NEW SYSTEM OF ELECTORAL REGISTRATION.

HC Deb 12 January 2000 vol 342 cc306-38

Amendment moved [15 December]: No. 1, in page 2, line 44, leave out from "elector" to end of line 2 on page 3.—[Mr. Kaufman.]

The Second Deputy Chairman

I remind the Committee that with this we are discussing the following: Amendment No. 2, in clause 8, page 10, line 11, leave out ", 2".

Amendment No. 3, in page 10, line 14, leave out from beginning to "and" in line 15.

Amendment No. 4, in schedule 1, page 19, line 28, leave out from "declarations" to end of line 29.

Amendment No. 5, in page 26, leave out lines 28 to 31.

Amendment No. 47, in schedule 2, page 27, line 33, leave out "20" and insert "5".

Amendment No. 48, in page 27, line 33, leave out "20" and insert "10".

Amendment No. 49, in page 27, line 42, leave out "20" and insert "5".

Amendment No. 50, in page 27, line 42, leave out '20' and insert "10".

Amendment No. 82, in page 28, line 2, at end insert— (4A) The third set of conditions is that—

1. (a) he was included in a register of parliamentary electors in respect of an address at a place that is situated within the constituency concerned,
2. (b) that entry in the register was made on the basis that he was resident, or to be treated for the purposes of registration as resident, at that address, and
3. (c) he either, prior to ceasing to be a resident of the United Kingdom, signed a declaration stating an intention to return to the United Kingdom to live within ten years of departure, or, alternatively, he continues to pay income tax annually in the United Kingdom.".

Amendment No. 51, in page 30, line 23, leave out "20" and insert "5".

Amendment No. 52, in page 30, line 23, leave out "20" and insert "10".

Amendment No. 53, in page 30, line 32, leave out "20" and insert "5".

Amendment No. 54, in page 30, line 32, leave out "20" and insert "10".

Schedule 2 stand part.

Amendment No. 7, in schedule 4, page 34, leave out lines 52 and 53.

Amendment No. 8, in page 35, line 19, leave out from "connection" to end of line 20.

New clause 1—British citizens overseas— .—(1) Sections 1 to 4 and subsections (1) and (2) of section 12 of the Representation of the People Act 1985, as amended by the Representation of the People Act 1989, are hereby repealed. (2) In section 3C of the European Parliamentary Elections Act 1978 (as inserted by the European Parliamentary Elections Act 1999), in subsection (2), paragraph (b) and the word 'or' at the end of paragraph (a) shall be omitted.

Mr. Gerald Kaufman (Manchester, Gorton)

When my speech was interrupted on 15 December, I was about to take an intervention from the hon. Member for Lichfield (Mr. Fabricant). There has been a more prolonged intervention in my speech—namely the entire Second Reading of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Bill, which the House had on Monday. In that debate, my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary made an announcement about the content of clause 130 of the Bill, which deals with the subject of this amendment and the others being taken with it. I found both clause 130 and what my right hon. Friend had to say profoundly unsatisfactory. I very much hope that what he said is not the last word. I will come to that in a moment.

I would like to resume the argument that I was putting to the House when the debate was adjourned just under four weeks ago. When we talk about the overseas vote, Opposition Members seem to indicate that my amendment would remove some major right. In fact, this fancy franchise is a flop. The hon. Member for Ribble Valley (Mr. Evans) has fantasised in this House about possibly 3 million overseas voters being removed if my amendment were accepted.

When the Conservative Government introduced the overseas vote, they did so unilaterally and not as a matter of consensus, as the present Government are seeking with this Bill. They introduced the measure against my opposition, as shadow Home Secretary, and that of the party which I represented.

Mr. Greenway

The intervening period has allowed us the opportunity for further research. When I seek to catch your eye later, Mr. Lord, I will give the right hon. Gentleman the benefit of the consistency that he has shown. However, he cannot say that there was no consensus on that matter. In its report in the 1982–83 Session, the Select Committee on Home Affairs unanimously supported a recommendation that all UK citizens registered in EEC countries should be permitted to vote in British parliamentary elections. The thoroughness of the report indicated that there was cross-party consensus for there to be overseas electors, and the subsequent legislation sought to implement that report.

Mr. Kaufman

That is not what emerged from the 1984 debates. The Home Affairs Committee in that Parliament took the view that there should not be an overseas vote, and did so unanimously. It is as simple as that.

Whether or not that is so, let us look at what the Conservative Government of the day envisaged might happen—and what might happen, let us be clear, on the basis of the seven-year period with which they started. They forecast that there would be 800 overseas votes per constituency in the seven years, representing half a million overseas voters. The latest figure—for last year— was 13,677: 21 per constituency. That is the extent of this huge, allegedly unalienable right, introduced in any case only 16 years ago, that the Conservative party persists in demanding.

The greatest number registered—I mean people registered to vote, not actual votes registered—throughout that period was 34,454 in 1991, which is 53 per constituency or 0.08 per cent. of the electorate. In 1990, the figure fell to 1,836—on the kindest possible calculation, that is 0.00 per cent. of the electorate—and that was after legislation extending the period to 20 years.

The amendment is not designed to stifle an insatiable demand for democracy among expatriates.

Mr. Graham Brady (Altrincham and Sale, West)

The right hon. Gentleman has explained that few people want to take advantage of the right that they have, but does not the fact that those few people do take advantage of it suggest that they feel strongly that they want to participate in the national life of their mother country, and is not that a good argument for continuing with that right?

Mr. Kaufman

A more direct way of their participating in our national life would be for them to live here rather than trying to affect directly how the country is governed after 20 years abroad.

The hon. Gentleman has intervened at a felicitous moment, because I was coming to the effect that even that tiny number of people can have. I see in the Chamber my hon. Friend the Member for Vale of Glamorgan (Mr. Smith), whose return to the House we welcomed in 1997. He was defeated in the 1992 general election by 19 votes, after three counts; 65 overseas votes were registered; 38 were cast by proxy—the majority from South Africa—and the proxies were well-known local Conservative party activists. He was out of the House for five years, not because the people of Vale of Glamorgan did not want him as their Member of Parliament but because a small group of Conservatives in the constituency defeated him on behalf of people who would never have been represented by him one way or the other.

Mr. John Smith (Vale of Glamorgan)

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. I believe that I am the only Member of Parliament ever to have lost a seat in a general election when the majority of votes cast by constituents resident in the constituency supported that candidate. He may not be aware of the sense of outrage in the constituency after the 1992 result, which I believe was reflected in the 1997 election, at which I gained the largest majority ever seen in the seat.

Mr. Kaufman

That experience illustrates the illegitimacy of the fancy franchise introduced unilaterally by the Conservative party and multiplied by four in the periodicity deliberately to suit itself: not to enfranchise the electorate but to enhance its own electoral prospects, as can be seen by the incidence of application to be registered.

5.30 pm

It is not simply that the services of my hon. Friend were denied to the House for five years, but that—given a tiny quirk of the vote in other constituencies—the overseas vote could have affected the government of the country. In the 1992 election, the overall Conservative majority was only 21. Eleven seats the other way and the Conservative party would not have had a majority. It would have lost the election and probably been replaced by the Labour party, even though it did not have an overall majority.

The overseas vote can decide not only who wins or loses in an individual constituency, but who governs a country in which large numbers of people who apply for the vote have chosen not to live for a generation and in which their children may never have lived at all. Tax exiles can decide the Government who decide what the taxes are. The right hon. and learned Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Mr. Hogg), who was an Undersecretary at the Home Office when the second piece of legislation went through, admitted the position. He said that it might be true that the legislation would extend the franchise to a number of people who might be described as tax dodgers and thus were perhaps unworthy. Of course, the Conservative party may draw its most devoted support from that sort of person.

Mr. Simon Hughes

Before we leave the subject of the Vale of Glamorgan example, can the right hon. Gentleman tell us whether the overseas voters in that constituency in the 1992 general election had never had a connection with the constituency? Is that also part of his case, or had they had a connection but left to live overseas? There is a huge difference between the allegation that votes were cast in Vale of Glamorgan on behalf of people who had no link with the area and the allegation that the right to vote was exercised, under the rules of the time, by people who lived abroad but had a secure link to the area.

Mr. Kaufman

I do not accept the distinction that the hon. Gentleman seeks to draw. He may regard my view as banal and elementary, but I believe that if one wants to decide the Government of a country, one should at least have the courtesy to live there. The hon. Gentleman earlier raised the case of his brother. Although I know that the Liberal Democrat party has a different policy for every street, having a different policy for every brother would be taking things too far.

Mr. John Bercow (Buckingham)

I am especially interested in this point because two relatives of mine live in Palma, although as far as I am aware they do not live there because I live here. They have both contributed substantially to this country over a long time and have paid, and continue to pay, taxes in this country. They are not worthy objects of the right hon. Gentleman's waspish denigration. Why should not they have an opportunity to contribute to the democratic process in this country when they have contributed substantially to its fortunes?

Mr. Kaufman

I am sure that if the hon. Gentleman's relatives wished to get away from him they would have moved further than the Balearic islands, and perhaps they should consider that in their future residential dispositions.

The vote in this country is based on residential qualification. People who live abroad and have some sentimental or fiscal connection with this country are not in the same position as those who live here and are subject to the decisions of Parliament and the Government.

