Constitutional Reform and Governance Bill
Philip Dunne criticises the Bill for failing to address the low participation of overseas voters or to increase the number of British expatriates eligible to vote in their home country.
Mr. Philip Dunne (Ludlow) (Con): I rise to cover two aspects of this subject-one included in the Bill and one not. Let me start with part 7, which deals with arrangements surrounding the Comptroller and Auditor General. I had the pleasure and privilege of serving on the Public Accounts Committee for two years, so I have some familiarity with the splendid work undertaken by the Comptroller and Auditor General and by the National Audit Office, which supports him. I believe it is appropriate for this Bill to cover some of the arrangements for the hiring and firing-if that is the right way to put it-of the Comptroller and Auditor General, so I welcome part 7.
Needless to say, the Bill appears to have missed one or two aspects, which the Lord Chancellor, who I see in his place, may be able to pick up in case I have misinterpreted the clauses that relate to my concerns. The first is the appointment itself. Clause 37 covers eight aspects of the office of the Comptroller and Auditor General and subsection (7) states that the
"person appointed holds the office for ten years."
It is entirely appropriate to have a time limit on the appointment, because, although I am not casting aspersions on previous incumbents, it became apparent that there was no time limit only when Sir John Bourn reached an age when people were starting to wonder whether there was an appropriate point for him to retire; he decided to do so when he was, I think, 74. Having a 10-year appointment is thus entirely appropriate. The question it gives rise to is: in what circumstances should an incumbent retire?
Provision is made for the incumbent to offer his own resignation, and Her Majesty, through an address from both Houses of Parliament, can also accept his removal and replacement by somebody else, but there is also a third eventuality, which the Bill does not address. That is that, if the incumbent reaches a certain age and becomes infirm, soundness of mind might become an issue-perhaps not to the incumbent, but to those who have to work with him or her. I have found no provision in the Bill for that to be taken into account with regard to a figure of such seniority within the accountability structure of the civil service and Government of this country. If the Lord Chancellor has any inspiration while I am speaking, or perhaps later, during the wind-up speeches, he might like to address that point.
The second issue I want to deal with relates to clause 38(8).
Mr. Wills: If the hon. Gentleman looks at clause 41, which is headed "Resignation or removal of the Comptroller and Auditor General", it might set his mind at rest. It states:
"Her Majesty may remove from office the person who is the Comptroller and Auditor General on an address of both Houses of Parliament."
That is an accepted procedure that also applies to other senior posts, so I hope that it provides the hon. Gentleman with some reassurance.
Mr. Dunne: I have read that clause, and I referred to it earlier, but if the Minister is telling me that that is the form of words used for dealing with the eventuality that I identified, I take some reassurance from what he has said.
The Minister may well be able to help me with my second concern, too. As I was saying, it relates to clause 38(8)(b)(iv), which requires
"the National Audit Office to monitor the carrying out of the Comptroller and Auditor General's functions".
Unless the Bill envisages a change in the relationship between the Comptroller and Auditor General and the National Audit Office, what the clause suggests is that the National Audit Office-of which the Comptroller and Auditor General is, in effect, the chief executive-should be the body to monitor the effectiveness of its own chief executive. That seems to me to set up a relationship that could give rise to conflict and confusion. In most organisations an entity other than the chief executive monitors the chief executive's performance, and that entity is normally the board or governors of an organisation rather than the body of which he is chief executive. Again, I may be missing something, but I invite the Minister to respond to that concern as well.
The third aspect of the relationship about which I feel some concern appears in clause 38(8)(b)(vi), whereby the National Audit Office and the Comptroller and Auditor General are charged with developing a code of practice that deals with their relationship. Here we have the National Audit Office monitoring its own chief executive, and having to agree with that chief executive the code of practice according to which it would undertake its monitoring role. The provision seems to me to have been ill thought through, and I hope that either the Minister will explain what it means this evening, or an explanation can be given in Committee.
