe will be a significant measure to deter fraud. The Government suggest that pilots are basically the way forward in testing this. Two years ago it seemed that they wanted as many pilots as possible to cover at the same time as much of the country as possible when it came to testing all postal voting. I and others in the debate suggest that the same principle ought to apply: let us have a very extensive testing of this principle. The transitional arrangements for individual registration, with the option of providing personal identifiers at the outset, seems to me to make a good test; one that should be done widely so that we understand properly its consequences. Pilots in limited areas with different circumstances may not really provide the proper test we seek. If giving voters the option of providing their signature and date of birth deters them registering at all, I would be very surprised. The noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, showed a number of forms he had signed. With almost every form, in any formal sense these days, you are required to provide your signature and something like your date of birth as well as your address. It is astonishing that in this day and age you can do something like apply to go on the electoral register and have a vote without providing your signature and date of birth. The forms seem almost more complicated and surprising to people in that you see the form but you do not have to sign it, unlike other forms for any serious purpose. I think that an entitlement to go on the register and vote is a very serious purpose. Of course it would be possible to make minimal improvements to the status quo based on a limited acceptance of some of the commission’s proposals. I note that the noble Lord, Lord Elder, has added his name to Amendment No. 80 covering the provision of personal identifiers, including signature and date of birth, at some stage of the process of obtaining a postal vote but not necessarily at the point of registration. The amendment was designed to avoid the problem outlined to us some time ago by the much respected figure of the noble Baroness, Lady Gould of Potternewton. She explained to me that she felt the problem with people signing the register at the outset and providing a date of birth was that if they were then relied on as the basis for going on the register, and only required if they might need a postal vote subsequently, was that people may not realise at the time that they wanted a postal vote subsequently. If we had a transitional scheme it would make sense to say that if somebody does not provide voluntarily their signature and date of birth at the point when they go on the electoral register, they should not be deprived of the right to vote by post at a later point. That has the defect that at the same time as they are applying for their postal vote, their signature is the same as the one for the register, but of course there is still a check subsequently with the formal declaration of identity. Above all, this proposal makes some sense in that many people will provide their signature and date of birth at the outset. We have seen that people increasingly understand the electoral registration process. If they did not, 29 per cent of people would not have opted out of the edited version of the electoral register. So, by and large, people understand the forms—although at a later stage we will turn our attention to the form that may be produced, and ease of understanding. But since large numbers of people will at the outset provide a specimen signature and date of birth, we will have a check. That check will be of value, and it will be of significant deterrent value. Many people will not know, understand or think that perhaps few of these checks are made. But, wherever there is a problem or a suspicion of fraud, whether it is a small-scale fraud or on the scale of the Guildford fraud a few years ago or the Birmingham fraud of last year, with this system there will be a greater potential to prove the scale of that fraud and to take proper action against it. Finally, on the issue of national insurance, it seems to me that it would tighten up everything based on problems with people remembering their date of birth and signature. But I really feel that the edited option—I know the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth, does not like it—is too complicated. I look at the form from many different angles. There is now better practice in how these forms are designed and filled in. The easiest and best forms now are where you simply look at them and if there is no change to be made you have nothing to do. But to add to it a signature, a date of birth, possibly an item on the edited register and a national insurance number might just be too much. Perhaps for some people of low educational attainment or for whom English is not their first language that would be a deterrent to completing the register. It would be a sad thing in our democracy if some people were deterred from completing the form because it simply became too complex.