My approach to the matter is extremely simplistic, which makes me impervious to interventions such as that from the hon. Gentleman. If I were to approach the matter on an "if and but" basis, I would be vulnerable, but the hon. Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway) pointed out that my position on the matter has been consistent for 16 years. I intend to maintain that position until my colleagues on the Front Bench—so brilliant in so many other ways—learn the appropriate lesson on this issue.

Mr. Michael Fabricant (Lichfield)

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Kaufman

I will give way to the hon. Gentleman as, before he came into the Chamber, I was pointing out that he sought to intervene when I was speaking four weeks ago.

Mr. Fabricant

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman, who is right to say that I tried to intervene on him in the previous century. However, he cannot have it both ways. He said that, given the small numbers involved, he was not trying to make a party political point, but then he gave the example of the 1992 election result in the Vale of Glamorgan constituency, which he clearly considers to be a party political matter.

How does the right hon. Gentleman know the outcome of that election? It was a secret ballot. How does he know that the overseas voters in the Vale of Glamorgan election all voted Conservative? After all, the Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the hon. Member for Neath (Mr. Hain), was born in South Africa and lived there for a long time. He used to be so left wing that it is doubtful that he would have been able to get into the new Labour party. However, he certainly is not, and has never been, a Conservative. Is the right hon. Gentleman making an uncharacteristically spiteful political point, or not?

The Temporary Chairman (Mr. Nicholas Winterton)

Order. Before the right hon. Gentleman replies, I urge hon. Members who intervene to do so briefly and succinctly, so as to ensure an orderly debate.

Mr. Kaufman

I am interested that the hon. Member for Lichfield assumes that, if a point is political, it must be spiteful. As far as I am concerned, I am making a party political point. I often make such points, and have spent a lifetime doing so. The case that I am arguing has natural justice on its side, but I am also putting it forward on behalf of the Labour party. I was elected by my constituents to act on behalf of the Labour party, and I shall continue to do so.

When my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary introduced the Bill on Monday, he said that he was going to reduce the period of the overseas vote from 20 years to 10 years. He then said that the Select Committee on Home Affairs had recommended a reduction to five years. My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State knows the amity that I bear for the Government—if amity can be regarded as a synonym for grovelling sycophancy. However, as Chairman of a different Select Committee, I sometimes wonder what the point of Select Committees is if Governments are able to ignore their recommendations.

The previous Government ignored the recommendation of a Select Committee and introduced the overseas vote. This Government saw what a Select Committee of this House, in this Parliament, said on the matter, and decided to ignore it. I do not see the point of Select Committees doing all the work that they do if Governments then brush their conclusions aside.

Mr. Martin Linton (Battersea)

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

Mr. Kaufman

I will certainly give way to my hon. Friend in a moment.

We should be clear that we are considering a franchise which the previous Conservative Government introduced, despite strong opposition from Labour. The period initially proposed was seven years; under pressure, the then Government proposed to reduce that period to five years. Now my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary believes that he is doing justice to the issue by reducing the period to double what the Conservative party originally regarded as acceptable. That simply is not satisfactory. Ten years is far too long—there could be three general elections during that period.

Is clause 130 of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Bill set in stone, or will the Government consider amendments to it on their merits? If so, I shall seek to table an amendment to that Bill comparable to the one before us. Are the Government at least ready to consider the five-year period recommended by the Select Committee and originally introduced by the Conservative Government 15 years ago? I would like to be able to work with the Government on this issue, but one needs a certain amount of flexibility if their most loyal supporters are not to become—on one issue, at any rate—a little disenchanted with them.

I hope that the Minister will respond in a way that will allow me to withdraw the amendment and seek to table another one to the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Bill. Before I sit down, I give way to my hon. Friend the Member for Battersea (Mr. Linton), as I said I would. One must be courteous to one's colleagues.

Mr. Linton

I thank my right hon. Friend for giving way. I agree that there is no harm in being accused of making party political points. After all, we are elected to this place as members of political parties. However, I remind the House that the Home Affairs Committee report had unanimous support from members of all three parties in recommending a reduction from 20 years to five. That policy was overturned by the Opposition only when they realised that the implication of that would be to deprive them of the monthly cheque for £83,000 from Mr. Michael Ashcroft. That is a clear case of changing policy for cash.

Mr. Kaufman

The best way to deal with what one might call the Ashcroft issue would be to abolish the overseas vote. The problem would be solved just like that. However, I accept what my hon. Friend says.

Mr. Fabricant

As I said earlier, the right hon. Gentleman has taken an uncharacteristically partisan approach. He said in the last century that he has been consistent—

Mr. Kaufman

Will the hon. Gentleman please stop talking about the last century? We are in the 20th century until midnight on 31 December this year. Let us at least get that right.

Mr. Fabricant

The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely correct. In fact, the former Dean of Lichfield, the Very Reverend Dr. Tom Wright, who has now moved to Westminster abbey, pointed this out to me. I had avoided the great cliche of saying the last millennium, but I can certainly refer to the last year.

Mr. Bercow

Will my hon. Friend give way?

Mr. Fabricant

I shall certainly give way to my hon. Friend, whom I know to be an expert on dates, among so many other things.

Mr. Bercow

My hon. Friend will recall that the right hon. Gentleman said only a few moments ago that he had displayed either grovelling sycophancy towards the Government or, at any rate, a suitable synonym for such grovelling sycophancy. Has he not just demonstrated, by his very sound attitude to the advent of the millennium next year, that he has done no such thing?

5.45 pm

The Temporary Chairman

Order. Interventions must be relevant, and must relate to the matter that we are debating. They should not be about whether we are or are not in the new millennium.

Mr. Fabricant

Thank you for your advice, Mr. Winterton.

Last year, the right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Kaufman) said that he had been consistent on this matter. He said, in fact, that he had said as early as 27 June 1984 that people who live overseas should not have the right to vote. However, his consistency does not necessarily mean that he is right. In fact, for once, the right hon. Gentleman may be desperately wrong. Those who live abroad—whether or not they pay United Kingdom tax—have an interest in the country whose nationality they choose to keep. If one chooses to live abroad, one may seek to become a citizen of the country where one lives. That does not necessarily bring tax disadvantages—it may bring an advantage—but if someone chooses to remain a citizen of the UK, he or she has an inherent interest in how the country is governed.

People may also have a fiscal interest, no matter whether they pay taxes in the UK. The rules of double taxation mean that someone who does not pay tax in the UK will still pay tax elsewhere. The Government claim— not always correctly—that they levy low taxation, although it is rising. There may be no fiscal advantage to living overseas. One may still have a financial interest in the UK if one is not paying tax here. Many people own property, although, of course, they pay property taxes. Many people have friends and relatives who pay tax. Many people who live overseas have trusts in the UK for the benefit of relatives or others, and those would be subject to UK taxation and affected by the economy and welfare of the nation. The whole point of voting at a general election is to try to decide what is best for our nation on tax, welfare and the economy.

It is fundamentally wrong to argue that those who live overseas should not have the right to vote. Despite the right hon. Gentleman's protestations, I believe that the amendment is politically motivated, and that is quite wrong. Over the years, it has been felt in the House of Commons that issues such as voting rights—whether by first past the post or proportional representation, for example—should be proceeded with by means of consensus. It is for that reason that the Committee stage is being taken on the Floor of the House rather than in Standing Committee.

The right hon. Gentleman's amendment is fundamentally wrong. We decide whether or not people should vote entirely according to their ability to make a choice. Voting is a function of age and ability. I believe that it is still illegal for people living in mental institutions to vote. There may be changes in the law, and perhaps the Minister would clarify the point.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Mike O'Brien)

indicated dissent.

Mr. Fabricant

They are not banned from voting?

Mr. O'Brien

indicated assent.

Mr. Fabricant

In the past, there was a principle that those who had been committed could not vote.

Mr. Richard Shepherd (Aldridge-Brownhills)

I seek elucidation. Is not new clause 1 discriminatory in the sense that, if I were rich and lived abroad but could afford a home in this country—or owned a house on which I paid rates—I should be entitled to vote? I should be on the electoral register, even though I did not have to pay taxes because I should be in the country for only 12 weeks in a year. Surely, the new clause discriminates in favour of the rich, who can afford to have a second home in Britain. The central point seems to be that of citizenship— perhaps my hon. Friend can help me in this matter.

Mr. Fabricant

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The central point is not whether people are rich or poor, but the perception of whether they are likely to vote Labour or Conservative. My hon. Friend, whose constituency almost abuts my own, is right to state that the whole question is one of citizenship. As I pointed out in my preamble, people who are prepared to remain part of the United Kingdom by retaining British citizenship, despite the fact that to do so might disadvantage them fiscally when they are living abroad, are proving their interest in the welfare of the UK. Is that not right? Surely, if one is a citizen of a democracy, one's most fundamental right is the right to vote.

It is all very well for Labour Members to say from time to time, "No representation without taxation"—a strange reversal of the war cry of the Americans when they sought independence—but that is not the case. Many poor people, who do not pay tax, voted Labour—quite rightly so. Sadly, after two and a half years, more poor people pay tax than was the case before the Government came to power. However, the Labour party does not claim that because people do not pay tax, they should not be allowed to vote. That would be a return to the 19th century.

