European Union Referendum Bill — House of Lords, 2015-12-14
Topic: Civil Rights
Edward Faulks (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, this has been an interesting and passionate debate. However, not much has been said about the amendment. I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan of Ely, for setting out the thinking behind the amendment in her name, but I confess that I am somewhat puzzled by it. I appreciate that she has done what she can to minimise the cost to the public purse, but unfortunately this has left the policy in a fairly odd place, as I shall endeavour to explain The amendment would entitle those over the age of 16 to take part in the election if they were on the register for parliamentary elections. It goes on to say that steps taken to register eligible persons shall focus on 15 year-olds who will be 16 at the time of the referendum, and shall use low-cost means such as emails. The amendment would not enfranchise all 16 and 17 year-olds; it would enfranchise only those 16 and 17 year-olds eligible to be on the register for parliamentary elections, known as attainers. The formula for working out who is an attainer is surprisingly complex. It is set out in the Representation of the People Act 1983. A young person is eligible to be on the register for parliamentary elections if they will, "attain voting age before the end of the period of 12 months beginning with the 1st December next following", the date on which an application for registration is made—that is to say, a person who will turn 18 during the year beginning 1 December following the date of the application The practical upshot of this is that there is a significant cohort of 16 year-olds who are not eligible to register for parliamentary elections. Because the legal definition of "attainer", which defines who is eligible to register, is pegged to 1 December, the number of people who can register changes over time, but it means that there is never a period when all 16 year-olds can register, nor is there a period when any 15 year-olds can register. Bizarrely, therefore, the number of 16 and 17 year-olds who could vote would depend upon the date of the referendum. The closer it was to 1 December 2016, the fewer young people could take part—until 2 December, that is, when almost all 16 year-olds would be eligible. For example, a young person whose 16th birthday was on 23 November this year—a date that noble Lords may remember, as your Lordships were debating the Report stage of this Bill—would be able to take part in a referendum held before 1 December 2016, but their friend whose 16th birthday was today, only three weeks later, would not be able to take part in a referendum held before 1 December 2016 This quirk makes the requirement to focus registration activity on 15 year-olds rather perverse. We would be left in the situation of being legally required to encourage the registration of 15 year-olds, despite there being no legal mechanism to register people aged 15 and despite the fact many people currently aged 15 will not actually be allowed to take part in the referendum. This is not a way to encourage democratic participation. The rules here are complicated because they are not designed to determine who may or may not take part in an election. They are designed to ensure an orderly administration of the electoral register. This is a wholly different thing and in no way suitable as a basis for the franchise I have been challenged at various times during the course of this debate on how I would explain a voting age of 18 to a 16 year-old. To turn this on its head, how would one reasonably explain this formula to a young person who would turn 16 shortly before the referendum? They ask the question, "Am I allowed to vote?". The answer would be, "Have you got a moment? I’ve got an algorithm here, and I may be able to give you an answer in due course". That is not a satisfactory way to make law The Government’s estimate of the cost of lowering the voting age for the referendum is in excess of £6 million. Most of these costs are created by the need to change the systems to deal with the addition of new young people to the registers, to register those young people, and by the increased activity by counting officers and regional counting officers to accommodate these additional voters. Of course, the noble Baroness’s amendment avoids the first two of these costs: no new people would be entitled to register for the poll, and the registration efforts must be "low-cost". I have already explained that some of this low-cost effort will be expended on 15 year-olds who are not eligible to take part anyway. However, the amendment still expands the franchise and so expands the cost required to run the referendum. Counting officers and regional counting officers will have to take extra actions to accommodate the increased franchise. They will need to print more ballot papers and send additional postal ballots, for example, and the lead campaigners are entitled to a mailshot paid for out of the public purse; clearly, expanding the franchise means printing and sending more material The Government estimate that this amendment would cost the taxpayer an additional £2.8 million or £2.9 million, depending on when the poll is held. This figure is made up of the additional costs of running the referendum—printing ballot papers and so forth—and the additional cost of a bigger mailshot for the designated campaigns. There may be further additional costs, such as those relating to awareness raising amongst newly eligible voters, which we have not included in our estimates. Obviously I cannot say whether this infringes financial privilege. That is an assessment carried out by the clerks in another place, under the authority of the Speaker. However, it is clear, with great respect, that in seeking to reduce the cost the noble Baroness has had to make some rather on-the-hoof assessments of the costs For the reasons I have endeavoured to outline, the Electoral Commission has advised that it does not support this amendment. The briefing makes very clear that it does not have a policy position on the voting age but that if the voting age is to be changed, this is not a sensible way to go about it. The Electoral Commission notes that, "only a small proportion of 16-year olds are currently eligible to be included in electoral registers" The commission is also concerned about the provisions on registration. It wants to be free to use "proven methods" to contact young people, such as by post, and warns that although email is widely used, it is, "not yet a well-established method of encouraging electoral registration" The amendment requires a particular focus on registering 15 year-olds, which the Electoral Commission says could, "lead to a significant proportion of the newly enfranchised group not being targeted" Clearly, this amendment is a deeply unsatisfactory way to go forward.