HL Deb 15 June 1976 vol 371 cc1197-209

7.34 p.m.

Baroness VICKERS

My Lords, I beg to move that the Bill be now read a second time. First of all, may I be allowed to congratulate the honourable Member for Woking who piloted this Bill through the House of Commons, the 16 Members of Parliament who served on the Committee and supported him, and those who supported him at the Report stage. I know only too well how difficult it is to get Bills through the House of Commons. I remember, too, my fate on two occasions—the first being when I got to Committee stage and three Labour and three Conservative Members sat in the passage in order not to give me my quorum; the second when I was slightly more successful and got the Bill to Report stage, when 40 Amendments were put down and the Bill was talked out. However, both of these Bills are now on the Statute Book because they were taken over by the Government, so if this Bill has an unfortunate fate, I hope that this Government will remember that ultimately they generally take over my Bills.

I hope that I shall have your Lordships' support for what I consider is a Bill to give fairer opportunities to Her Majesty's Services. I want them to take part in Elections. We have to remember that the Services support any Government, irrespective of Party, and that they serve them very well. I think it is a very important point that whatever their feelings and whatever the result of an Election, the Services serve the Government to the best of their ability.

I understand that there has been a separate system of registration for the Services since 1918. While I was looking up past history, one interesting fact that I found was that in 1918 the men serving in Her Majesty's Services after that war were given the vote at the age of 18 because it was considered—and this was the first and only time it has happened—that if they were old enough to tight for their country they were old enough to have a vote for their future. Since that date special provisions have been made. I understand that they were originally made to serve those who were not Regular Servicemen and it was agreed to continue this practice until the Representation of the People Act 1969. Previously this had meant that once a Serviceman registered himself he did not have to reregister until he left the Service or cancelled his registration. As from 1918, it was the duty of the commanding officer to notify the Serviceman each year of his electoral rights. New voters were declared each year and then attested at their units, checked, and, together with previous voters, forwarded to the constituencies for the electoral registration officers. Voting then could take place by post or by proxy. Also it was possible for them to opt out of the system. If they had a civilian residence, then they could vote in that neighbourhood.

The system lasted until 1944. The Vivian Committee on Electoral Machinery produced a White Paper in December 1942 and recommended the setting up of controlling machinery in the form of a central index on the lines available for the National Registration Central Index, in the same manner as for civilians. In 1946 there was another Committee on electoral registration, the Oliver Committee, which recommended the transfer of responsibility from the Central National Registry Office to the record offices of the three Services. However, this was not considered practical as the CNRO was working well and, I am glad to say, was economical. Therefore, it was not considered necessary to change.

One remembers the period in 1945 when it was considered that Servicemen should have the vote. There were three weeks between civilians voting and the Service votes coming in, because the Servicemen were stationed all over the world. In 1968, the Speaker's Conference to which the matter had been referred made the recommendation that the continuous registration of members of the Forces and their wives should cease, and that annual registration should continue. In 1948–49 the Representation of the People Act was revived, so 1949 was the first occasion when wives were able to vote if a residin overseas with their husbands. In February 1968 there was another Speaker's Conference, which again made recommendations. The report said: The present arrangements for continuous registration of members of the Forces and their wives should cease. This is the point that I want to change in the Bill which is before your Lordships today.

The Service authorities should in future be required to obtain information for the purpose of registration from any member of the Forces who appears to be qualified to be registered whenever similar information is required to be given by a civilian householder, in other words, they have the same type of registration then as civilians. I want to underline the point that it should be the duty of the commanding officer of each unit to see that this is carried out and that an entry is made in the ordinary register.

As your Lordships will realise, this is not a very practical suggestion so the legislation recommended was not carried out as then intended. Forms were just handed out to individuals and they were supposed to send them to the appropriate registration office, and there was no compulsion on the officer to issue the forms. This has been one of the difficulties. Many people did not want to go to their officers for forms; many officers perhaps were too busy to remember the forms in time, and this has meant that many people did not get on the register because there was no compulsion for the officer to issue the forms or for the Serviceman to take any action.