Mr. Bercow

I do not think that my hon. Friend has entirely done justice to the intervention of my hon. Friend the Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr. Shepherd). Does he agree that this matter is extremely significant for the right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Kaufman)? It would be a damning indictment of his amendment if its effect—deliberate or inadvertent—were to protect people living abroad who own property in this country, at the expense of people living abroad who do not.

Mr. Fabricant

My hon. Friend is absolutely correct; the measure is discriminatory. We should discriminate on one factor and on one factor only: United Kingdom citizenship. If people choose to remain citizens of the UK, whether that advantages or disadvantages them fiscally is irrelevant. If they remain members of the UK, there should be no discrimination against them; they should be allowed to vote.

Mr. Linton

The hon. Gentleman said that his hon. Friends the Members for Buckingham (Mr. Bercow) and for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr. Shepherd) are both right. In fact, they are both wrong. It is not enough to spend the night of 10 October in some residence in Britain in order to qualify for a vote; the qualification depends on where one is resident on that date. To be resident—whether for electoral or income tax purposes—one has normally to reside at a place. People who are normally resident overseas would not qualify for a vote in the UK, even if they owned a house in this country and spent the night of 10 October there. That has not been tested in the courts, but it is the understanding of electoral registration officers.

Mr. Fabricant

The hon. Gentleman is right. Technically, one has to be resident. After all, many Members of Parliament own more than one home, especially if their constituency is beyond commuting distance from Westminster. Technically, people have to be resident not only on the day, but on that very evening. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right on that point. However, we all know that, in practice, that is not the interpretation. Hon. Members or electors may not be at home on that night, so they may not be technically resident. In that case, the electoral returning officer might say, "Perhaps they are away on business or on holiday." The form is not filled in with the idea that one has to be present on that night.

Mr. Harry Barnes (North-East Derbyshire)

The point under discussion would have been clarified to some extent if my amendment to prevent double registration had been accepted. That would have made it clear that one is supposed to register where one is fully resident. It would have avoided having people flitting about—as MPs do— and being registered in different places. That was a worthwhile amendment; it would have helped to clarify new clause 1, which I hope to defend later.

Mr. Fabricant

I am not sure whether I shall vote with the hon. Gentleman—I shall listen to the arguments—but I have some sympathy with what he said last year. If the Government are to introduce, in due course, a national register of electors, that would be an especially effective way of ensuring that people do not vote twice in two constituencies for the same assembly—whether that be Parliament or one of the regional assemblies that I so abhor.

Mr. Bercow

I am sorry to trouble my hon. Friend again, but his speech is so interesting that it provokes interventions. As the law stands, and given the failure of the amendment tabled by the hon. Member for North-East Derbyshire (Mr. Barnes), is not the hon. Member for Battersea (Mr. Linton) factually wrong? At present, it is perfectly legitimate for people to be on the electoral register at two addresses, so long as they vote only in respect of one of them.

Mr. Fabricant

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Indeed, I pointed out that if the amendment tabled by the hon. Member for North-East Derbyshire had been accepted, it would have prevented someone from voting twice in two constituencies for one assembly. Perhaps we could have some clarification from Ministers of whether it is still legal for someone, such as a student, to vote twice for two different assemblies—that is, to vote at home with a postal vote for a local council and, in the same election, to vote for a different council in the university town in which he is living—I see that the Minister agrees. The hon. Gentleman's amendment would have ensured that there could not be multiple voting for the same assembly.

Mr. Linton

Just to ensure that the House does not suffer under a misapprehension, the definition of residence is not residing in a place for one night. According to the Inland Revenue, it is somewhere between residing there for more than half the year, which will guarantee that one is qualified for residence, and for a period from a quarter to one half of the year, which will entitle one to residence. That is why people can be resident in two places. That is why they can be resident overseas even though they spend a quarter of the year in this country. In an application for electoral registration, people can have dual registration—a practice to which my hon. Friend the Member for North-East Derbyshire (Mr. Barnes) and I would like to see an end—but one cannot be resident overseas and have a vote in this country.

The Temporary Chairman

Order. I make another plea to the Committee for brief interventions, so that we can make progress.

Mr. Fabricant

The hon. Member for Battersea (Mr. Linton) is right in the point that he makes about the Inland Revenue. That applies to the rules whether one is paying UK taxes, or paying only overseas taxes under a double taxation agreement. However, he is not correct in saying that just because that is the Inland Revenue's interpretation under finance legislation, it has any implication for residency rights under Representation of the People Acts. As I understand the matter—again I seek clarification from the Under-Secretary of State whose constituency almost abuts my own—it is the evening of 10 October that determines whether one is resident.

The measure is blatantly unfair. I have friends who have worked overseas for UK companies, in unpleasant climates and in unpleasant countries—I shall not say where—but who are very active in politics. Furthermore, the assumption that such people are always Conservative is patently wrong. I gave the example of the Minister who lived in South Africa, where he was brought up. He had an overseas vote and obviously voted Labour, or, in his case—for all I know—communist.

6 pm

Mr. Bercow

I think he was a Liberal.

Mr. Fabricant

My hon. Friend tells me that the hon. Gentleman is a former Liberal.

I have a friend from university who worked for Unilever and worked overseas, His father was general secretary of the north-east region of the Communist party. My friend used his postal vote. He told me that as there were no communists in the constituency in which he wanted to vote, he was forced to vote right wing, as he put it—he had to vote Labour. Therefore, the assumption that all overseas voters are Conservative is patent nonsense.

Nevertheless, the amendment is blatantly unfair. As my hon. Friend the Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr. Shepherd) said, the whole test is that of citizenship. I firmly maintain that if one chooses—one does have choice in the matter—to remain a citizen of the United Kingdom, one has an interest in the United Kingdom. If one has an interest in the United Kingdom, one of the oldest democracies, with the second oldest Parliament— the oldest being the Althing in Iceland, which I have had the privilege of visiting several times—one has the right to vote, and that right should not be taken away.

The right hon. Member for Gorton says that it is wrong for Governments to ignore Select Committee reports. Unfortunately, Governments do. Some Select Committees are more listened to than others. A recent report by The Guardian gave marks according to the publicity that various Select Committees get, and it was interesting to note that every Select Committee got either nul points or one star, and only one Select Committee got four stars. That was, surprisingly, the Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport. I suspect that both Conservative and Labour Governments listen to the Culture, Media and Sport Committee because it has the oxygen of publicity. The point that I wish to make, without going off the point, is that the Select Committees that seek obscurity sometimes deserve to be ignored by Governments.

I shall not try your patience any more, Mr. Winterton. Citizenship is the issue. If people choose to retain United Kingdom citizenship, they choose to belong to a mature democracy. A mature democracy offers its citizens voting rights, and those voting rights should not be taken away.

Mr. Barnes

I shall speak to the amendments that stand in my name, but first and foremost I want to support new clause 1 and the amendments tabled by my right hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Kaufman), and to reinforce his opposition to schedule 2 standing part of the Bill. In fact, my amendments are merely fall-back provisions in case my right hon. Friend's attempts to abolish overseas electoral registration should fail. My fall-back provisions are to some extent pre-empted by clause 130 of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Bill, but they have been tabled in this Committee as fall-back measures and allow us to discuss the principles that they involve.

My name appears on the amendment paper in support of every one of my right hon. Friend's amendments. They show the clear, principled position to which we should adhere. I believe that people who move overseas become part of a fresh society, in the sense that they are subject to the laws and provisions of that society and will be linked with it by their family relationships. Their children are growing up in that society. Therefore the major things that happen to them depend on what is happening in that society—not on a few decisions on taxation taken in this country.

Mr. Dominic Grieve (Beaconsfield)

That simply cannot be right, can it? It is the central feature of citizenship that one owes rights and obligations to the state in return for protection. If a person goes to live abroad and is arrested, that person continues to look to the British consular service for protection until he has taken the citizenship of another country. Surely that in itself is a justification for being allowed to keep the right to vote, and to influence elections, in the country whose citizenship one claims.

Mr. Barnes

That is not such a powerful argument. It is an argument about the nature of citizenship, links with this country and the services that a citizen expects, but why should a citizen who lives elsewhere expect the right to vote in his country of citizenship? Masses of other matters affecting a person's life are determined by the country in which he lives. Ideally, that is where the vote should be exercised while they are resident.

Hon. Members may remember that I introduced an amendment earlier to say that the names of overseas residents in this country, in addition to those from the Republic of Ireland and from the Commonwealth, should be on registers in this country. I believe that that applies to about 680,000 people. Therefore, the principle for which I am arguing is consistent with my earlier arguments. The argument that people should vote where their links and connections are is overwhelming. It overrides the arguments about citizenship. Citizenship is mentioned in a metaphysical sense as though it were the only thing that mattered in every set of circumstances and overrode every other consideration.

Under the rolling register proposed in the Bill, United Kingdom citizens who go overseas can immediately re-register once they re-enter the United Kingdom for residential purposes. If a citizen feels that he very much belongs to the United Kingdom, and is drawn to the United Kingdom at every opportunity but his work sometimes takes him elsewhere, that presents no problems. When he is in the UK, he can re-qualify again in order to register; the Bill allows that to be done very quickly.

