The Minister is better than this motion—let us all agree on that. Like the SNP spokesperson, the hon. Member for Glasgow North (Patrick Grady), I think it is a hangover from the Boris Johnson days, when the Electoral Commission upset him and he wanted to influence it. The Minister can correct me if I am wrong.
The Government claim that this strategy will enhance the parliamentary accountability of the Electoral Commission and increase public confidence in its work, but as everybody has stated today, it will do the complete opposite. This strategy and policy statement is little
more than an attempt by the Government to undermine the independence of the Electoral Commission and to stamp their own agenda on the regulation of our democracy. This is a fight for our democracy.
We in this House need to take back control—that is important. Avoiding transparency and accountability seems to be the hallmark of the Government. Do not just take my word for it; the Electoral Commission itself wrote to MPs this week stressing that the principle of independence is crucial to maintaining confidence in our electoral system. It warned Members:
“The introduction of a mechanism such as a strategy and policy statement—by which a government can guide an electoral commission’s work—is inconsistent with this independent role.”
If the commission is saying that, and the Speaker’s Committee is saying it, why is the Minister trying to convince us otherwise? It really does not make any sense.
As we have heard many times, this is not the first time that the Government have attempted to rig our democracy. They forced through their voter ID system, which threatened to disenfranchise the most vulnerable in society. Remember that, as my hon. Friend the Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood (Cat Smith) mentioned, the right hon. Member for North East Somerset (Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg) let it slip that that was a deliberate attempt to manipulate electoral outcomes in favour of the Conservative party, and then went, “Whoops!” because he had made a mistake and said the quiet bit out loud. It is not a shock that the Government are once again attempting to influence an independent body that oversees our elections, but it should shock us all.
This draft strategy and policy statement sets out the Government’s strategic and policy priorities for the Electoral Commission. It also contains
“guidance to which the Commission must have regard in the discharge of its functions.”
That places on the commission a concerning legal duty to consider first and foremost the Government’s priorities when fulfilling its duties. If it does that, it cannot be independent, and the whole point is that it is supposed to be independent. It is simply unacceptable for the Government to direct the commission on how it should carry out its functions. If a foreign Government were wielding that much power over their elections, there would be calls to send in independent advisers to ensure that their elections were being held democratically—that is how bad this is. When people ask, “Do we have corruption in our Government?”, I say, “Yes, we do, and this is an example of that.”
The Government keep focusing on the prevention and detection of voter fraud, yet there is little evidence that voter fraud is widespread. In fact, it is so rare that there were only nine convictions—