Electoral Administration Bill

moved Amendment No. 86:"Page 15, line 24, at end insert—" ““(   )   In section 10 of the Representation of the People Act 2000 (c. 2) (pilot schemes for local elections in England and Wales) after subsection (1) insert— ““(1A)   No pilot scheme shall take place by all-postal voting or involve sending ballot papers to electors who have not expressly and explicitly requested to vote by post.”””” The noble Baroness said: We are discussing pilots. The noble Baroness will be aware that ultimately we hope to end up with one pilot. But in the meantime, as the Bill stands, we need to try to make these provisions as perfect as we can. Amendment No. 86 would add a provision to the Representation of the People Act 2000 to ensure that there could be no compulsory all-postal voting in a pilot. Amendment No. 87 has the same effect but includes the provision that there could be no all-postal vote in any election. Amendment No. 88 would make further additions to the 2000 Act by ensuring that no pilot scheme could provide for the use of analogous electronic means. I hope that the thinking behind these amendments is clear. All Members of the Committee are mindful of the need to prevent fraud—we have discussed it endlessly for the past two Committee days. We discussed at Second Reading the postal vote fraud scandal in Birmingham. Yet there is nothing in this Bill that rules out all-postal voting or experiments with other methods of voting. Indeed, the CORE consultation paper mentions e-voting and the ease with which it could be introduced via the CORE register. Apparently, online fraud is growing at 300 per cent a year. It is the fastest growing type of fraud in the world. Therefore, there is a possibility that if pilots are introduced, they could be used as a vehicle for voting experiments that would put at risk the safety of the franchise. Postal voting alone is subject to interception on receipt of votes by post, misuse through handling by third parties through identity fraud and the pressures of undue influence, especially on those voting, for example, from residential homes. It is really not fair to the electorate to select a random area—as we have discussed this afternoon—and force all voters in that area to vote in a certain way, and perhaps sometimes to vote in a way to which they are not accustomed. The Electoral Reform Society stated that rather than going for all-postal voting voting in a solve-all tactic, the Government should concentrate rather on,"““making more votes count and introducing a more appealing political culture””." However, I am not discussing that at the moment. The Bill makes no provision for personal identifiers which could secure the postal vote further. The right to vote is precious. It seems absurd that the Government are willing to subject that right to short-term experimental schemes which we are trying to rule out through these amendments. The amendments intend to put in place safeguards against the pitfalls of elections taking place via piloting. We have already put forward our opinion on pilots and our proposed alternative, the transitional provision for personal identifiers by using the postal vote to ““test drive”” the idea. We believe that all-postal voting is a step too far. I beg to move.