We should not mix compulsory registration with a system of voluntary registration. Compulsory registration is democratically superior to voluntary registration. We should expect everyone in a society to be obliged to appear on an electoral register. It should then be their decision whether to exercise their franchise, but we should ensure that no one who is part of a society misses out.

Voluntary registers are obnoxious, because if we operated voluntary registers in this country, some groups would be included in the registers and others would be excluded. We would by no means have full democratic arrangements. Voluntary electoral arrangements overseas have the same failing. There is no mechanism by which we can oblige everyone who is overseas to register, and it is sensible not to mix up these two arrangements but to stick with the stronger principle—compulsory registration.

Compulsory registration ensures that those who are rootless, poor and alienated are incorporated into electoral systems. Voluntary registration would exclude them. If we operated such a system, it would be like the system that exists in America where there has been a massive lack of registration. The principle of compulsory registration rules out the arrangements for overseas registration.

In 1984–85—when, finally, a period of five years was established—my right hon. Friend the Member for Gorton vigorously fought against the establishment of overseas registration rights. In 1989, that period was extended to 20 years. I had entered the House by then, and was one of a small group of Labour MPs who, at every conceivable opportunity, opposed the measure to try to extend the period, first to 25 years and then to 20 years. In 1989, I studied the speeches that my right hon. Friend had made in 1984–85—speeches from which he has quoted—and was glad to see that the Labour party had put up a vigorous battle in the House of Commons on these matters. I was only sorry that that did not occur on the later occasion, because there was at least an opportunity to say, "We shall go no further than the five-year provision."

The Labour rebels who attempted to hold the line at five years were consistent in their voting. There were six Divisions against the measure, including in Committee, on Second and Third Readings and on the money resolution. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the people who were the most involved in rebelling on those matters were all members of the socialist Campaign group. They voted four, five or six times against the measure. In fact, the only people who voted against it on six occasions were myself and Dave Nellist. People in the Labour party with democratic socialist principles that they extended to electoral arrangements were concerned by what was happening then. However, it might seem a strange alliance for someone from the socialist Campaign group to tuck in behind the amendments that were so vigorously moved by my right hon. Friend the Member for Gorton.

Mr. Kaufman

As my hon. Friend will know, I was at that time a member of the shadow Cabinet and, therefore, bound by collective responsibility. Had I not been, he would have had my company in the Division Lobby.

Mr. Barnes

I believe that that is the position that my right hon. Friend would have taken. I know that he was quite upset at the deal that Labour shadow Home Office representatives were engaged in. A low-level deal was reached to extend the provisions for postal and proxy votes and to increase the amount that could be spent on by-elections by allowing the Conservatives to increase the time that one could be out of the country for up to 20 years. That was entirely unacceptable.

Mr. Bercow

I am listening intently to the hon. Gentleman, but I am anxious about his call for compulsory registration. What would he say to someone who felt at risk of violence and chose, however unfortunate it might be, to come off the register?

The Temporary Chairman

Order. The hon. Gentleman's intervention is not in order as it does not relate to the amendment. Unless he can prove that it does, I trust that the hon. Member for North-East Derbyshire (Mr. Barnes) will continue his speech.

Mr. Barnes

May I just say briefly that we have compulsory electoral registration in this country? That is the basis of our system. If Members do not agree with that system, they should table amendments to the Bill and use the other procedures of the House to change it.

Mr. Shepherd

In what way do we have compulsory registration in this country? My local authority makes inquiries and prints the register out on a pretty rote basis. However, there is no compulsion to register.

Mr. Barnes

If someone fails to register, he can technically be fined £1,000 for failing to fill in a registration form. Millions of people are missing from the electoral register, so it is obvious that this aspect of the law does not work all that effectively. I am not in favour of bearing down heavily on those who are not on the register. I support the Bill, which is trying to get the people who are missing from the register back on it.

The Temporary Chairman

Order. Bearing in mind the number of amendments that have been selected for debate, it is important that we have an orderly discussion. Will the hon. Gentleman please return to consideration of the amendment?

Mr. Barnes

I will now consider the amendments tabled in my name. So far, I have spoken to the amendments tabled by my right hon. Friend the Member for Gorton, but to which my name has been attached.

6.15 pm

My amendments would restrict the period of the operation of the overseas vote to five or 10 years. The Select Committee on Home Affairs suggested that the period should be five years, and 10 years is the proposal which the Government have made in the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Bill. That proposal has been supported by the Liberal Democrats. However, I have also attached my name to amendment No. 82, which the Liberal Democrats' tabled and which would not allow someone who is not initially registered in this country to be registered overseas. At present, a babe in arms can be taken overseas and is able to vote in this country on his or her 18th birthday. The Liberal Democrat amendment would not permit that. Furthermore, a declaration should be signed by a person overseas to say that he or she intends to return to this country at the end of the 10-year period.

I have adopted the Liberal Democrats' proposals, in connection with the five-year provision, in amendment No. 119. It is a starred amendment, because I tabled it only yesterday. However, I want the principle in the Liberal Democrats' amendment to operate in connection with the five-year as well as the 10-year arrangement. I am a bit disappointed that the Government have chosen a separate Bill to deal with that item. It is perverse that we should discuss overseas votes and the period of time in which one can have an overseas vote under this Bill when the decision will be made in the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Bill, which has the objective of amending this Bill. The House has yet to decide whether it will pass this Bill.

I hope that the Government will respond to my right hon. Friend's case and will end such undemocratic and unacceptable arrangements. If not, I hope that we shall provide for a shorter period for registration overseas that will contain the necessary checks. That will act as a staging post in clearing the matter up until my right hon. Friend's views win the day.

Mr. Simon Hughes

The hon. Member for North-East Derbyshire (Mr. Barnes) referred to amendment No. 82, which was tabled by my hon. Friends and myself. However, it is not the lead amendment, which we began to debate last month and last year, if not to say in the previous century or millennium. It would not result in a trivia quiz question if the right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Kaufman) were involved, but he has probably made the longest interrupted speech that Parliament has heard for a long time. It began a month ago today and only finished this afternoon. I understand his position, but I disagree with it and take a different view.

When I intervened earlier, I was not special pleading on behalf of my older brother who was abroad but who has now returned to the United Kingdom. I used that case as an example of someone who had lived in the UK for a considerable part of his adult life and who had been sent by his employer to work abroad. He had no choice in the sense that that was there the job was; he could not go anywhere else. When the job finished, he returned. He never changed his intention to come back, but the question of how long he was outside this country was not in his hands. He happened to be in a Commonwealth country—Cyprus—but his case is replicated throughout the country. Anyone on any pay grade in any constituency could find himself in that position.

My hon. Friends and I reflected on what is not a theological position; there is no absolute view of what is right or wrong. Each country legislates appropriately. Commonality of legislation is an issue when it comes to voting for the European Parliament. If there is one set of rules in one country and another set in another, one begins to have a varied process for choosing representatives. However, let us put that issue aside for a moment. We are concentrating on elections in the UK and we are free to choose our own rules.

The right hon. Member for Gorton reminded us that we went from no overseas voting to it being allowed in a period of five or 10 years. A period of five years was decided on, but that suddenly shot up under the Conservative Government to 20 years. In the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Bill, the Second Reading of which we debated on Monday, the Government now suggest that the period should be 10 years. I want to explore two or three issues in relation to that and urge the Minister to reflect that the distance between the Government's current position and ours is very small. If it is appropriate, I am happy for the matter to be considered under the other Bill and I hope that we can reach maximum consensus.

I intervened earlier on the right hon. Gentleman to clarify the history of this issue. I refer to the relevant and interesting example of Vale of Glamorgan, where the right hon. Gentleman's colleague was clearly turfed out by people who were not in the constituency at the time of the election. There is no suggestion that those people did not have a connection with the constituency. They voted by proxy and the evidence showed that many of them had declared themselves to be Conservatives, and clearly the majority determined the result. However, it appeared that they fell within the rules because they had a link with the constituency and were calling on someone local to act for them.

That is not nearly as awful as people looking at a map of the United Kingdom, choosing Vale of Glamorgan because it is a very marginal seat, and saying that they would exercise their franchise there, even though they had never had a link with the constituency. We must have a system in which people cannot pervert the normal process by choosing where they place their vote because that right is not open to everybody else. People who have one home or who qualify to vote on the basis of one home do not have freedom to choose where they vote, and no one else should have that freedom either.

Those who are abroad must have their vote in the place where they last had a link—this is where the argument about young people applies—otherwise there will be abuse of the system and the people who are resident in this country all the time feel that they are not equally valued.

Mr. Fabricant

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Hughes

Yes, but I want to keep my contribution brief.

Mr. Fabricant

Is the hon. Gentleman implying that at the moment there is a mechanism whereby one does not have to have a local link? Surely the point is that to vote in a constituency one has to have a connection, and there is no way that someone could, as he said, scan the map to find a marginal constituency in which to vote.

Mr. Hughes

That point raises several issues. That should be the position, but I have to tell the hon. Gentleman that the law is not entirely clear about that. Secondly, we are debating what the law should be, and I want us to make sure that at the end of this process we make the law as clear as possible.

Thirdly, if we are to be fair and have a system that does not allow arbitrary choice, we cannot have a rule that allows people living in Cyprus or India, for example, who have not lived in this country since birth, suddenly to come on to the register at age 18 and pronounce where they will have their vote. I am flagging up the need to end up with an Act that makes sure that that problem is solved.