I am also concerned about omissions from the Bill that relate to British citizens living overseas. Two particular categories concern me. The first consists of those who are already disenfranchised by our present arrangements for participation in general elections in this country. Those who have lived overseas for more than 15 years are disfranchised, as the Minister mentioned when he appeared to be provoked by my intervention on the hon. Member for Cambridge (David Howarth) to point out that the issue had been discussed in the Chamber before. Indeed it has, but I think that the Minister may have been a bit hasty in leaping to his feet to deny that there were many people in that category, and to appear to deny that many other countries had more restricted arrangements than ours.
In the Minister's defence, I accept that it is hard to get a handle on the numbers. The Foreign Office will reply to parliamentary questions, as it has from time to time. I believe that it produces an annual estimate of the number of British citizens who live overseas, and it is around 13 million.
Mr. Wills: I am sorry if I have misunderstood the hon. Gentleman. Is he referring to people who are not on the electoral register because they have lived overseas for a certain period-which, under the existing provisions, renders them ineligible to be on the register-or is he referring to people who have a right to be on the register because they have not been expatriates for the period concerned, but the registration process has not caught up with them for some reason, and we have not been diligent enough in some respects? Which of those is the burden of his accusation, or is it both? If he can clarify what he has said, I shall be happy to give him as much reassurance as I can when I wind up the debate.
Mr. Dunne: I am grateful to the Minister, who is being very fair in trying to get to the bottom of my concern. The short answer is that both categories exist, and in fact there is a third, with which I shall deal later. At the moment, I am focusing on those who are already disfranchised as a result of decisions made in the House.
David Taylor (North-West Leicestershire) (Lab/Co-op): I may be about to repeat remarks I made in the previous debate to which the hon. Gentleman has referred, but I do not accept the 13 million figure. That seems to me to be enormous, and probably includes the £10-passage people from the 1950s. The number of ex-pats registered in a typical constituency is pitifully low, and of those who are registered the number who use their vote is lower still, so what is the point of this?
Mb< Mr. Dunne: I completely agree on both counts. The number of people who participate in our elections from overseas is pitifully low, but there are reasons for that, and they are built into the system we as a House have devised for allowing such participation. I shall come on to that.
The 13 million figure includes some 3 to 4 million of British national overseas passport holders who received their passports at the time when the Hong Kong colony was handed back to China, so they can be struck out of the 13 million. That gets us to a figure somewhere under 10 million. That figure is made up of estimates provided by each of our principal missions overseas as to how many British citizens are resident in the countries where they are based.
Mr. Wills: This is an important point, and the hon. Gentleman will know from previous exchanges and correspondence with him and other Members that the Government take it extremely seriously. Every step we have taken in terms of electoral administration has been to make sure the register is as comprehensive and accurate as possible. Registration is key to that, including the registration of British citizens, wherever in the world they are, who are eligible to vote, subject to the statutes of this House. As that is crucial, will the hon. Gentleman be clear about these figures, because they are huge? As my hon. Friend the Member for North-West Leicestershire (David Taylor) has said, they are very significant figures, and I hope the hon. Gentleman will agree that the methodology is also very important. I would therefore be very grateful if he would let the House know exactly what question he asked of those missions and exactly what the reply was, as well as what methodology they used to reach their estimates, and whether it was the same for each mission.
Mr. Dunne: I will be very happy to provide the Minister with the specific Hansard references for the parliamentary questions that were asked, but I do not have that information to hand at present. When he looks through his files and I provide him with the answer to his question, I am sure he will find that these estimates are made by foreign missions and given on an annual basis to the Foreign Office, which supplies the figures.
