HC Deb 21 May 1979 vol 967 cc837-46

10.21 p.m.

Miss Janet Fookes (Plymouth, Drake)

I am grateful to you, Mr. Speaker, for your indulgence in allowing me to delay my speech until most hon. Members who wish to depart have done so. It seems an opportune moment, immediately after a general election, to raise again the vexed issue of the way in which the spouses of Service personnel vote. This mostly affects wives, and I shall therefore refer to them as Service wives for the remainder of my speech. This has been a problem for Service personnel ever since 1918, when separate registration was introduced. There have been a number of inquiries—four, I believe—and no less than five pieces of legislation. Somehow, it has never been quite right. The last attempt in 1976, though laudable in its intention, actually had the reverse effect of what was intended. The Service wives were furious about the new arrangements.

There were three major changes. First, the wives were to be regarded as Service personnel instead of civilians, as before. Secondly, they had the right then to have a proxy appointed even while they were in the United Kingdom. That arrangement had previously appertained only if they were overseas with their husbands. Thirdly, once registered they were enabled not to have to register yearly as before so long as the husband's Service registration was in force. That may appear to be an improvement on the previous situation, bearing in mind the fact that many Service personnel are constantly uprooted.

But the road to hell, Mr. Speaker, as you well know, is paved with good intentions. Far from pleasing Service wives, it infuriated them. There was a more complicated procedure for them to follow. They had to receive a form, usually via their husbands, though I believe that it is now being sent to them direct. It was a green form, which roused them to this pitch of fury, requiring a more than usual number of details, including the husband's Service number and rank and various other details. All this had to be attested by a responsible person, either of a certain rank within the Armed Forces or such persons as justices of the peace or priests—the kind of people who will normally do so for a passport.

Ever since this system came into force, I have had personal representations from Service wives, either individually or as deputations. I well recall one angry deputation which arrived at my advice bureau. I believe that my colleagues with Service constituencies will all say the same.

Let me briefly rehearse the objections of the Service wives. First, there is a major point of principle. They object, as civilians, to being treated as Service personnel. They think that it places them in a dependent and humiliating position. In an age when equality of opportunity and equality between the sexes is perhaps more prized and more in evidence than ever before, they are not prepared to be treated as appendages of their husbands.

Secondly, they object to the system of attestation—the counter—signing which, they feel also, is not needed in civilian life and which they do not see the necessity for if they are Service men's wives. Thirdly, they feel that the system of sending them their forms is chancy. Depending on whether the husbands are careful or careless, they either get the forms or they do not. If there is any kind of marital disagreement, they are not likely to get the forms. One or two have said that their husbands' views differ from their own, and the husbands do not present them with the forms.

There are all these permutations. It seems strange that this kind of official form should rely on someone else carrying it home. It reminds me of my teaching days, when the school would send notes to parents via the children and be surprised when the parents did not always receive them.

Mr. Antony Buck (Colchester)

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, both for raising this important subject and for what she is saying. Does she agree that an additional factor is that the "S" marked on the register would have security connotations in Northern Ireland?

Miss Fookes

My hon. and learned friend has anticipated the remarks that I was about to make. This is of particular concern where Service personnel do a tour in Northern Ireland; that is not a feeling that should be dismissed lightly.

So we have all these objections in principle, and certainly in practice at the last general election a number of things went wrong. I am very much indebted to the Forces Wives' Association, which operates in the Plymouth and Bodmin area, for a great deal of information.

Mrs. Watkins, of that association, was so concerned about the various tales of woe that came forth that the association did a survey of its own. It canvassed about 277 Service wives between 28 April and 5 May. It found that of that number 178 were not eligible to vote. Others in great numbers objected to the attesting and to the "S" beside their names on the register. They also raised various other objections.

I was not able to get from the electoral registration officer for the Plymouth area any up-to-date figures of those who might have failed to put themselves on the register, but there was certainly a drop of no less, than 45 per cent. from the old register to the new—that is, from 1977 to 1978. Although that position has improved, it means that there are still large numbers of women not able to vote.

Partly this is because some of them refused on principle to register but in other cases it is because those who went through all the motions still found, to their horror, that they were not registered, or that they were on one register but not carried through to the next. One of the objects of the 1976 legislation was to prevent that.