I understand that in the latest figures available it is stated that out of 400,000 only about 300,000 were registered, for various reasons. I can understand it, because for those serving in Sabah or Sarawak, for example, during the confrontation, or those serving in Belize there was a gap between enlistment and the opportunity to sign a Service declaration. This shows some of the difficulties; being in overseas areas it was difficult to obtain information if they had not actually been registered. On the other hand, it might have been considered that those who had left the Service might still have their names on the Service register. However, as civilians they would be required to register yearly once they had left the Service, and to my mind that would be a correction as no one could have two votes.

In 1973 there was another Speaker's Conference which reconsidered the whole matter, and they found that the eligible voters registered had fallen to between 20 and 30 per cent., and they recommended that: The present arrangements for annual registration of members of the Forces should cease ". Each Serviceman and new recruit should be registered, but he can still declare each year if he wants to make a change or have his name taken off. The wives of Servicemen also should be registered as Service voters, and no military offence is created if, for example, the Serviceman or Servicewoman does not want to vote.

I understand too that when an honourable Member of another place raised this matter in 1975 the then Minister stated that the Government considered the question suitable for Government legislation and hoped to introduce legislation at an early opportunity. So I hope noble Lords on all sides of the House will be prepared to support this Bill, as it went through the other House at Third Reading " on the nod ".

If I may, I shall explain briefly the effect of one or two clauses because, regrettably, there are very few noble Lords in the House and I hope that perhaps they may read in Hansard what has been said tonight and therefore when we come to the Committee stage we shall not be worried with a lot of useless Amendments. The effect of Clause 1—and I shall only sketch it because the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, knows this much better than I do—provides that, in future, members of the Forces, and their wives or husbands, once registered in pursuance of a Service declaration, shall remain registered without the necessity of making a fresh declaration each year. That covers the point I have already made. A declaration would remain valid until cancelled or the declaration ceases to be in force on a change in the circumstances giving the Service qualification.

Under the existing law members of the Forces have a Service qualification whether they are in the United Kingdom or abroad. Their wives or husbands—and quite a number of women in the Services have husbands—have such qualifications only when residing abroad with their spouse. Clause 2 of the Bill would confer on them the same qualification as a member of the Forces; namely, they would have the qualification whether in the United Kingdom or abroad.

As I mentioned before, there is an obvious risk that under the once-for-all registration system the register will become out of date because of the inclusion as Service voters of persons who have in fact left the Forces. However, I understand that the Ministry of Defence intend to overcome this by making arrangements which will ensure that registration officers are informed as soon as a Serviceman leaves the Forces. The existing provisions for annual Service declarations will be retained for Crown servants and their wives and husbands and the members of the British Council and their wives and husbands. All these have Service qualifications only when serving abroad or when residing abroad with their husbands or wives.

I regret that this clause cannot affect this category of persons and they cannot make the Service declaration. I sincerely hope that a new Speaker's Conference will consider such matters as whether voting facilities should be extended to such persons as international civil servants, especially as there are now so many working in the EEC, and there are also Red Cross and NAAFI employees, businessmen and other British subjects temporarily residing abroad.

Subsection (1) of Clause 1 is designed to clarify the whole purpose of the Bill. It refers to the existing provision of Section 2(1) of the Representation of the People Act 1969, that a Service declaration shall be made only with a view to registration in the register of electors for that particular year. The effect of this is that at the expiry of a particular year the person who declares will get on the new register only if he or she has made a fresh Service declaration.

Subsection (3) of this clause provides that a Service declaration made by a member of the Forces (defined in Section 46(l) of the Act of 1949) or the wife or husband of such a member shall, if not cancelled, continue in force so long as he or she has a Service qualification. This means that a member of the Forces who has made such a Service declaration and transmitted it to the appropriate registration officer will remain on the register for that electoral area indefinitely without the need to make a fresh declaration each year. I understand that the qualifying dates for this after the Bill becomes an Act will be the 10th October in the United Kingdom and 15th September in Northern Ireland.