These are not the numbers of people who are eligible; I completely accept that. They are the figures for the overall quantum of British citizens estimated to be resident overseas at any one time. That includes both the currently enfranchised and those who have lived overseas for more than 15 years and who are therefore by current rules disfranchised. It is of concern to me that that large category of an indeterminate number of people-I think we can all agree that many of the foreign missions do not know how many people are resident overseas, but that they estimate the figure-is currently disfranchised from participating in domestic general elections or by-elections to this place. They are also, in most cases, disfranchised from voting in the national elections where they happen to live, so they are, in effect, electorally non-existent. That seems to me to be fundamentally unfair, unjust and not in accordance with the principles of democracy that this House likes to uphold. It is a great shame that that issue has not been addressed in the Bill.
The Minister said that many other countries have restrictions similar to ours in respect of the point of enfranchisement. I accept that the current rule is that if someone spends 15 years away they lose their right to vote. However, from answers to parliamentary questions and research I have conducted, I have found that not many other countries have voting rights more restrictive than ours. Within the European Union, I believe there are three: Malta, Cyprus and Denmark-and it is questionable whether Ireland has more restrictive rights than ours. That is a very small number of countries that provide a shorter period for which their nationals can continue to vote in their home country.
Mr. Wills: The hon. Gentleman is making an important point. I wonder whether he would remind the House that it has examined this issue on several occasions. He will be aware, from his careful research, that the House decided to vary the period after which expatriates are no longer eligible for registration. Will he remind the House of the arguments used to reach the current limit? Will he give his own assessment of the arguments made at that time?
Mr. Dunne: The arguments took place before I was a Member of this House. I have, of course, read some of the debates, but I do not think it would be right for me to rehearse all those arguments, because they range over a large number of topics. I should say that one of the main arguments used was that once people have left this country, they no longer pay tax here. That is not true; a large number of expatriates continue to pay tax in this country-for example, tax on their pensions or tax on property that they may have here. A large number of these people also have family connections here; even if they themselves have severed their links with this country, their families may well be educated here.
Mr. Francis Maude (Horsham) (Con): The Minister asks my hon. Friend what the arguments were when the House decided this. The Minister talks as if the House took a wholly free decision to reduce the period from 20 to 15 years. That is not how I recollect it; the Government produced a proposal and, as they had a majority in this House that was well into three figures, they drove it through. There was no suggestion that there was a free, independent and wholly uninhibited debate on the subject.
Mr. Dunne: I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for that comment. He has the benefit of having participated in those debates, whereas I do not. To develop my theme a little further, may I say that not only are the vast majority of EU countries much more liberal concerning the rights of their citizens to participate in their national elections-in essence, once a French citizen always a French citizen, and once a German citizen, always a German citizen, and, as such, those citizens are allowed to vote in their elections-but so, too, are other members of the OECD. The only country, aside from those that I have mentioned, to have more restrictive voting rights than this country is South Korea, and it has a particular reason for that.
Mr. Straw: Let me take the hon. Gentleman back to the point that my hon. Friend the Member for North-West Leicestershire (David Taylor) raised with him. Since this arrangement for overseas voting was first introduced-in, as I recall, the Representation of the People Act 1983 -[Interruption.] Hon. Members say that that was done by consensus. I cannot remember what the final vote was, but I do recall some intense arguments in this House. This was at the high point of Baroness Thatcher's Administration and Labour Members were concerned-I make this point in a serious way-that along with the fiddling of unemployment statistics and much else besides, an effort was being made to fiddle the franchise. I shall return to the point very quickly, Mr. Deputy Speaker. In the event, the surprise for Members on both sides of the House has been-this applies to those who have been resident abroad for only three or four years, let alone 15 years-how few people have bothered to use this right. The proportion is far fewer than the 65 to 70 per cent. who turn out from a UK base.
Mr. Dunne: I am grateful to the Lord Chancellor for making that point, because it takes me on to the second category that I wanted to discuss, which comprises 2.5 million people who we believe are eligible to vote; the Foreign Office believes this and I accept its figures, although they are still estimates. I am talking about the British expatriates who have lived abroad for less than 15 years. As he correctly says, a small proportion of that number participate in elections in this country, so I will return to the relevant question that was posed by the hon. Member for North-West Leicestershire. The reason why very few of those people participate is because we make it almost impossible for their vote to count. At the previous general election, in 2005, 17,000 British expatriates participated; I believe that that was more or less the number who were registered, so the turnout among those who had bothered to register was quite high.
