Political Parties and Elections Bill

The new clause makes amendments to Section 15 of the 1983 Act. Subsection (2) of the new clause would remove the fixed period provided by the 1983 Act after which a person registered in pursuance of a service declaration will cease to be registered. Subsection (3) of the new clause would remove the provisions which give the Secretary of State the power to make an order varying the period. That power was exercised in the Service Voters’ Registration Period Order 2006, which set the period for which a service voter could remain registered under a single service declaration at three years. As an alternative to service registration, service voters can register as ordinary electors when they are eligible to do so by virtue of their residence. The practical result of these provisions would be that those persons registered in pursuance of service declaration will remain registered as electors until the registration officer has reason to think they are no longer entitled to be registered, they cancel the declaration or they register elsewhere. On the surface, this amendment might appear to address concerns about under-registration amongst service personnel. However, registering service personnel to vote in one place for an indefinite period previously created inaccuracies in the electoral register, which led to the introduction of a 12-month limitation on service voter registrations in the 2000 Act. In practice this amendment would simply re-introduce the same inaccuracies to the electoral register, so that we have high registration rates, but low participation levels during elections because of the inaccuracies. I reassure the Committee that we are serious about increasing registration rates among service voters. I remember with affection Lord Garden—we were opposite each other for a number of years in the defence field—arguing that there was too little registration among the Armed Forces. He did so with passion and effect. Since 2005 the MOD has been working with the Electoral Commission to address under-registration among members of the Armed Forces. Bimonthly meetings are held to develop information campaigns with MoJ officials also in attendance. Each year a campaign is run around the same time as the annual canvass to provide information to Armed Forces personnel and their families about methods of registration, with particular focus being placed on the service declaration facility. The 2008 information campaign was run between October and November, and activities included sending a combined service voter registration leaflet and application form to service personnel in 5,000 military units across the world; holding registration days in each unit led by a dedicated unit registration officer; advertisements in service broadcast and print media; placing information on the Electoral Commission and MoD's websites; and providing additional guidance and tools, such as promotional posters and resource CDs to all units. The MoD is not in favour of this amendment; it has serious concerns about it. It believes that if service personnel were registered indefinitely, they would continue their very mobile careers expecting to be automatically re-registered in any new UK constituency in which they may come to be resident, and as a result they would fail to re-register when moving constituencies. It is the MoD’s view that this will lead to personnel being disenfranchised because their registration details will be out of date. We think that the three-year period strikes the right balance between encouraging service personnel to register and maintaining an accurate register. That is not the only reason for maintaining the current position; the existing regime allows that period to be varied by order if the view is reached, on consideration of the evidence, that a longer or shorter period would be beneficial. We think that retaining that flexibility is important. Furthermore, the annual information campaign run by the EC and MoD is encouraging members of the Armed Forces to register to vote or update their registration details where they have moved and the choice of registering as an ordinary elector or service voter is helping to maximise registration rates in the forces. The Government do not want to undo this good work. It is for those reasons that we think that this extremely well meant amendment should be withdrawn.