The purpose of Clause 2 is to confer on the wives and husbands of members of the Forces the same right to register in pursuance of a Service declaration as their spouses already have. The right to make a Service declaration depends on whether one has a Service qualification. Servicemen and Servicewomen have such a qualification, whether in the United Kingdom or abroad, by virtue of their membership of the Forces. They thus fall outside the arrangements for registration via the ordinary civilian canvass but may, if they wish, register after making a Service declaration. Their wives or husbands, if in the United Kingdom, are subject to the normal civilian arrangements. If they leave the United Kingdom to reside abroad with their spouses they acquire a Service qualification for the time of their residence abroad. This clause will enable them to register, after making a Service declaration, in the same way as their husbands or wives.

I realise that there are drawbacks to the present system for the majority of Service wives. They frequently move house as a result of their husbands' postings. This may mean that it is difficult for them to acquire a permanent address. This in turn means that, regrettably, they may not become registered. Even if registered, they may well have moved away from their constituency by the time of an election. They would then in effect be confined to a postal vote. This may be difficult to arrange or to cast in the short time available between the announcement of a General Election and polling day. I understand that the Ministry of Defence, after consultation with the three branches of the Armed Forces, have therefore concluded—and I hope their conclusions will he regarded as correct—that the interests of the great majority of Service wives would be best served by the change. This would confer on them a Service qualification while in the United Kingdom as well as while abroad.

So in future a Service wife will be able to appoint a proxy whose appointment will remain in force at her convenience or until her Service qualification lapses. She will still, of course, like other Service voters now, be able to vote by post or in person if circumstances permit. But if the exigencies of her husband's Service career make this difficult or impossible, her proxy vote will remain safe. This is her husband's position now, and it will be strengthened by the new system, if it goes through the House tonight, of the once-for-all registration created by the rest of the I believe it is right we should give the wives of Servicemen the same safeguard of their right to franchise.

My Lords, I should like to emphasise that this will not put anyone at a disadvantage. There are wives, although it is considered they are in the minority, who are perfectly well served by the normal civilian arrangements. There is no question of disenfranchising these. They will simply get on the register by different means than existed before. There may be the odd case where the elector resents being compelled to take one route to registration rather than another, but I understand that the Secretary of State for Defence believes it will be for the benefit of the great majority of Service wives to make this change.

My Lords, Clause 3 covers consequential Amendments and repeals previous Acts of Parliament. Clause 4 covers the Short Title, Citation and Commencement. Subsection (2) of Clause 4 provides that the Act shall come into force on such a date as the Secretary of State may order, and the order may be made by Statutory Instrument. I hope that tonight your Lordships will give this small but important Bill a Second Reading, and that the Secretary of State will then be able to take action at the earliest possible date.

Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a. (Baroness Vickers.)

7.52 p.m.

Lord LYELL

My Lords, I think the whole House will be grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Vickers, for introducing this Bill, and also for the very full way in which she has explained all the provisions, and the purpose of the Bill. I am sure the House will be aware that the main part of the Bill seeks merely to bring electoral law as it affects Servicemen back to the position it was in before the Representation of the People Act of 1969 altered the rules of registration.

Various estimates have been made of the number of Service voters registered as such. The figure of 100,000 has been mentioned in another place in an earlier debate, and we must remember that this total is numbered among approximately 400,000 Service voters who would be eligible to vote as such. The 300,000 Service men and women, together with their spouses, are not disenfranchised, hut it is often difficult for them to ensure that they are on the register somewhere within the United Kingdom.

I believe that it is indeed encouraging to read of the Government's views on this when the Bill was given a Second Reading in another place. It was admitted that there are powerful reasons for supporting the Bill: first and foremost because it will lead to a substantial increase in the Servicemen's vote: secondly, because the Government in another place admitted that the situation was unclear whereby the onus of registration lies with the Servicemen (they admitted it is not necessarily for the best), and lastly, because the Government cannot find enough of their own Parliamentary time to permit orderly discussion and, we hope, the passage of the Bill. Yet the Government admit that the number of Servicemen who will be affected is substantial. I think the noble Lord. Lord Harris of Greenwich, would agree that this figure is in the region of 400,000.