It is perfectly proper to have a debate about whether the criterion for voting should be citizenship or residence at the time of the election. If, at the end of the day, we decide that someone who is abroad and can vote nowhere else has sufficient connection with this country to vote here, we need to define that connection. There are several ways of doing so. The first is that the person concerned is a UK citizen and that he keeps his vote here no matter whether he has a right to vote elsewhere.

The second definition is that the person has a residence here and is based here, even though he may not be here very often. As the hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr. Shepherd) mentioned, that means that the person has a choice. That criterion would be discriminatory on the basis of property and wealth and should be rejected.

The third way of defining a connection is to ensure that before they leave the country people make a statutory declaration that they are leaving for a limited period. Although that is not a perfect system, the declaration could be taken into account in other matters such as tax. There is every difference between people who leave this country to live somewhere else and say for tax purposes that they are not a UK resident, and people who have lodged in a public place a declaration to return. That declaration clearly has tax implications, so it is likely that people would not make it without thinking seriously about it.

The fourth way is to introduce a mechanism by which people can attest to the impermanence of their move abroad.

Mr. Greenway

On the hon. Gentleman's point that people who choose not to pay tax in this country should not be allowed to vote, has he considered that many of them choose not to pay tax in this country under double taxation agreements because they have to pay tax in the country where they are working, often for a British company?

Mr. Hughes

I have considered that, and I have discussed the subject with my hon. Friend the Member for Torridge and West Devon (Mr. Burnett), who is much more expert in these matters than me. We have never pulled together in UK law, certainly not in English law, the various entitlements that people can have. They are entitled to certain rights because of their citizenship here; they have other entitlements because of their domicile here—domicile is a complicated area of legal definition— and they are given other entitlements by virtue of their residence here, but if they are well advised and know their way around the system, it is still possible in law for them to play the field and vote in a certain place and be exempt from tax or have their tax liability reduced.

I do not expect a portmanteau answer from the Minister now, and I appreciate that the Bill is concerned with electoral reform, not taxation, but we should try to use the opportunity to make sure that we do not have additional criteria that further complicate the rights and entitlements of people who go abroad and return home. At the moment, the law is complicated in defining people's liabilities to the state and their rights. We should at least ensure that people's entitlement to vote and obligation to pay tax flow as similarly as possible from the status of their residence, and are not made too complicated.

Mr. Grieve

That is simply impossible. A French national living in the United Kingdom, paying UK tax, would have no entitlement to vote. Unless we depart from the basic principle and extend the vote to all residents by making residency, not nationality, the sole criterion, we will never get the clarity that the hon. Gentleman seeks.

Mr. Hughes

Of course I understand that a French national living here may have taxation obligations here but not the right to vote, other than in European Union elections. I was simply saying that when we legislate to provide, in this Bill or the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Bill, a new definition of people's right to vote here, we should make the whole system of rights and entitlements less, not more, complicated than it is now. To pick up on the point made by the hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills, we should not end up with legislation that discriminates in favour of the well off and well advised. Everybody should have equal opportunity to exercise their franchise.

Mr. Bercow

I fear that the hon. Gentleman might not achieve the equity and simplicity that he seeks. Would not a requirement for a declaration of intent discriminate unfairly against those persons who, through no fault of their own, were not at the time of emigration in a position to know whether, and therefore when, they would return?

Mr. Hughes

I understand that. We are getting into a lot of detail, although in Committee we probably need to do so. All one can ever do is declare that, in so far as it lies within one's power, one intends to return. Some people are posted abroad indefinitely and of course they cannot say how long they will be away. That is the purpose of our probing amendment, No. 82, which would at least allow one to declare one's intention to return within 10 years. The hon. Gentleman could suggest the alternative proposition that one should be able to declare one's intention to return at the earliest date on which one's employment allows.

Mr. Linton

Is not the hon. Gentleman aware that the provision that he is defending is the very one that allows some people, including some who have been mentioned in this debate, apparently to vote in two countries and pay tax in neither?

Mr. Hughes

That is exactly why we need to try to pull together all the different pieces of legislation. The benefit of Committees such as the Home Affairs Committee, on which the hon. Gentleman sits and alludes to often, is that evidence can be taken and conclusions reached about how best we can do that.

The hon. Gentleman rightly reminds us that the Home Affairs Committee expressed the unanimous view that there should be a five-year rule. We argue for a 10-year rule not because we have a fundamental objection to the five-year proposition but because of the pragmatic consideration that in a global economy people move around more often and are away for longer periods. The more that we thought about it, the more we came to that conclusion.

I remind the hon. Gentleman that whichever conclusion we reach—the five or 10-year proposition or anything other than the stipulation that one cannot be absent at all, with which we began the debate—we may need to find a mechanism through which people may declare their intentions, such as a register kept for the purpose. Otherwise, the system will be open to abuse and misinterpretation.

Hon. Members want to deal with the crude abuse of the system by those who leave this country for ever, have no intention of returning and, to use the cliche, live a life of Riley on the Costa del Sol or Brava, or somewhere else, but continue to have a vote and the ability to influence this country. The public certainly regard that as an abuse of the system. If people are definitely returning to this country, and soon, or are planning to do so, that is one thing, but if they have retired or settled elsewhere, there must come an early point at which their interests and right to influence the political system move with them.

6.30 pm

Mr. Shepherd

I am concerned about the retirement element of the hon. Gentleman's argument. I notice in my constituency—I am sure that it is so for him, too—that, with early retirement, people are spending increasing time abroad. Taxation may be one reason, although for health reasons they may want a sunny climate. Nevertheless, their entire family and interests are still focused on the United Kingdom, they are not often integrated into local societies elsewhere, and, as they become older and often need medical advice, they return to the UK. Their link with the UK is clear, substantial and constant. Should they be deprived of the vote after 10 years?

Mr. Hughes

That is a valid question. Indeed, my right hon. Friend the Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Mr. Maclennan) took the original view that there should be no time limit. That is a perfectly proper alternative view at the other end of the spectrum to that of the right hon. Member for Gorton. To take the example given by the hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills, someone may retire early and live in Spain but never become a Spanish citizen. Their assets, savings, tax liability and family might remain in the UK, and they might always return due to illness or to recover or to die.

We are not rejecting the proposition because it is wrong; it is a matter of struggling, as a Committee, to find a mechanism that prevents abuse of the system by those who intend never to return and who take all their interests elsewhere, but protects those who retain an interest in this country. Our considered view was that the 10-year proposition was about right, but that there may need to be some way of checking its operation. Otherwise, people in such a bracket will have the advantage of a vote here even though they may be as certain on leaving that they will never return as those who have been away for two or 20 years. That is why a simple 10-year rule may not be sufficient.

At the end of the day, the Committee must come to a view. The major point of dissent from the amendment tabled by the right hon. Member for Gorton is on the basis that one should not lose one's right to vote here just because one is out of the country, especially when for family, commercial or business reasons one has no alternative but to make such a choice. I hope that the Committee will come to a different conclusion from the right hon. Gentleman's.

Mr. Denis MacShane (Rotherham)

This debate has opened up some interesting themes about citizenship, which are complex. Is one a citizen because one's bloodline is of a given nation, as say the Germans; one was born in the nation, as say the Americans; or for other reasons? I was nervous to hear the idea emerging from some quarters that the Inland Revenue should decide who is and who is not a British citizen.

I have some interest in this debate, as will many people who are listening to it or will read it on the net tomorrow. We should have some regard for the 9 million fellow British citizens who will take some interest in the proceedings of this Committee.

Mr. Fabricant

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. MacShane

May I make a little progress? I am trying to be brief.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Kaufman) began this excellent debate just before Christmas, but never could we have envisaged that the discoursus interruptus—if I may call it that—would cause such a follow-up, comprising many excellent contributions. He described himself as a grovelling sycophant. I hope that there is no one in the House who has greater admiration for his many talents than me.

Mr. Kaufman

I hope that there is.

Mr. MacShane

It takes one to know one.

Some might feel that my right hon. Friend was adopting a little Englander or anti-internationalist approach, but given his distinguished record as a shadow Foreign Secretary, his many wise writings on many aspects of international affairs and the deft way in which he managed to transport all his wonderful Select Committee to Hollywood for a lovely week of lying around on sun-loungers watching Hollywood films, one sees one of the great internationalists of the House and someone who knows the world intimately. However, it was not always thus.

In my right hon. Friend's wonderful book, "My Life in the Silver Screen", which I recommend to the Committee, he says that, as a boy, I saw numerous westerns, all of which"—

The Temporary Chairman

Order. All this might be extremely interesting and very accurate, but it is not relevant to the debate—unless the hon. Member makes its relevance clear in the next few moments, as I hope he will.

Mr. MacShane

I shall if I may, Mr. Winterton. This debate is about whether our many citizens who live overseas should have the right to vote.

Mr. Fabricant

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. MacShane

No.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Gorton tabled the amendment that will take away such citizens' right to vote. In his book, he says: I saw numerous westerns, all of which I enjoyed but none of which I could understand, as I had no idea in which country the West was situated". He has moved on from those boyhood moments to become a great internationalist, so I am surprised that he is inviting hon. Members, for the first time since I became a Member, to reduce the franchise. I thought that, on the whole, the British Parliament had always increased the franchise.

