Voter Registration: We’re winning

Some good news for a change as the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee’s new report shows we’re making progress on getting Individual Electoral Registration (IER) right.

The Society has been working closely with the UK Government, all political parties, electoral registration officers and civil society to suggest changes to the Bill to help prevent as many as 10 million voters falling off the register.

It seems the alarm bells have been headed. The report acknowledges that IER is the right move but urges caution as to how the change is implemented.

We are delighted to see so many of our recommendations included in the report, particularly the need to scrap the opt-out, retain the threat of legal fines for non-registration and preserve the household canvas. The Committee is absolutely right to back the need to retain the annual canvass and the threat of penalty as the government’s proposals would mean councils would have no carrot, no stick and no opportunity to target hard to reach citizens. Quite simply if we want a complete and accurate register, then officials need the tools to get the job done.

The Committee was also right to rein in the government on its plans to make it possible for citizens to essentially ‘opt out’ from democracy. Being on the register is not just about rights, it’s about responsibilities. It determines how public services are delivered, underpins the right to trial by jury of your peers, and sets how political boundaries are drawn.

To coincide with the release of the Committee’s report we are publishing our own report feeding back the findings from our roundtable on Individual Electoral Registration in October. Attendees at the roundtable included the Electoral Commission, Equality & Human Rights Commission, local Electoral Registration Officers, black and minority ethnic, disability and young people’s organisations, politicians and researchers from the three main political parties as well as a Cabinet Office civil servant. A number of considerations and recommendations were tabled, see full report here.

Some of the issues flagged up at the event remain unaddressed in the Committee’s report including the question of whether the electoral register should be the basis for the Boundary Review or whether it would be better to scrap this entirely and use population figures instead. The problem with a patchy and incomplete list is that the new boundaries will not accurately represent the real shape and size of constituencies so citizens who are not registered but who still deserve fair representation in parliament, will be disadvantaged.

There has also not been enough consideration of how the move will be practically implemented against a back drop of local government cuts. Roundtable attendee Michael Summerville, Electoral Registration Officer for London Borough of Hackney said:

“We have spent years building up the register. We’re concerned that all that work with be undone. We could be looking at a 20-30,000 drop from a register of 165,000.”

“I don’t see how we’ll have the time to prepare for IER on the back of the 2014 Elections. We’re already losing resources.” 

There still needs to be more consideration key groups who will be disproportionately impacted by the shift. The Committee report make the rather weak recommendation that more public information on IER is needed but this will not be enough to safeguard the communities likely to be most severely affected by the change.

As Chris Ruane, MP for Vale of Clwyd told us:

“The people who are going to be left off are poor, black and ethnic, and living in privately rented and social housing. We’re going to return to electoral registration rates like Alabama in the 1950s.”

We could be looking at a doomsday scenario. The problem needs to be tackled head on – waiting for the drop is not an option.

It’s vital that this Wednesday’s Opposition Day Debate brings this debate back to the forefront. It can’t be reduced to another round of partisan point scoring, or coalition infighting.

We are sleepwalking into change which threatens the very legitimacy of British politics. The Committee’s recommendations must be heeded.

You can download a full copy of the Committee’s report on Individual Electoral Registration here and a full report on the Electoral Reform Society’s roundtable on IER is here.