In the course of the Second Reading debate in another place the Government pointed out that the position of the Service voters before 1969 had become totally out of date, since each Serviceman was registered at his last known address before he enlisted in the Armed Forces. In several cases this resulted in Servicemen having a vote, and being registered at a street or particular area in towns, cities, or even in the countryside, which no longer even existed. But it was admitted in another place that, as a result of the Representation of the People Act 1969, the Service vote, registered on the non-perennial system whereby each Serviceman is responsible for ensuring that he is registered each year in the same way as civilians, this vote fell to a figure as low as 30 per cent. of the eligible voters. Surely this cannot have been intended, in spite of the benefits to the electoral registers. In cases I have already mentioned, there were benefits.

There was a Speaker's Conference in 1973, which discussed the problems of the Service voters. This Conference recommended that the present position should be maintained, and also that each Commanding Officer or Commander of a particular unit should have to accept the obligation of ensuring that all Servicemen and women under his command were correctly registered each year. Above all, the Conference considered that Service voters should have the same rights and obligations as their civilian counterparts. While this may be a laudable concept, I really cannot say that it seems entirely appropriate to the position of Service voters and to the necessity that they should be enabled to vote at each and every General Election.

One word, frequently mentioned by several speakers in the Second Reading debate in another place, was the " turbulence " of Service life. Your Lordships will be aware that the exigencies of Service in the Armed Forces takes Servicemen and women all over the United Kingdom and Western Europe as well as to Malaysia, Singapore and Belize, as we have heard this afternoon from the noble Baroness, Lady Vickers. Often, there is not the time to arrange for adequate or reasonable proxy votes, and the often scattered units overseas may have more urgent messages to transmit from any desert, swamp or jungle than one which is somewhat administrative to us. Of course it is important, because it ensures that each and every member of that unit has been duly registered as a voter on a particular day. Naturally, we accept that civilians have a continuing legal obligation to see that they and their dependants are duly registered, but I am sure that the House will agree with me that the Servicemen and their dependants, by the nature of their duties and obligations, cannot be regarded for these purposes as mere citizens, nor, indeed, as servants of the Crown.

We have only to consider the problems of soldiers performing their four-month tours of duty in Northern Ireland. Quite possibly the soldier who is going to Northern Ireland will have his wife and his place of residence in BAOR. There are also the United Kingdom Mobile Reserve Forces who are ready to move to any part of the world within 24 hours. Noble Lords will admit that the modern defence Forces indeed are well able to carry out all the essential documentation. But it seems to me that all this Bill seeks to do is to enable some of the nonessential documentation to be laid aside, to bring the position of Service voters and their spouses to what it was before 1969. The position of being registered as a Service voter on entering the Armed Forces, and of remaining as such until such time as the voter leaves the Armed Forces, I believe is more important than bringing Servicemen into line with their civilian counterparts.

My Lords, in conclusion, I am glad that the Government have undertaken to render this Bill all available assistance. We all look forward to hearing what the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, will have to say. while at the same time thanking the noble Baroness, Lady Vickers, for bringing this Bill before the House.

7.58 p.m.

The MINISTER of STATE, HOME OFFICE (Lord Harris of Greenwich)

My Lords, the Government welcome this Bill. I would certainly want to take this opportunity of congratulating the noble Baroness, Lady Vickers, and her honourable friend in another place for having sponsored this measure, and for having put it forward with a very substantial degree of vigour. I know that only too well from having had discussions on this Bill with the honourable gentleman. Although the noble Baroness is quite right in saying that our numbers tonight are fairly limited, it is appropriate that she should put forward this measure, given the very distinguished career she has had in another place when she was the Member for a Division which had a very substantial proportion of Service voters. It is also appropriate that we have with us this evening the noble Lord, Lord Alport, who also had a substantial number of Service constituents when he was a Member of another place.