Mr. Barnes

Labour has not always tried to extend the franchise. Property and university votes were done away with because they were wrong—and it is wrong in connection with overseas votes.

Mr. MacShane

My hon. Friend is talking about people who had two votes in elections to this Parliament, but I am talking about those who have only one. My right hon. Friend the Member for Gorton and others propose to take away that vote.

Mr. Fabricant

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. MacShane

I am trying to make maximum progress to allow others to make proper speeches.

There are 650,000 British citizens currently living in the European Union who have a very close connection with and an interest in what happens in this country. There are 214,000 service personnel who live overseas sometimes for quite long periods, as we know from other debates.

Mr. Kaufman

They all have proxy rights.

Mr. MacShane

They do not all have property rights.

Mr. Kaufman

Every British service man and service woman abroad has the right to apply for a proxy vote and to exercise it. My amendment would not deprive them of the right to vote.

Mr. MacShane

The point is that all British citizens overseas may at times of high emergency or war be placed under some control by the Government. It seems rather odd that we may theoretically invite them to make sacrifices for the country but not allow them to vote if they so desire.

There are 840,000 people receiving United Kingdom state pensions abroad, and those people are directly connected to this country. That is a valuable network of British citizens, and it does not matter whether or not they are residents in this country. When Palmerston enunciated the great doctrine of civis Britannicus sum, he did not say that it was necessary to reside at 24, Park villas in Gorton to have British citizenship.

The paradox is that we allow more and more people to vote in this country who are not holders of British passports. Every European Union citizen living in this country may vote in European Parliament and local government elections.

Mr. Fabricant

I agree with most of the hon. Gentleman's arguments, but I am rather confused about the motives for them. Are they to be regarded as sycophancy for the Government Front Bench or is he advancing them because he voted in overseas elections when he was living in Switzerland?

Mr. MacShane

I could not vote in Switzerland when I lived there briefly.

I return to the key point. It has been suggested that we take away the right to vote from our own passport holders, but we are extending that right to nationals of foreign countries in this country. Every Irish citizen who comes here has the right to vote and, indeed, to stand for Parliament. I have no problems with that because it is a tribute to the tolerance of this country. It is wrong to reduce the right to vote to our passport holders when we extend that right to so many nationals of foreign countries who are foreign passport holders.

It is all the more perverse to reduce the right to vote of our citizens abroad when other countries are seeking to extend the right to vote of their citizens who are abroad. I expect that later this year we shall all on the Government Benches go to parties organised by Democrats Abroad, as they seek to get support for their candidates in the American election. Conservative Members may go to parties organised by Republicans Abroad. No American citizen has his right to vote taken away from him because he lives abroad. German citizens are allowed to live abroad for 25 years before the right to vote is taken away from them. Spain allows all its citizens abroad to vote. Italy and Switzerland have recently changed their constitutions to allow their citizens abroad to vote. Many more citizens of all countries, including the United Kingdom, are living in the European Union or further abroad. It must be recognised that we now live in a more global economy and society.

A day or two ago my right hon. Friend the Member for Gorton told me that the man who makes excellent salt beef sandwiches in St. John's Wood flies home to Israel to vote. I presume that he is an Israeli citizen and that he does not lose the right to vote because he provides excellent salt beef sandwiches in St. John's Wood.

India allows all of its citizens who are abroad to vote. The many Indian passport holders who live in this country can vote in their elections back home.

There are two more brief arguments with which I must deal. There is the question of residence and whether only one address should count. That would certainly present problems to Members of this place. When I was the local Labour party secretary in the Birmingham, Selly Oak constituency, I was encouraged to get all the students on to the electoral roll. Labour won that seat with the help of the students' votes in 1974. We lost it in 1979 because the students momentarily, or for another 18 years, swung back to the right.

Plumping is important and it needs to be dealt with by regulation. That is plumping in the sense of, for example, people putting all their votes into Vale of Glamorgan or any other particular place.

I do not know whether the amendment will be pressed to a Division. If it is, I ask the House of Commons not to send the message contained within it to our citizens who are working overseas. They might do so for a few years or for much longer. They are British citizens and we are proud of them. We shall not take from them the fundamental expression of citizenship in the modern world, which is the right to participate in the democratic process.

6.45 pm

Mr. Grieve

I do not always agree with the sentiments expressed by the hon. Member for Rotherham (Mr. MacShane), but on this occasion I agree wholeheartedly with his remarks. I apologise to the right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Kaufman) because although I was present for the start of his speech before Christmas, I missed part of the middle and end of it this afternoon.

We have dwelt on citizenship, which is a key factor in whether someone should be allowed to vote. Some surprising arguments have been advanced because they seem to denigrate citizenship and to suggest that it is only a series of privileges to be abused. As Lord Haw Haw discovered to his cost, the abuse of his privilege of obtaining a British passport in 1940 before he zipped off to Germany to make his broadcasts cost him rather dear. He abused his citizenship rights and paid the penalty.

Citizenship carries rights and obligations. Someone who installs himself for 40 years in a foreign country but chooses to keep his British citizenship is retaining a privilege and a right that may be useful to him in terms of consular access if he has difficulties, but one that places him under obligations. When someone is under obligations to a state, surely that gives him a right and an entitlement to have a voice in the way in which that country is run. It is a fundamental issue. The argument that is advanced by the right hon. Member for Gorton and others who wish to get rid of this right surprises me.

In part, I have a French background. I contrast the approach that appears to be adopted by France and the attitudes that seem to be advanced by the right hon. Gentleman. If a French citizen is overseas, that is seen as a great plus. He is out in the wider world and perhaps representing the interests of France for as long as he may be able to promote them. The French invite such people to their embassies every 14 July. They send newsletters to keep in touch with them and they encourage them to vote. They try to involve them as much as possible in the life of their country, with which they may have only the remotest contact.

Curiously, we have before us another form of Frenchness. I do not think that I have ever heard a greater series of Poujadiste arguments than those that have been put forward this afternoon in favour of getting rid of the overseas electoral register. They are all about people who are supposed to be milking the milch cow. It is alleged that they are abroad because they cannot pay tax. It is suggested that they are enjoying privileges while not fulfilling their obligations. Such a mean-minded set of reasons for getting rid of the overseas right to vote has rarely been heard.

Mr. Fabricant

I could not help but intervene on my hon. Friend when he mentioned that he is half French, given my surname, which is of French origin.

Does my hon. Friend agree that the French encourage their nationals to visit their embassies when abroad because although they may not be paying French tax, when they are working for French companies they are earning money for the French economy for the benefit of that nation? British embassies and commissions abroad do the same for our nationals who are working abroad. Although such people are not paying tax, they are still contributing to the welfare of the United Kingdom and therefore should be entitled to the vote.

Mr. Grieve

I agree with my hon. Friend, but this issue goes wider than that. Someone living abroad may feel sufficiently connected with the United Kingdom to retain his citizenship. He may be a dual national, and dual nationals may vote in elections in two countries at once. If such a person feels sufficiently connected to be prepared to maintain the obligations of citizenship, it appears to me fundamental that that should give him an entitlement to be heard on how the country is run. It is as simple as that.

Mr. Barnes

For how many years?

Mr. Grieve

I would not have quibbled with the 20-year rule, but I note with interest that the right hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Mr. Maclennan) has suggested that it should be for as long as citizenship is maintained. As an issue of principle, I do not disagree with that one iota, although I would not necessarily interfere with the present system.

There is a degree of mean-mindedness in the whole approach. As the hon. Member for Rotherham rightly said, it is profoundly ironic that, at a time when we have extended the franchise to large numbers of residents who have, for one reason or another, chosen not to take up the obligations of nationality and British citizenship, the amendment would deprive people who usually feel intimately connected with this country, loyal to it and interested in its well-being, of the right to vote. It would amount to kicking them out. I am wholly against it. The amendments are ill-considered, and I hope that the Committee rejects them.

Mr. Greenway

Arguments on the rights of United Kingdom citizens overseas to vote in parliamentary elections in this country have been well rehearsed and documented over a long period. This debate, like previous debates on the Bill, has been characterised by references to the history of the past 15 years or so on this and other electoral issues.

The right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Kaufman), who proposed this amendment, made his position clear on Second Reading and in the debates on both sides of the Christmas recess. A study of the official record shows that he has, as he has always maintained, never been enthusiastic about this measure, and was unhappy about it in 1984. The hon. Member for North-East Derbyshire (Mr. Barnes) and a former Member, Mr. Dave Nellist, whom we all miss, have been absolutely consistent throughout all the debates.

The right hon. Member for Gorton has two difficulties. First, although he may say that he has always opposed this measure, he was a senior member of the shadow Cabinet in 1989 when, at the instigation of the then Opposition, the current 20-year rule was introduced by an amendment. Reference has been made to the fact that he was the shadow Foreign Secretary at that time, so he cannot walk away from joint responsibility for the decision that was taken.

