UK Parliament / Open data

Elections Bill

My Lords, I am grateful for the support for this amendment. I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Barker, that I am proud to be an anorak with her, on this and other issues. She of course had a considerably more sophisticated approach to what should appear and how it might be covered. If this were to be developed, I had always thought that, since this is a fast-developing space, the Electoral Commission, having got this bridgehead, would then have some subsidiary code, which would be what it required third-party campaigners to provide somewhere on their website. I saw that as a second stage, having got this initial agreement. I am very grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman. She is essentially right about public trust and confidence and the growing interest in and significance of third-party campaigning. I am grateful for her support.

My noble friend talked about the Electoral Commission website. I do not think it is very informative, and I do not think people should have to go to the Electoral Commission website to find out whether someone is a third-party campaigner or not. They should be able to see from the organisation itself. I am grateful for two-thirds of a loaf from my noble friend—or maybe half a loaf. I hope we are not going to fall back on “it would be good practice if”, because that is a let-out. I notice he used the words “good practice” in his summation, so I hope that he will reflect further; I, and I suspect others in the House, would feel that “good practice” did not go far enough in this small but important area. With that, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

About this proceeding contribution

Reference

820 c477 

Session

2021-22

Chamber / Committee

House of Lords chamber

Subjects

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