§ The Minister for Local Government and the Regions (Mr. Nick Raynsford)The Government are looking at many ways, including e-voting, to modernise our electoral system and to increase the opportunities that people have to vote. To test the robustness of the new options and to build public confidence in them, we are promoting an extensive programme of pilot innovations at local elections.
In September we, in conjunction with the Electoral Commission and the Local Government Association, published a prospectus inviting applications from English and Welsh local authorities to apply to run electoral pilots at local elections in 2003. The closing date for applications to run pilots in the May 2003 local elections was 29 November 2002.
I am pleased to announce that we have received 63 applications from authorities wishing to participate in this pilot round. Of these, 19 are proposing to hold e-voting trials, seven other applications include e-counting, and 37 involve all-postal ballots. Seven authorities propose testing other variations to the normal electoral process, including extensions to the voting hours.
The May 2003 pilot applications cover nearly 6.8 million electors. In comparison, the May 2002 pilots covered 2.5 million electors.
The level of interest and enthusiasm shown by authorities is very encouraging. The widespread readiness to pilot new and innovative approaches to holding elections will benefit voters by testing ways to make elections more straightforward and accessible. Our electoral pilot programme is an important step towards achieving our aim of an e-enabled general election post—2006.
Following consultation with the independent Electoral Commission, we expect to announce our decision on which non e-voting pilots have been approved later this month, and the decision on the remainder by mid-January 2003.
With this high level of interest shown by local authorities, our focus in the early part of 2003 will be on undertaking with the successful applicants the extensive groundwork necessary for them to hold their pilots. As a result, we do not anticipate giving approval to any requests for piloting at local authority by-elections that are to be held between 1 January and 31 March 2003.
Outside that period, our general approach on local authority by-election pilots is that we would be minded to approve proposals, including e-voting, for pilots only in certain circumstances. These are when the proposals 8WS meet the standard criteria set out in our September 2002 prospectus and contain innovative features or are from authorities that had run pilots before and are seeking to apply the same scheme to another election. We will, of course, consider carefully any application that is made.
In all cases, it is important for local authorities to make any application as early as possible given the tight timetable for by-elections. Local authorities may wish to submit outline proposals in advance of an application for a specific by-election.