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Lord Norton of Louth: Perhaps I may intervene to give the Minister some ammunition, if he cares for some, in response to what the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, has just said. The noble Lord said that he does not see it as a problem given the instances he cited. When he says that it is not a problem, he means that it is not a problem for the political parties. The electors may have a somewhat different perspective, and that is the aspect that we should look at. The noble Lord identified the problem of delays under the existing system. That is an argument for reform of the existing system to expedite it, so electors are not left for too long without a Member of Parliament; it is not an argument against the amendment.
I notice that the noble Lord's party, when advocating reform of the electoral system, does so on the basis that electors will be able to understand the new system because we have a sophisticated electorate who will be able to get their heads around it. The logic of that is that they will have no difficulty getting their heads around the parliamentary by-election followed shortly thereafter by a pilot election.
Lord Greaves: The argument that we use is that people are not capable of counting.
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: Clearly, we cannot please everyone. This discussion has shown that we must consider what the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, said, before Report. We invite the noble Lords, Lord
Norton of Louth and Rennard, to discuss with us how we can get an amendment that will make everyone happy. In the mean time—
The Deputy Chairman: Amendment No. 62 is tabled in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Greaves.
Lord Greaves: I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendment No. 63 had been withdrawn from the Marshalled List.]
[Amendment No. 64 had been withdrawn from the Marshalled List.]
Lord Greaves moved Amendment No. 65:
- Page 5, line 28, leave out paragraph (b).
The noble Lord said: The amendment seeks to probe whether the Government's piloting might extend to innovative ways of counting votes as compared to manually separating them, putting them in piles and so on. Will they consider using electronic machines or other mechanical contrivances rather than people? I would view such proposals with less than enthusiasm but, at the moment, the amendment merely seeks to probe the Government's view. I beg to move.
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: Amendment No. 65 would remove a specific reference to how the votes cast at an election are to be counted. Currently the pilot order can make provision regarding what is termed the "pilot matters". These are defined as when, where and how voting takes place and how the votes cast are to be counted. This needs to be retained in particular as we may wish to allow for electronic counting.
However, the good news is that no decision has yet been taken on this. A meeting is scheduled for Tuesday of next week, to be attended by government officials, the pilot regional returning officers or their deputies and the Electoral Commission. The meeting will inform the Government's view on the use of e-counting within these pilots and we shall return to this issue at a later date. It may be helpful to discuss this with noble Lords opposite after the meeting and before the Report stage. The settled policy will then be set out in the policy paper which, as I have said on a number of occasions today, will be sent to interested Peers prior to the next stage.
With those assurances, I hope that the noble Lord will feel able to withdraw his amendment.
Earl Attlee: I am a little confused. The Electoral Commission report suggested that the decision had to be made by mid-December. We are now nearing the end of January. I am extremely concerned whether there will be sufficient time to set up the system of all-postal votes. How does the Minister know to which pilot regions he will be talking when he has not made a decision about which regions will be piloted?
Baroness Hanham: My recollection is that there was a pilot at the previous European elections—at least
one of which took place in London—on electronic counting. It was extremely slow and the result came out hours and hours late. The Minister may wish to concentrate on that issue as well.
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: I can see the point that the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, is making. I can assure him that if we have the meetings and move quickly we will be able to have everything in place by 4 June. He said previously in Committee that it has not yet been agreed how many regions we shall be piloting. I made the point then and I shall make it again that it is a chicken and egg situation. Obviously we cannot be specific until we know the number of regions, but we are carrying out an enormous amount of preparatory work so that when the decision is made, we can move very quickly.
If we felt that we would not be able to fulfil our obligations by 4 June, we would obviously be very troubled—but we are not.
Lord Greaves: I am grateful to the Minister for the information he has provided. Whether it amounts to assurances I am not quite sure. He referred to "4 June". Was that a slip of the tongue?
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: I am sorry. It is 10 June. The earlier date is my son's birthday.
