§ VISCOUNT MIDLETONMy Lords, in the absence of my noble friend Lord St. Aldwyn, I desire to ask His Majesty's Government for how long it is intended that the suspension of Parliamentary and local government registration by the second clause of the Parliament and Registration Bill shall continue; and whether, having regard to the fact that the Register of 1914 is already completely out of date, they will undertake to carry a Bill to provide a new Register before the expiry of the present Parliament in September, 1916. I would also express the hope that any Register which is drawn up before next September will take due account of all those who may have lost their residence by periods of service abroad.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEMy Lords, we fully recognise the great importance of the point dealt with in the Question of which my noble friend Lord St. Aldwyn had given notice. It is no doubt the case that if it were to be found desirable to have a General Election during the course of the next few months we should have to depend upon the old Register or provide ourselves within the time with a new Register specially prepared in order to met the emergency. Neither of those alternatives is free from difficulty. The old Register is, as we are all aware, obsolete, and is becoming more and more obsolete with every month that passes. On the other hand a new Register would take time to compile, would involve a considerable amount of work for which the officials concerned might have some difficulty in finding the necessary time, and would require legislation which, I am sure my noble friend will realise, might prove to be of a very controversial character. There is also this to be remembered, that a Register compiled at the present moment would of necessity be incomplete, because it could not include those gallant soldiers who are now employed on active service and whom none of us would desire to deprive of the opportunity of recording their votes. At this moment I am not prepared to give an undertaking that, whatever happens, we shall carry the necessary legislation before the month of September next, but we certainly contemplate the necessity of such legislation, and we are already taking such steps as are possible to provide for the preparation of the new Register. We have every hope that by setting to work in good time on the details we may be able to put the new Register into force without much delay as soon as Parliament has agreed to the legislation which will be necessary.