§ 6.25 p.m.
§ The MINISTER of STATE, HOME OFFICE (Lord Boston of Faversham)My Lords, with permission I shall repeat the Statement made by my right honourable friend the Home Secretary in another place this afternoon. The Statement is as follows: "I will with permission, Mr. Speaker, make a Statement about the Government's proposal for a short Bill about the holding of the parliamentary General Election on Thursday, 3rd May, the day fixed by the Local Government Act 1972 for elections to district and parish or community councils in England (outside London), and Wales.
"The Government are giving notice today of the introduction of a Bill which will be published and available tomorrow.
"The Bill will make provision to defer the parish or community council elections for three weeks (to Thursday 24th May) and will permit the additional costs attributable to the postponement to be met by the Exchequer. The Bill will also make a number of changes to assist the conduct of the parliamentary and the district council elections on the same day.
"The same polling stations will be used for both elections. They will be stations normally used for parliamentary elections.
"Ballot papers for both elections will be placed in the same boxes in the same polling booth (extra boxes will be available for particular areas if they are required).
"The hours of polling for local government elections will be extended so that they will be the same as for parliamentary elections, from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m.
"New notes of guidance to voters will be prepared, to make the procedures absolutely clear to them.
1689 "The ballot papers for each election will be easily distinguishable and the Bill, if enacted, would enable me to give directions about the means for achieving this, and I will inform the House on Monday of how I propose this should be achieved. In any case, however, the parliamentary ballot will retain its traditional colour, shape and form with the addition of the words: 'Parliamentary Election', and: 'You may vote for no more than one candidate', at the top of each ballot. In Wales, the same statement will appear also in Welsh.
"At the close of the poll all ballot papers will be sent to the parliamentary returning officer. He will separate the ballots as between the two elections. He will then count the parliamentary ballot papers, and send the district council papers to the appropriate returning officer.
"The same officer will deal with postal voting applications for both elections. The Bill will not otherwise alter the postal voting position in either election.
"These provisions should ensure that there will be no obstacle in the way of combined elections being conducted in an orderly and efficient manner on 3rd May, and I shall be seeking the approval of the House of Commons on Monday for a Bill on these lines."
§ My Lords, that concludes the Statement.
§ Lord CARRINGTONMy Lords, the House will be obliged to the Minister for repeating this Statement. I do not think that this is the right moment to discuss the contents of it. I hope that in the busy three days we have got next week there will be time at any rate to discuss something.
I myself doubt whether it is very wise to have the two elections on the same day. I think it might have been better to postpone the local government elections, but there is nothing we can do about that at this moment. The only other thing I should like to do is to congratulate the Civil Service on having the foresight to be prepared for the events of last night.
§ Lord BOSTON of FAVERSHAMMy Lords, I am much obliged to the noble Lord, Lord Carrington, as indeed I feel 1690 sure your Lordships' House will be, for the observations that he has made. Perhaps, if I can say so on their behalf, I thank him too for the very kind remarks he has made about the civil servants involved in these matters.
Of course I recognise what he has had to say about the question of the possible postponement of the council elections. As I know he will appreciate, the district council elections did present a particular problem because the notices for those went out today, and it was felt that it was right therefore to let them run. But I quite appreciate the observations that he has made about that, and am grateful.