Lord Greaves: So the noble Lord is not changing polling day on the hoof and holding elections on a week-end as my noble friend would like. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 66 to 69 had been withdrawn from the Marshalled List.]
Lord Rennard moved Amendment No. 70:
- Page 6, line 11, leave out "under section 1"
The noble Lord said: This concerns an interesting principle about a great deal of election legislation. I thank the Minister for explaining how he intends elections to be conducted. I understand particularly the reservations of some noble Lords that, if this is to happen, local authorities will need to prepare effectively for the elections and to know as soon as possible how they are to be conducted.
There have been a number of controversies over orders relevant to elections such as these. I recall particularly the rules for the election of the Mayor of London four years ago, which caused significant dispute within the House.
At this stage, until we have a little more detail about the Government's proposals for the regulation of these elections, we are not prepared to allow them to go ahead by order without at least some parliamentary scrutiny. I am not saying that that is our fixed and final position. As more detail emerges we may, in the interests of haste, maximum efficiency and getting the elections agreed quickly, at a later stage agree that the elections should proceed as the Government intend.
But at this point I feel uncomfortable about agreeing that matters should proceed by order without parliamentary scrutiny. I beg to move.5.45 p.m.
Baroness Hanham: My amendment simply supports the amendments moved and spoken to by the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, and to which the name of the noble Lord, Lord Goodhart, is added. We believe that both Clauses 1 and 2 should be subject to parliamentary scrutiny, which is what these amendments would ensure.
Perhaps I may raise one question. The Minister said that everything would be ready for 10 June. In fact, everything must be ready by 22 May if the three-week time-scale is to be met, so time is short. I should correct what I said about electronic voting being carried out in the European elections. It was used in the mayoral election in London and proved to be very slow.
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: These amendments seek to subject the detailed pilot order to parliamentary scrutiny. I understand why noble Lords are pressing for this. The pilot order will make detailed changes to electoral procedures in the pilot regions. I must remind noble Lords that we are talking about the fine detail here. For example, I have here the all-postal voting scheme 2003 for the district of Herefordshire. When the orders are published for these pilots, they are likely to be three times the size of this scheme. Given that people are as bound by the regulations as they are by the Act, we feel that the most efficient way of handling this is by order.
We have taken as our precedent Section 10 of the Representation of the People Act 2000. This allows pilot orders for local authority election pilots to be made without being subject to parliamentary scrutiny. There is admittedly a difference in that under RPA 2000, local authorities volunteer to run pilot schemes, whereas under this Bill they will be compelled to do so. However, we feel that this is compensated for by the fact that Parliament must approve where the pilots will take place and, in broad terms, the method of piloting to be undertaken; in this case, postal voting. Last autumn we also consulted local authorities and other stakeholders on our proposals for the pilots.
The Committee on Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform has already considered this Bill and in its fourth report of this Session agreed that parliamentary procedure was not necessary for the pilot order. It recommended wider publication of the pilot order than that which is specified in the Bill. We have agreed wholeheartedly with this recommendation and we are looking at ways of making the order widely available using printed and electronic means of dissemination to, for example, electoral administrators, political parties and representative organisations.
We are not attempting to avoid scrutiny of our policy. After all, the Bill itself requires that the Electoral Commission is consulted on the contents of the pilot order and will be required to carefully assess each pilot after it has taken place. Additionally, we are developing the policy that will inform the pilot order
in conjunction with regional returning officers, the Electoral Commission and other stakeholders. We have been open in presenting our policy during our debates on specific issues such as, for example, supported delivery points or access for those with disabilities. However, I take the point that the details are important and, perhaps for the tenth time today, I shall mention that we are absolutely committed to sharing our policy intentions further with noble Lords of all parties between now and Report, and we welcome their responses to this policy.
I must finish, however, by reiterating that our view is that parliamentary scrutiny of the pilot order is not in itself appropriate. An important balance is to be struck between scrutiny and maximising the time that those implementing the pilots have to proceed with legal authority. I hope that the noble Lord will therefore withdraw his amendment.
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