HC Deb 01 February 1918 vol 101 cc1973-7

39. These rules shall apply to Scotland subject to the following modifications, namely:

The Secretary for Scotland shall be substituted for the Local Government Board;

The provision for the transmission of a copy of the register to the Local Government Board shall not apply.

40. These rules shall apply to Ireland subject to the following modifications, namely:

(1) References to the Local Government Board shall be construed as references to the Local Government Board for Ireland.

(2) The district electoral division as constituted under the Local Government (Ireland) Act, 1898, shall be the registration unit; but—

  1. (a) where a district electoral division is divided into wards, each such ward shall be treated as a separate registration unit; and
  2. (b) where a district electoral division is situate partly in one Parliamentary polling district, partly in another, or partly within and partly without any town (within the meaning of the Local Government (Ireland) Act, 1898), or ward of a borough or town, each part shall be treated as a separate registration unit;
and references to parishes or parts of parishes shall be construed as references to registration units.

(5) The power of the registration officer in certain cases, to require the overseers to perform duties in connection with registration under this Act shall be construed in all cases as an obligation upon him to require each person holding the office of overseer to perform duties analogous to the duties which, but for the passing of this Act, would have been performed by that person by virtue of his office under the enactments relative to registration in force at the commencement of this Act, and it shall be the duty of every such person to comply with those requirements.

(6) The overseers shall be entitled to payment for services performed and expenses incurred by them in the execution of any duties under these rules. The payments shall be made at such times as may be fixed by order of the Local Government Board for Ire land under this Schedule, and any sum. payable to an overseer under this provision shall be treated for the purposes of this Act as part of the expenses of the registration officer on whose requisition the services were performed or the expenses were incurred.

This provision shall apply to any superintendent registrar of births and. deaths or clerk of the union who is not an existing clerk of the union, so far as respects lists or information supplied by him in connection with deaths or persons in receipt of poor relief in like manner as it applies to overseers.

13. It shall be the duty of the registration officer to publish a list of the names of persons to whose registration notice of objection has been given as soon as practicable after the seventh day of March in the ease of the spring register and the fourth day of September in the case of the autumn register.

Lords Amendments:

In Rule 2, leave out the words "entitled to vote only," and insert instead thereof the words "not entitled to vote.''— Agreed to.

In Rule 3, leave out the words "include in" ["and include in the register"], and insert instead thereof the words "add as a. supplement to."—Agreed to.

Leave out the word "as" ["as a separate list"].—Agreed to.

Leave out the words "for the whole registration area, or, where the area includes more than one constituency, for each constituency in the area," and insert instead thereof the words "each polling district in the registration."

The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Sir G. Cave)

I beg to move, "That this House doth disagree with the Lords in the said Amendment"

Sir W. DICKINSON

This has relation to the absent voters, and it is proposed to put the absent voter in two places on the register. At one time I took objection to that. I thought it was not advisable to put them on the regular register and also on the supplemental register. I believe there has been a difference of opinion between the experts as to the advisability of it; and the experts have advised the Home Office that it would be better to put the name in two places on the register. There are objections to having the names twice, on the ground of impersonation. I do riot think there is any provision for insisting that the absent voter's name on the ordinary lists shall have a distinctive mark. It is absolutely essential that that should be so; but in the rule as to the marking of the register there is no provision to ensure that. I think it might be done by regulation afterwards. It is very essential that if a man is an absent voter and his name is put on the absent voters' list there should be no possibility of his giving a vote or somebody else giving a vote for him in respect of the name on the ordinary list.

Sir G. CAVE

The only object of the Amendment would be to require that the absent voters' list should be divided into polling districts and should be available either as a whole or in parts for the polling districts. I quite appreciate the point which the right hon. Gentleman has raised, and I think it can be done by regulations or orders. I think it ought to be dons, and I will call attention to it.

Lords Amendment disagreed with.

Lords Amendment:

In Rule 3, leave out the words "a list of those," and insert instead thereof the words "of persons."—Disagreed with.

Sir G. CAVE

I beg to move, at the end of Rule 3, to insert the words "every such list shall be made out according to polling districts."

Amendment agreed to.

Lords Amendments:

In Rule 4, leave out the word "Parliamentary," and insert instead thereof the word "municipal."—Disagreed with.

Leave out the words "situated in a Parliamentary county," and insert instead thereof the words "not situated in a municipal borough."—Disagreed with.

In Rule 7, after the word "to" ["to prepare the electors' lists"], insert the words "make the necessary inquiries and to."—Agreed to.

After the word "unit" ["unit on his behalf"], insert the words "and publish the lists in the unit."—Agreed to.

At the end of Rule 8, insert the words "or made by or sent to him under Section twenty-four of the Municipal Elections (Corrupt and Illegal Practices) Act, 1884."—Agreed to.

In Rule 10, after the word "claim" ["The form of a claim"], insert the words "for a person making a claim on his own behalf."

Sir G. CAVE

I beg to move, "That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said Amendment."

Mr. M. HEALY

Will the right hon. Gentleman say what is the object of the Amendment? I think it is meant to dispense with the personal claim. In Committee we inserted words which made it necessary for the voter to make a personal claim, but there are difficulties in regard to that, and I hope the right hon. Gentleman is going to make provision to enable a claim to be made, not necessarily personally, but by somebody else.

The PRESIDENT of the LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. Hayes Fisher)

We intend that the claim can be made by somebody else, and that he need not make it on his own behalf. Unless these words are put in it appears that certain penalties may be attached to persons who claim on behalf of somebody else. This Amendment is to enable the registration officers to take the claim from some other person and to prevent any penalties being imposed upon that person or to make it difficult for him to make a claim on behalf of somebody else.

Lords Amendment agreed to.

Lords Amendments:

At the end of Rule 10, insert the words "Where a claim is made on behalf of a claimant by another person, the registration officer shall not enter the name of the claimant on the register, unless the matters required to be stated in the declaration under the foregoing provision are proved to his satisfaction."—Agreed to.

After Rule 13, insert as a new rule,

"(14) It shall be the duty of the registration officer to publish a list of the names of persons to whose registration notice of objection has been given not later than the twenty-first day of February in the case of the spring register and not later than the twenty-first day of August in the case of the autumn register."—Agreed

In Rule 13 (a), after "persons" ["the names of persons"], insert the words "included in the list of claimants."—Agreed to.

In Rule 14, leave out the words "before the fifteenth," and insert the words "not later than the eighteenth."—Agreed to.

After the word "claimant," insert the words "if registered."—Agreed to.

In Rule 15, leave out the words "person registered as a."—Agreed to.

After Rule 15, insert as a new Rule: