Elections Bill

My Lords, I will follow on from the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, on undue influence. I think that a large part of this stems from Richard Mawrey’s judgments in the Tower Hamlets case. Anybody who has not experienced what the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, has clearly seen in places such as Bradford and Kirklees and I witnessed in Tower Hamlets will not appreciate what one is talking about, which is a serious problem. The first time I went to an election in Tower Hamlets a friend of mine, Councillor Peter Golds, to whom my noble friend Lord True referred, identified this: “See those people there? See that person there?” We are talking about people standing 100 metres to 150 metres away from a polling station. They walk alongside people going to vote. They stop people going into the polling station. When complaints are made to the police, the police feel that they are powerless to intervene. Anybody who has not experienced that sort of undue influence cannot appreciate the intimidation involved. I welcome the clause and the points made by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, and the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, because it is an important change to electoral law.