I think there is no doubt that this is a measure which will be of substantial significance to Service voters. As the noble Baroness said at one stage, it is certainly unusual to proceed by way of Private Members' legislation in the area of electoral law. Indeed, for that reason, the Government, I think quite properly, have taken a very close interest in this Bill in order to ensure that it is technically sound.

As the noble Baroness has said, the aims of the Bill are straightforward. Members of the forces have a Service qualification. This entitles them to make a declaration as a result of which they may be put on the register for elections. Under existing legislation, Service declarations are only valid for the lifetime of the register and so a fresh declaration is required each year. This Bill allows members of the Forces, and their wives or husbands who make a Service declaration, to remain registered for the duration of their Service qualification. Servicemen generally are compelled to move house far more frequently than the remainder of the population. It was because of the disruption this causes that the Speakers Conference of 1972–74 recommended that the system of annual registration be abandoned in favour of the system of once-for-all registration which had already operated between 1949 and 1969.

The Speaker's Conference also recommended that this system of Service registration be applied to the wives of members of the Forces. At present the wives and husbands of members of the Forces have a Service qualification only if they are residing abroad to be with their spouse. The Bill seeks to confer on wives and husbands of members of the Forces a Service qualification wherever they may be, that is to say, whether they are in the United Kingdom or abroad. There has also been full consultation about this proposal with the Services, and it seems clear that the change will be to the advantage of the majority of Service wives in this country. As I have indicated, there is nothing new in once for-all registration for members of the Forces. The system was criticised when it was last used because the register became out of date from the inclusion of names of those who no longer had a Service qualification. It will clearly be important to do what we can to avoid this happening again. The Ministry of Defence intend to make arrangements which should ensure that registration officers are informed as soon as a person leaves the Forces. The precise nature of these arrangements is still under discussion.

I know that some of your Lordships will he disappointed that this Bill cannot be brought into force this year. But there are, I think, reasonable grounds for this. A new system of registration for members of the Forces, their wives and husbands, will necessitate some amendments to the existing Representation of the People Regulations. More importantly, amendments to and reprints of the relevant forms of Service declaration will be required. I am afraid that this cannot be done in time for the next register because the Service authorities have already distributed the existing forms in preparation for this year's registration programme.

A more serious problem arises on the registration of the wives and husbands of members of the Forces. To implement the Bill it will be necessary to amend the prescribed electoral canvass form (Form A) and its Welsh counterpart; but the forms for this autumn's canvass have already been printed and distributed to registration officers. There is no statutory authority for the withdrawal or replacement of these forms. The Government have considered a suggestion that the Bill should contain a transitional provision that a Service declaration made this year by a member of the Forces should be deemed to have a continuing effect as if made under the Bill. We are convinced, however, that this proposal is more likely to cause confusion than to achieve its purpose. In our view, the safer and more effective course is to avoid adding complexity, by waiting until the whole Bill can be brought into force at once. We intend to try to achieve this in time for the register after next. I would emphasise that no disfranchisement will occur from the delayed implementation of the Bill. All those eligible to be registered can be registered this autumn under the present arrangements. The beneficial effects of once-for-all registration are cumulative and long term, and a year's delay will not, I hope, make much difference.

In conclusion, I would simply say that I hope this Bill achieves its purpose of greatly increasing the proportion of members of the Forces who are able to exercise the franchise. This is at present very low—most estimates put it at about 20–25 per cent. as opposed to the 60–70 per cent. before 1969. I am sure we should do all we can to remedy this situation and it is for this reason above all that I commend the Bill to your Lordships' House.

Baroness VICKERS

My Lords, I should like to thank the noble Lord for his gracious and generous reply. and I am grateful to know that this Bill will be implemented as soon as possible. May I also thank the civil servants for the aid they have given me in preparation of these rather difficult details in some cases.

On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.