I suspect that in years to come, we will learn what views he expressed to Lord Hattersley, who as shadow Home Secretary sanctioned the tabling of the 20-year rule amendment by his junior colleague, the right hon. Member for Edinburgh, Central (Mr. Darling). It is worth reminding the Committee of what he said in 1989. He said: a number of people will leave this country perhaps to… work in Europe or in other parts of the world but will still maintain a lively interest in the affairs of this country. He went on to say that it was right that they should retain the right to vote and added: I believe 20 years is a sensible compromise".—[Official Report, 5 July 1989; Vol. 156, c. 411.] That has been the settled position ever since.

The right hon. Member for Gorton has a second, more contemporary difficulty. As he admitted, his party does not agree with him. The excellent contribution from the hon. Member for Rotherham (Mr. MacShane) shows that there is some good sense on this issue among Labour Back Benchers. I greatly applaud what he said. [Interruption.] From a sedentary position, he makes a gesture that seems to show that, rather than being sycophantic, as my hon. Friend the Member for Lichfield (Mr. Fabricant) suggested, he may have done himself some damage. As a fellow Yorkshire Member, he has not done himself any damage as far as I am concerned. It is always good for us to have a supporting contribution from Labour Members.

I also want to comment on the Liberal Democrat view. The hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) spoke to the Liberal Democrat amendments. We know what the right hon. Member for Gorton thinks, and it looks like we know what the Government think, but we are less clear about the Liberal Democrat position. In 1989, the right hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Mr. Maclennan) argued that there should be no limit on overseas voting rights. I shall not detain the House with direct quotations, but anyone who studies Hansard will see that his position was unequivocal.

The hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey accepted that, but seemed to suggest that there was now evidence of abuse and that that was why the Liberal Democrat position should change. In this debate, and when we touched on this issue on Second Reading on 30 November, no one has produced a shred of evidence of abuse. It has all been general innuendo. People have taken the opportunity to air their dislike of overseas voters having any rights.

Mr. Bercow

Does my hon. Friend agree that the implicit suggestion of the right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Kaufman) that Britons living abroad are ordinarily ignorant about what is taking place in this country was never true, and is likely to be even less true now with the development of technology in general and the internet in particular? Such people are often very well informed about the affairs of this country.

Mr. Greenway

As always, my hon. Friend makes an extremely good point. I shall come on to the changed circumstances of the world as it is now, because I agree with him that, if anything, it should encourage us to be more generous to British citizens living overseas and not less, as the amendment asks us to be.

Mr. Simon Hughes

The hon. Gentleman knows that I understand the argument for an indefinite right. If he is arguing for that, does he accept that it should at least be qualified by a requirement to establish whether persons who have left these shores want to retain their link with this country and intend or hope to come back one day?

Mr. Greenway

I have not argued for an indefinite right. I reminded the House that that is what the right hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross argued for in 1989. I am arguing that the settled position that was reached by the House in 1989 should remain. I shall come on to other aspects of the debate, which may answer some of the hon. Gentleman's other points.

I want the hon. Gentleman to concentrate a little more on his own position. The Liberal Democrats support a 10-year limit in the amendments to which they have put their names. Their then home affairs spokesman, the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith), said as recently as September that it should be seven years. On Second Reading, when this matter came up, the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey advocated caution and further consultation. He said: We must not act in haste and repent at leisure."—[Official Report, 30 November 1999; Vol. 340, c. 192.] Yet here we are, less than five working weeks later, being asked to accept a high-falutin amendment that suggests that people should sign a declaration before going abroad, and reintroduces the argument about taxation.

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That is another issue on which the Liberal Democrat view has changed dramatically. In the 1989 debates, the right hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross was scathing about the suggestion of a Labour Back Bencher that there should be a taxpaying requirement. I consider the proposal of the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey to be as nonsensical and impractical now as it was then. United Kingdom citizens move to live abroad—in many cases, because of their work. They may or may not pay tax, depending on their circumstances. Double taxation agreements are there to protect citizens of all countries, and to ensure that they need not pay tax twice. They choose to pay tax in the third country rather than here to avoid double taxation, not so that they can walk away from any obligations that they may have to the United Kingdom. Many expatriates working abroad would be both disadvantaged and disfranchised by the Liberal Democrats' proposal.

United Kingdom citizens who go abroad because of their work, often at short notice, experience a huge amount of disruption in their personal and domestic lives. It is doubtful whether they will give much thought to then-voting rights, and they are unlikely to give priority to signing the declaration proposed in amendment No. 82.

Mr. Fabricant

Will my hon. Friend give way briefly? Mr. Greenway: I will give way one last time.

Mr. Fabricant

Would not the signing of such a declaration be a pointless exercise in any event? People who wanted to retain the vote, and to make a declaration, could do so, even if they intended to remain abroad for any length of time. This is woolly thinking, which, if I may say so, is typical of the Liberal Democrats.

Mr. Greenway

I am glad that I allowed my hon. Friend to intervene.

We live at a time of increased globalisation. More and more people in all walks of life—and, I dare say, in all classes—are moving to live and work abroad; and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham (Mr. Bercow) reminded us, the internet has led to additional globalisation, and allowed people who still have British passports and British citizenship to be fully informed about what is happening in their country of origin.

People who leave to work abroad often do so on a temporary basis, not knowing whether and in what circumstances the move may become permanent. We strongly believe that those people, as United Kingdom citizens, have a right to expect the House of Commons to protect their interests, which include their right to vote in parliamentary elections. The hon. Member for Rotherham made that point forcefully. What Parliament and the Committee must decide is for how long that voting right should remain. Until recently, the status quo of 20 years was regarded as a settled position, and we see no real case for change. The Government have argued that there should be no change to the franchise in the Bill, because it implements the recommendations of the working party. We hope that the Minister will confirm that that is still the Government's view.

There were no discussions, and consequently there was no consensus in favour of the change, in the working party, but the Government have decided to include an amendment to 10 years in the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Bill, which will implement the recommendations of the Neill committee. That committee, however, did not consider the issue either. My right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir G. Young) made that point forcefully during Monday's Second Reading debate, but neither the Home Secretary nor the Under-Secretary of State chose to respond to it.

The report of the Select Committee, of which both the hon. Member for Battersea (Mr. Linton) and my hon. Friend the Member for Lichfield are members, will show that Mr. Gardner, who gave evidence on behalf of the Labour party on overseas voting rights, told the Committee that a reduction in the 20-year entitlement was not a priority for Labour. We consider the argument that the franchise issue is closely linked with the funding issue, which the Home Secretary advanced on Second Reading of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Bill on Monday, to be both spurious and insulting. Those issues should be considered separately.

This week, the Government promoted a Bill that suggested that voting rights should continue for 10 years. Now, we are about to hear the Minister argue that the right should be retained for 20 years. The Minister has admitted to me in written answers that the Government have made no estimate of the number of people who will be affected by the change. We think that it is around 3 million; the hon. Member for Rotherham said that it could be as many as 9 million. Surely that alone is an argument for thinking again before lowering the limit. I apologise for singling out the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey, but anyone who heard his speech will realise that the proposals that we are being asked to accept have not been thought through.

The right hon. Member for Gorton and the hon. Member for North-East Derbyshire were consistent to an extent, but there are fundamental disagreements between us. Given the confusion, argument, counter-argument and profound concern about the political motivation for any proposed change, the Government should have consulted before proposing 10 years in the Bill that was debated on Monday. We have said that we will support the Neill Bill, but support for that Bill should not be seen as support for the argument in favour of 10 years. Today's debate has shown that more thought is needed.

If the 20-year rule is reduced or, worst of all, abolished, Parliament will disfranchise British citizens for the first time since 1832. This is a shameful, spiteful, mean-minded and ill-judged proposal that the Committee should reject.

Mr. Mike O'Brien

I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Kaufman) on his robust and eloquent speech, but I would have expected nothing else. My right hon. Friend is known to be a doughty campaigner for the causes that he champions, and he has considerable knowledge and experience of electoral law—as, indeed, does my hon. Friend the Member for North-East Derbyshire (Mr. Barnes). I also listened with interest to the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes), who put his case very well. Some of the issues that he raised are worthy of further consideration.

Having said that, however, I must add that I have been reminded somewhat of Sherlock Holmes's "dog that did not bark in the night" in the case of Silver Blaze. We have spent a good deal of time, before Christmas and this afternoon, discussing an issue that does not currently feature in the Bill—and, in my view, should not feature in it.

My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary made it clear on Second Reading that he believed that the rights of overseas voters and, in particular, the time that they should be allowed to remain on an electoral register after leaving the United Kingdom were serious issues that needed discussion. They are contentious issues, as has been shown by today's debate. He said that the Government hoped that, if possible, any changes in the period should be made on the basis of consensus. Most important, he suggested that such discussions should take place in the context of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Bill. That Bill contains a provision that would reduce the period for overseas voters to 10 years, as we discussed during its Second Reading on Monday.

As today's discussions have demonstrated, the right to be on the electoral register is in many ways closely tied to the issue of who may make donations to political parties. That is one good reason why it would be better to leave discussion of the 20-year rule to the other Bill. I have no doubt that we can expect a lively debate on the issue at that time.

Another reason is that the Representation of the People Bill is intended to give effect to the recommendations of the working party on electoral procedures, which, I remind the Committee, was an all-party group that proceeded on the basis of consensus. With the small exception of the new false particulars offence in schedule 5, we have deliberately avoided going beyond the recommendations of the working party. The amendments would breach that principle.