Today-as at the last time of calculation-there are only 14,000 such people, as evidenced by a response to a parliamentary question. Only 14,000 people, out of 2.5 million, are registered. We have to ask ourselves why. The Lord Chancellor and his colleagues will say that it is because they have no interest-they have left the country, they cannot be bothered and they are no longer engaged with the political process in this country. It is possible that a proportion of the 2.5 million feel that way, and that that proportion is similar to the proportion of the domestic population who, regrettably, feel sufficiently apathetic about our election process and politics in this place not to participate in voting.
Let me explain one or two of the practical difficulties of participating in a general election in this country for those who happen to live abroad.
Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con): Does my hon. Friend not agree that if one is living abroad, one feels a sort of disengagement and feels isolated from realpolitik in the UK? Despite the fact that so many people have Sky boxes-they are illegal, I might add-in Spain and elsewhere, they cannot feel involved and do not feel the need to get involved in a general election.
Mr. Dunne: As I was saying earlier-and as my hon. Friend will have heard-I think that there is a case for saying that some of our citizens abroad feel disengaged. However, I am not seeking to address that audience-I am seeking to point out to the Minister that the deficiency of this Bill is that it does not address the practical steps that could be taken by anybody who wants to encourage those who have the right to vote from overseas to do so.
Mr. Wills: The hon. Gentleman has been very generous in giving way, and I appreciate it. He raises an important point, which is difficult and complex. He is probably aware that 3 million to 3.5 million people in this country are eligible to vote but are not on the register. There are all sorts of problems with that, and it is enormously difficult. Most electoral registration officers are very diligent in trying to get everybody who is eligible on to the register. We have laid duties on them and given them new powers, more or less with the support of the whole House. Those duties include sending out regular canvass forms and making house-to-house visits. If we are to believe the Leader of the Opposition, we live in an age of austerity. I hope that the hon. Gentleman-perhaps he can confirm this-is not suggesting house-to-house visits for the 2.5 million expatriates to whom he has referred.
Mr. Dunne: I am certainly not, but I am very glad that the Minister raises that point. One challenge for any Administration, and for any individual electoral registration officer, is identifying where the people who are eligible to vote live. Were we to follow the practice that the Minister suggested that I might be heading towards, we would have to knock on the doors not just of expatriates but of everybody who happens to live abroad. We do not know where they live. The Foreign Office missions do not keep a full register of British expatriates resident in their country. Every ambassador to whom I have spoken on this subject-I have touched on it with a number of them-says, "If only we could have a system whereby we could identify where expatriates live." They would like to have access to such a system so that they could fulfil some of their statutory duties in the event of an emergency, or whatever.
We require our citizens overseas to register annually. Citizens within the country are, as the Minister has suggested, sent an annual reminder of who is on the register for their property, but those who are resident overseas are not sent a reminder. If they do not bother to register or if they are not prompted to do so by some diary note that tells them that their registration will fall due, they fall off the register. That is a major inhibitor to people remaining on the register. People have to register every year, whereas many other countries have registration that lasts for the duration of their Parliament or for a fixed period of time. Some countries have 10-year registration; I think that that would be innovative and would deal with the problem.
The second practical problem for expatriates is that they have to have their identity confirmed on the registration form by another British citizen who is also on the register. As we know from our earlier discussions, only 14,000 such people live overseas. Many people who might like to vote while living overseas cannot, because they cannot find anybody who meets the criteria and is eligible to certify that they are who they say they are.
The Government put forward a consultation on individual voter registration that was due to be published last June. We have not heard the results yet, so the debate has been moved not one step further. The fact that the Bill says nothing about voter registration is another deficiency, and a missed opportunity.