What should be done? The Service wives have no doubt about what they want. They want the option either to be treated as civilian voters or as Service men for the purpose of registration. That seems a reasonable request. I hope that my hon. Friend will examine that seriously. At least there should be a post mortem on present procedures, because many things are wrong.

I should like to see the process of attestation abolished and the "S" deleted. Those are minimum requirements. I endorse the demand by Service wives for an optional system.

Mr. Robert Hicks (Bodmin)

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Drake (Miss Fookes;) on raising this important subject. Both the chairman and secretary of the Forces Wives' Association are my constituents. The new Minister should conduct an inquiry into the effects of the Act. Clearly it is not working as effectively as it should. Service wives object to the discrimination. I support my hon. Friend.

Miss Fookes

I am glad of the support of my hon. Friend the Member for Bodmin (Mr. Hicks). It is essential to make it as easy as possible for people to exercise the right to vote. It is a supreme irony that those deprived of their vote are dependent for their livelihood on the attitude of the Government of the day. If anyone has a vested interest in voting, it is a member of this group. I hope that the Minister will give us some cause for hope after all the frustration and anger felt by Service wives.

Several Hon. Members

rose—

Mr. Speaker

Order. For the sake of new hon. Members, I should explain that the only way that they can be called to speak on an Adjournment debate which is not their own is by reaching an agreement with the hon. Member whose debate it is and with the Minister. Both must agree.

10.33 p.m.

Mr. Peter Viggers (Gosport)

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Drake (Miss Fookes) for allowing me to show the support expressed from many parts of the country for what she is now asking of the Minister. I congratulate her on being the first to raise this important matter.

There is a widespread sense of outrage among Service wives that they are debarred from voting in the normal way. This is felt strongly in my constituency, which has more Service wives than any other constituency. Many of us were unable to move the previous Government. I hope that the present Government show more sensitivity.

10.34 p.m.

The Minister of State, Home Office (Mr. Leon Brittan)

I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Drake (Miss Fookes) that it is timely to debate an electoral topic so close to the recent election campaign. However, there can never be a wrong time to debate a matter such as this which affects so closely a fundamental right of our citizens.

I am delighted to be making my debut at the Dispatch Box on this subject. The Government attach the greatest possible importance to the right to take part in elections without undue difficulty or hindrance, bureaucratic or otherwise.

The House has not been slow to pay attention to the problem of Service personnel and their wives. Hon Members from both sides of the House, particularly those with concentrations of Service personnel in their constituencies, have taken particular interest. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Drake and to my hon. Friend the Member for Gosport (Mr. Viggers), who raised the matter on several occasions during the last Parliament. I also pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Woking (Mr. Onslow), whose legislation was passed, as well as the work of Lord Lloyd of Kilgerran.

I am sure that my hon. Friend will understand if I am not yet in a position, two weeks after taking office, to say precisely when all the matters that she has described can be set right. What I can say, however—and I wish to say it in the clearest terms—is that the Government fully accept the need for change, particularly in the registration arrangements of the wives and husbands of Service personnel who are resident in the United Kingdom.

Unlike our predecessors, we do not consider that just because the arrangements have been changed once quite recently they must therefore be left as they are for some years before further action can be taken, however unsatisfactory the present situation may be.

It may assist the House if I briefly review the general arrangements for Service registration which were introduced in 1976. They were based on a recommendation from Mr. Speaker's Conference on electoral law. I am glad to say that in many respects the 1976 Act, which was sponsored by my hon. Friend the Member for Woking and supported by many Conservative Members of Parliament as well as by the Government, has worked well. Before the 1976 arrangements were introduced, registration of Service personnel was running at a rate of 25 per cent. or less of those eligible. Since then the overall rate of registration has significantly improved, to a present level, on the 1979 register, of about 45 per cent.

That may still appear unsatisfactory in comparison with a civilian rate of registration of 95 per cent. and above, but it must be remembered that Service registration is voluntary and is therefore bound to be less complete than civilian registration. The most significant point about these statistics is that the increase, which is very satisfactory, is cumulative. As a result of the 1976 Act, a Service man's registration is not an annual obligation; it is permanent. There is no question of his or her losing the franchise because of a change of duty or a move to a new address. I believe, therefore, that the basic change brought about by the 1976 Act was a change for the better.

However, two major difficulties have come to light which have been most penetratingly analysed by my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Drake. The first is that under the 1976 Act all wives and husbands of serving Service personnel were taken into the Service voting scheme. It was felt, no doubt with good intention, that this would be to their advantage. Many wives of Service personnel suffer the same disruption of their personal circumstances as do members of the Services themselves.