The Government hope that the Bill will receive a fair wind in its passage through both this House and another place. That will enable the first innovative pilot schemes to be run at next May's local government elections. That timetable would be jeopardised if we embarked on consideration of a potentially controversial issue such as the time during which overseas voters may claim the right to vote. In the light of what I have said and in the knowledge that there will be an opportunity for full discussion of those issues, I invite my right hon. and hon. Friends and other hon. Members not to press the amendments to a vote.

I do not want to advance all the arguments. We have had much discussion today and I know that the Committee wishes to move to other important issues, but we take the view that 20 years is probably too long. People who have been away for effectively a generation may have little or no knowledge of contemporary issues in the constituency in which they vote. It is difficult to argue that a person should vote in an election for a Government of whom he has not been a subject for 20 years. However, as the period away decreases to 10 years, the argument for reducing the period loses some of its strength. Although it may have some force, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Gorton said, it has less force than that for reducing the 20-year period.

Mr. Brady

Has the Minister considered the position of pensioners who may have contributed taxes and national insurance throughout their working lives, who then go to live overseas—but depend on pensions, the level of which might be fixed by the House and by the British Government? Surely those people have a right to be enfranchised and to have a say, given that they have contributed not to a fully paid fund, but to something that will have variable benefits to be paid by decision of the Government. Those people should have some say in the matter.

Mr. O'Brien

There are strong arguments on both sides. Some people say, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Gorton did, that people should live in the country in which they vote for the Government. Others say that people may live outside the UK; be retired outside the UK, having contributed during their working lives; be abroad on business; or work for the United Nations, the European Union, charities overseas or commercial organisations, important as those are.

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Many of those people may retain homes in this country. Their children may go to school here. Many may have a clear intention to remain permanently here in future. Many may retain, as has been said in previous debates on the issue, a lively interest in affairs here. There is an argument that we should not deny them a vote. However, others who are resident abroad, perhaps for tax or other reasons, have no intention of ever returning here, yet for 20 years they are entitled to vote. There is arguably some unfairness in that.

It is difficult to create complex criteria that would be fair to everyone. People are so multifaceted and live in such a multitude of circumstances that any test that tries to apply to all of them would be so unnecessarily complicated that it would end up being arbitrary. We have concluded that although 20 years is too long, 10 years is a compromise that we hope the House will eventually be able to accept. There is an argument for ensuring that such debates do not cause unnecessary dispute. It is right that they be lively, but it is also right that the franchise and elections should not be the subject of substantial unnecessary dispute, with Governments chopping and changing after every election the way in which the franchise operates.

There are strongly held views and we need to look for a balance. The proposed reduction of the qualifying period for registration as an overseas voter from 20 to 10 years is a balanced and equitable response to the recommendations of the Select Committee on Home Affairs. As the Committee unanimously recognised, the existing 20-year qualifying period is excessive. It recommended restoring the original five-year qualifying period, but that may go too far in the other direction. As I have said, many people who work abroad for international organisations may reside abroad for more than five years, but have every intention of returning permanently. A reduction to 10 years strikes a balance.

I want to make it clear that it is not a question of making it difficult for particular individuals to make donations. The Government have reached a view on the matter on the basis of principle and of trying to achieve consensus.

Mr. Grieve

There is no consensus.

Mr. O'Brien

We are trying to bring about some sort of consensus. I accept that, as has been demonstrated in the debate, a consensus does not exist at the moment, but. as we progress, I hope that we will be able to come at least to a compromise, if not a consensus.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Gorton has asked whether clause 130 is set in stone or whether the Government will continue to think about it. We have always listened with great care to his views. I urge him to withdraw his amendment now and we will listen with care to his views during consideration of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Bill. We have a considered view, but we will continue to listen. Perhaps our view is not set in stone, but it is a considered view. We will continue to listen to the debate. I hope that, on that basis, he will feel able to withdraw his amendment.

Mr. Barnes

I hope that one of the groups that will not be greatly listened to in connection with overseas votes is the Conservative party and the Conservative Front-Bench team. When a measure was introduced in 1989 to extend the period to 25 years, and it was set at 20, the Conservative party tried to destroy electoral registration in this country through the linking of the poll tax to the electoral register. That led to 1 million people not being enfranchised.

Mr. O'Brien

I must make it clear that we listen to all views if they are properly put forward. We will listen to them with proper care. If they are put forward in a less than considered way, we will give them the credit that is due.

The hon. Member for Lichfield (Mr. Fabricant) asked about people in mental hospitals. People who are detained in mental hospitals are not, and never have been, banned from voting. However, they have been effectively disfranchised as they have not been able to register in respect of the hospital where they reside. The Bill would remedy that anomaly.

The hon. Gentleman raised citizenship issues, as did the hon. Member for Beaconsfield (Mr. Grieve). However, although citizenship issues are important, they are not the only issues. In parliamentary elections, people who may be able to vote include British citizens, some Commonwealth citizens, Irish citizens and some overseas electors—who may also, of course, be citizens of other countries. In European parliamentary elections, British, Commonwealth and European Union voters—including Irish voters—may be able to vote. Different rules apply in local government elections. The issues are, therefore, neither simple nor attached only to citizenship. Moreover, there are restrictions on who is able to vote, based on age and various other factors.

The hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey asked whether overseas voters would be able to pick and choose their constituency. People must be registered at the last address at which they were registered in the usual way. People who were too young to be on the register when they lived in the United Kingdom must be registered at an address where they previously lived and where a parent or guardian was registered.

Therefore, to some extent, there is already a requirement for a constituency link—which the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey is seeking to strengthen—and that is one of the issues that we shall be able to address in our consideration of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Bill. The hon. Gentleman will be able to make his arguments then. There may well be ways of strengthening and making clearer the role of that link. Although I am currently not convinced that using the Inland Revenue is the best means of accomplishing that goal, we shall continue to listen with great care to the arguments being made.

The hon. Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway) urged us not to legislate in haste on the issue and repent at leisure. However, we have a little more leisure time to consider the matter—at least until we again consider the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Bill. Strong arguments have been made on both sides of the franchise issue, and we shall have to try to reach if not a consensus, at least—to take the points made by the hon. Member for Beaconsfield—a compromise, so that we are able to go forward with some sense that we have achieved fairness.

On that basis, I hope that my right hon. Friend the Member for Gorton will withdraw his amendment, and that the hon. Members who tabled the other amendments will not press them.

Mr. Kaufman

The hon. Member for Lichfield (Mr. Fabricant) and some other Conservative Members have said that the franchise should be based on citizenship, and that, if that happens, there should be no terminal period for that franchise. However, the Conservative party—which those hon. Members have voted for and supported at every level—has imposed such limits. Therefore, the principle that those hon. Members support—I respect their right as individuals to support it—has not been supported by the Conservative party in government.

The hon. Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway) mentioned confusion on the issue, and said that he is opposed to chopping and changing policy. However, the Government whom he supported consistently chopped and changed on the issue. At various times, the previous Government offered the House four different time limits on the overseas vote: five years, seven years, 20 years and 25 years. It is therefore perfectly clear that Conservative Members do not regard time limits as a matter of principle; if they did, they would have decided on a figure and stuck to it. They seem to regard time limits as a convenience, or as something that they can get away with.

Some hon. Members, such as the hon. Member for Beaconsfield (Mr. Grieve), described overseas voting as a cherished right and the obligations of citizenship. However, overseas voting is not an obligation but an option. Moreover, it is an option that barely anyone takes up—although the results of people taking it up may be extremely invidious.

With deep affection, I tell my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Mr. MacShane) that he still needs to learn a lesson or two in sycophancy.

Mr. Grieve

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Kaufman

No, I shall not give way; the Committee wishes to conclude this debate.

My hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham described 9 million people and 840,000 pensioners who potentially could be overseas voters. The hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale, West (Mr. Brady) also mentioned pensioners' interests. If 840,000 pensioners are concerned about their pensions—the hon. Gentleman did not seem to be aware that those people's pensions are frozen when they move residence from the United Kingdom—and feel strongly about the issue, they could register to vote. We could have 840,000 overseas voters who are pensioners.

Mr. Brady

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Kaufman

No. If the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I should like to wind up.

In fact, of the 9 million potential overseas voters mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham, and of the 3 million people mentioned by the hon. Member for Ryedale, 13,000 people are registered. We are speaking, therefore, not about an inalienable right, but of an option that only a handful of people decide to exercise, with possibly highly invidious results— including, as we know, the defeat of my hon. Friend the Member for Vale of Glamorgan (Mr. Smith).

I can therefore tell my hon. Friend the Minister that, in response to his request, I shall withdraw my amendment. He said that he wants a consensus—which is fine—but I should be very grateful if he took into account the fact that consensus does not simply mean agreement between Ministers and Conservative and Liberal Democrat Members, but also agreement between Ministers and Labour Back Benchers. Provided that Ministers realise that 350 Labour Back Benchers have at least as great a vote as 160 Conservative Members—their number seems to be decreasing—and 46 Liberal Democrat Members, and that we have at least twice as much right as Opposition Members to participate in a consensus, I believe that the Minister's promise to listen might result in something that is acceptable to all of us.

On that basis, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clauses 1 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 2 and 3 ordered to stand part of the Bill.