Expatriates have the benefit of a very clear identifier. I am not allowed to use audiovisual props in the Chamber, but I am holding British passport in my right hand. It has a single-number identifier, and allowing expatriates to verify that they are British by use of their passport number would overcome the problem of identity confirmation. I accept that there are some data protection issues, but unfortunately the Government have chosen not to go down that route, even though it would make it easier for people to register and therefore to vote.
I have tried the patience of the House and Ministers perhaps a little too long this evening, so I shall end by saying that people abroad who register to vote have to do so remotely. Most do so by post, which works well in the UK. Participation in postal voting by citizens resident here is rising each year, and I welcome that.
Mr. Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con): My hon. Friend has not touched on the question of registration by service personnel overseas. At the last election, whole swathes of them were denied the right to vote. Does this Bill do anything to rectify that?
Mr. Dunne: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for referring to armed services personnel. The Government, with the Ministry of Defence and service chiefs, have taken steps to increase significantly awareness of voting among armed forces personnel overseas, but there is no doubt that operational risks are involved. We have all heard the rumours that British Forces Postal Services in theatre are at risk of being closed down for security reasons. That would mean that members of our forces currently serving in Afghanistan might well be denied a vote if a general election were to take place very soon. That would obviously be a tragedy; if possible, our servicemen and women should not be deprived of the opportunity to vote.
My point about postal votes for people overseas has to do with the date by which candidates are able to withdraw their nominations from the ballot. That date is so close to the day of the election that ballot papers cannot be printed-and therefore posted overseas-until 11 days before the ballot. The result is that ballot papers arrive overseas approximately one week before polling. Many people cannot be certain, therefore, that their ballot papers will get back to the relevant constituency in time to be counted, even if they sign them and put them back in the post on the same day that they receive them.
David Taylor: The hon. Gentleman is talking about the alleged difficulties of registration. However, my registration authority is one of many to register voters by text or email, so that is not a problem. Secondly, on the question of returning ballot papers, the fact that expats retain strong links with this country means that they will undoubtedly know people in the constituency where they are registered whom they can trust to cast a proxy vote.
Mr. Dunne: I agree with the first part of what the hon. Gentleman said, in that it would help if expats could register using modern technology. However, they are not allowed to, as they have to complete the form. My understanding is that the Electoral Commission does not allow electoral registration officers to accept registration from overseas by electronic means, because it is not satisfied with the present security arrangements. The technology is there, but it is not yet being used.
On the hon. Gentleman's second point, the evidence suggests that after five or 10 years, many people who move abroad may not have family or friends in the area they left. For instance, 18 or 19-year olds who go abroad to university may decide to stay overseas; although they might have been eligible to vote as teenagers, they no longer have people they can call on to exercise their vote for them.
However, the hon. Gentleman is right to say that a proxy vote is the only way that expat citizens overseas can be certain that their vote counts. Asking people to participate only by way of proxy invites them, in effect, to give away their vote. That is a difficult thing to ask people to do remotely.
I conclude by regretting that the Bill does nothing to ease the participation of eligible voters or to facilitate voting for many British citizens who are disfranchised at present. That is a great shortcoming and failure of fairness in the Bill.
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Previously in the same debate:
Mr. Philip Dunne (Ludlow) (Con): The hon. Gentleman is ranging widely on the omissions from the Bill. Does he agree that another omission is the failure to overcome the lack of fairness shown to British citizens who vote when they happen to be living, either temporarily or permanently, overseas? We are now one of only four countries in the whole European Union that have restrictive rights that disfranchise millions of our citizens overseas. Should not those people be taken care of in this constitutional reform Bill?
David Howarth: I would not argue as broadly as the hon. Gentleman does, and this might not be the right Bill in which to address that issue, but I think there is a problem, especially in terms of British citizens who work for international organisations, who seem to be discriminated against in an unfortunate way.
