Electoral Administration Bill

moved Amendment No. 103:"Page 45, line 8, leave out ““may”” and insert ““shall””" The noble Lord said: Clauses 36 and 37 cover the question of making voting easier for people with disabilities. Clause 36 covers official election documents generally and Clause 37 applies to information supplied to postal voters, but they both raise what are, in effect, identical issues. Clauses 36 and 37 have the wholly praiseworthy purpose of trying to broaden the requirement to provide accessible information to voters with disabilities to enable them to vote—and vote independently. However, we believe that the clauses fall short of the objectives and need strengthening. First, the provision of accessible information must be mandatory in the sense of it being necessary to provide accessible information, although the detail should not be wholly mandatory, and a decision on whether or not to provide the information should not be left to the discretion of the returning officer. That is covered by Amendments Nos. 103, 105 and 107. The second problem, as we see it, is that references to Braille and to graphical representations are too specific and too narrow. It should be possible to have further and alternative formats here. In particular, the Disability Rights Commission—on the basis of whose brief we are moving these amendments—says that what is known as the Easy Read format, in which information is contained in easy words, big writing and pictures, is particularly important. We also need other formats for information—for example, audio format, which is needed by the visually impaired or dyslexic voters. All those formats also need to be provided in foreign languages as well as in English or Welsh. That is covered by Amendments Nos. 104, 106, 108 and 109. The experience of the Disability Rights Commission at the last election was that good information packs and support and training for returning officers were useful in getting people with disabilities—particularly people with learning difficulties—to vote. It is important that it should be as easy as possible for people with any kind of disability to vote. The amendments do not deal with mobility problems, which are one of the major problems that arise, but they deal with reading problems, whether caused by language or visual problems or by learning difficulties or dyslexia. Therefore, we believe that provision under Clauses 36 and 37 should be mandatory and not merely permissive, and that it should enable the introduction of a considerably wider range of formats than those which are specified, apparently on an exclusive basis, in the two clauses. I beg to move.