It was thought that wives of Service men moving both abroad and around the United Kingdom would actually benefit from permanent registration. However, it is now clear that the arrangements that were made in the 1976 Act do not fully reflect the wishes and needs of many spouses of Service personnel, as my hon. Friend so clearly pointed out, and especially the wishes and needs of the wives of Service men, many of them particularly placed in the naval centres of Plymouth, Portsmouth and Gosport, but also elsewhere in the country.

It is clear that many of these electors who had long resided in the same area in the United Kingdom, perhaps at the same address, and who had been accustomed to sending in each year their registration form to the electoral registration officer as civilians, greatly resent a system that requires them first to make a declaration as a Service voter and then to have this countersigned by an officer, a non-commissioned officer, or a public official. They resent both the principle and the procedures. Despite efforts made by the Home Office and the local authorities to explain the procedure and to ensure that wives were able to forward their forms direct to registration officers, many Service wives have, I regret to say, consistently refused to be registered.

We clearly cannot allow this to continue. I therefore wish to inform the House that the Government accept the need for change in the operation of the Service scheme as it affects Service wives. I see no objection in principle to the scheme which was set out in the Bill introduced by Lord Lloyd in the previous Session of Parliament whereby wives would have the option of registering either as civilian or Service voters. There may, of course, be practical details to be sorted out and we shall consult electoral registration officers about these. I must make it clear that it will not, unfortunately, be possible, even given our sense of urgency, for us to make changes in time for the next round of registration for the 1980 electoral register, as that will begin with the distribution of forms in the late summer.

I hope that in view of the Government's clear acceptance of the need for change in the system many of those wives, especially, who have not registered under the present system will now consider registering even under a procedure that they understandably, and in my view justifiably, dislike. There will be local elections next year in many areas. There is inevitably the possibility of parliamentary or European Assembly by-elections. Having won the Government over to the principle, I hope that Service wives will feel that there is no longer the need or the point to make the gesture of refusing to register under the present unsatisfactory arrangements.

I urn to the second area, covering matters that affect all Service voters, and not only spouses, where the Service scheme causes anxieties. I know that there are strong feelings, for example, about the "S" marking on the electoral register, for many of the reasons advanced in the debate. That marking predates the 1976 Act. There is a feeling that the special marking exposes Service men to unwanted attention and possibly even risk. I am assured that there is no evidence of that, but the fact that the feeling is there and that it discourages registration is important. I see no difficulty in principle, subject to the consultations that I have mentioned, in dropping the "S" marking.

Similarly, I am aware of the dissatisfaction that exists over the procedure for attestation of Service declarations, or counter-signing. Such a procedure was introduced because it was felt that the electoral registration officer receiving a form from a Service man would not be able to conduct the local inquiries and checks that may be made on an electoral registration form that he receives from his immediate locality. One can see the sense in that, or at least the logic, but I appreciate that it can and does appear to many as an unnecessary interference in the citizen's right to register. We should devise a system that makes more use of the information that is already held centrally by the Ministry of Defence on potential Service voters and does not involve the use of the objectionable attestation procedure that is found by many to be humiliating. If electoral registration officers have doubts, they may make a cross-check with the indices held by the Ministry.

I hope that on all these points I have been able to indicate a willingness to meet the legitimate concerns that have rightly and forcefully been expressed by my hon. Friend, and that she will be able to reassure her constituents.

Mr Cranley Onslow (Woking)

I express to my hon. and learned Friend my thanks for the improvements that he will make to the legislation that I was fortunate enough to pass through the House. All Private Members' Bills are imperfect, as are many Government measures, and clearly the legislation that I introduced is an example. As my hon. and learned Friend is in such a receptive frame of mind, I make one more plea. I ask him to reconsider the registration of the adult dependants of Service men when they are with their Service families overseas. That is another area that needs tidying.

Mr. Brittan

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising that question. I take the matter fully aboard.

I hope that the tenor or my remarks indicates that it is the Government's intention to take whatever steps are necessary to ensure that the franchise of those in the services, and that of their spouses and other connected with them, may be readily exercised and is protected from any unnecessary bureaucratic interference with its exercise.

Question put and agreed to

Adjourned accordingly at fifteen minutes to Eleven o'clock.