Grand Committee
Armed Forces (Service Complaints Miscellaneous Provisions) (Amendment) Regulations 2026
Baroness Antrobus
That the Grand Committee do consider the Armed Forces (Service Complaints Miscellaneous Provisions) (Amendment) Regulations 2026
Baroness in Waiting/Government Whip (Baroness Antrobus) (Lab)
My Lords, these regulations were laid before both Houses on 29 June 2026. They make consequential amendments to the Armed Forces (Service Complaints Miscellaneous Provisions) Regulations 2015, following amendments introduced through the Armed Forces Commissioner Act 2025. For ease of reference, I will refer to them as the 2015 regulations.
These draft regulations introduce two principal amendments. First, they amend the 2015 regulations to replace references to the “appropriate officer” with references to the “appropriate person”. This allows for suitably qualified civilians, as well as military personnel, to carry out specified administrative functions within the service complaints system, including liaising with the Armed Forces Commissioner and providing updates on the progress and outcome of service complaints. The regulations also include a transitional provision to ensure that existing cases continue smoothly when the changes come into force.
Secondly, the regulations amend the list of matters that may not be the subject of a service complaint. Specifically, they provide that decisions on whether an appeal has been brought on valid grounds cannot themselves be challenged through the service complaints process. This ensures that the system is not burdened with complaints concerning procedural admissibility decisions, and it supports the efficient operation of the service complaints process.
Overall, the amendments provide greater flexibility and efficiency in the administration of the system, while maintaining existing safeguards and preserving the rights of service personnel. The amendment permitting suitably qualified civilians to undertake specified administrative functions within the service complaints system was requested by the single services themselves, to provide greater flexibility in administering the system.
The amendments will be implemented through existing service complaints processes and procedures. Any necessary guidance and administrative instructions will be updated to reflect the changes made by the regulations.
In summary, these regulations make two technical and consequential amendments to the service complaints system. They improve administrative flexibility, support the efficient operation of the service complaints process and ensure consistency between the regulations and the Armed Forces Act 2006, as amended by the Armed Forces Commissioner Act 2025. Importantly, these amendments do not alter the rights of service personnel or the protections available within the service complaints system. I hope that noble Lords will join me in supporting the draft regulations. I beg to move.
Baroness Smith of Newnham (LD)
My Lords, I am delighted to welcome the Minister to her place and thank her for introducing this draft statutory instrument so clearly and effectively. We may be aiming for a record in how fast we deal with a statutory instrument, because it appears, on the face of it, to be uncontroversial. Changing the words “appropriate officer” to “appropriate person” is absolutely straightforward.
The one area where I would be interested to hear the Minister’s advice is on the change to the appeals process. In her opening remarks, she said that it would not really make any difference and that it is intended simply to streamline provisions and to make sure that people are not appealing on frivolous grounds. However, could there be any cases where someone who would have been able to find a way to appeal could be somehow knocked back during the appeal process because the person making the decision—it is not clear whether it will be the “appropriate person” deciding who can and cannot appeal—takes a very hard-line approach to whether the appeal is valid? That is the only area of possible concern.
The Earl of Minto (Con)
My Lords, I too take this opportunity to welcome the Minister to the Dispatch Box. I look forward to having many instructive exchanges with her.
The crux of the matter under consideration in these regulations is, as has already been mentioned, the substitution of “appropriate officer” with “appropriate person” in the 2015 service complaints regulations. Noble Lords present may well remember that this issue was first raised during our debates on the then Armed Forces Commissioner Bill last year. At that time, my noble friend Lady Goldie raised a concern about the removal of the chain of command from the service complaints system. However, after discussions with the Minister and officials, the Government clarified that the amendments to Sections 340B and 340N of the Armed Forces Act 2006 did not replace the role of the commanding officer but simply supplemented their involvement by permitting a sufficiently qualified civilian also to make a referral to the newly established Armed Forces Commissioner. After receiving that assurance, my noble friend was content to withdraw her opposition to those amendments.
These regulations are consequential to the changes made by the Armed Forces Commissioner Act 2025 and simply translate the changes made to the service complaints process into the relevant secondary legislation. As such, given the assurance that we received last year, we do not oppose these regulations.
Baroness Antrobus (Lab)
My Lords, I thank noble Lords for their contributions, brief though they were, and for the constructive scrutiny that they have brought to this important issue. I thank the noble Earl, Lord Minto, and the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, for their welcoming words. I am grateful to them and to their colleagues, as I have learned much from their insightful contributions to defence debates in the months since my introduction to this place earlier this year. They have been most instructive, and I look forward to working with them—preferably not against them, where possible. We all agree, I am sure, that the defence of the nation is the primary duty of our Government.
I will address the concerns raised. On the specific concerns raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, the amendment is not intended to prevent service personnel making a complaint. Service personnel will continue to be able to raise service complaints. The amendment applies only to decisions on whether an appeal has been brought on valid grounds. The idea is to make the service complaints system better for those who need it most and ensure it is not clogged up by specific service complaints about a service complaint. The amendment does not affect the substantive right to make a complaint or appeal a complaint decision; it simply clarifies that procedural decisions relating to the validity of an appeal cannot themselves be challenged through the service complaints process.
As I set out, the regulations make two technical and consequential amendments to the service complaints system. To recap, the first amendment provides greater flexibility by allowing suitably qualified civilians, as well as military personnel, to carry out specified administrative functions within the service complaints system. The second amendment clarifies that decisions on whether an appeal has been brought on valid grounds cannot themselves be challenged through the service complaints process, supporting the efficient operation of that system. Importantly, these amendments do not alter the rights of service personnel, the grounds on which a service complaint may be made or the protections available within the service complaints system. With those comments, I commend the instrument to the Committee.
Withdrawal Agreement (Windsor Framework and Governance) (Amendment) Regulations 2026
(1 day, 7 hours ago)
Grand CommitteeRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Baroness Twycross
That the Grand Committee do consider the Withdrawal Agreement (Windsor Framework and Governance) (Amendment) Regulations 2026.
Relevant document: 10th Report from the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee
The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office, and Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Baroness Twycross) (Lab)
My Lords, I apologise to noble Lords for the delay to the start of these proceedings. I will begin by setting out the background to this instrument. It concerns the governance arrangements for the Windsor Framework and Northern Ireland’s trading arrangements, and the UK/EU withdrawal agreement.
First and foremost, the instrument takes forward and supports certain commitments the Government made in response to the independent review of the Windsor Framework that was conducted by my noble friend Lord Murphy of Torfaen and published at the end of 2024. It does so by providing greater flexibility in the process for the Northern Ireland Assembly’s Democratic Scrutiny Committee to scrutinise regulations that are applicable under the Windsor Framework. It also clarifies the statutory obligations of Northern Ireland departments to support the committee by providing it with responses to reasonable requests for information.
Secondly, the instrument helps facilitate the Withdrawal Agreement Joint Committee to use written procedure to adopt decisions or recommendations such as those in relation to the Windsor Framework, which is, of course, a crucial element of the withdrawal agreement. This will keep the governance arrangements of the withdrawal agreement working effectively, particularly where we need to keep rules that apply in Great Britain and Northern Ireland in step.
I will now explain in more detail how the instrument meets its purposes, which are threefold. First, in response to recommendations made by the independent review of the Windsor Framework, the Government committed to providing greater flexibility to the Northern Ireland Assembly’s Windsor Framework Democratic Scrutiny Committee in examining and considering EU legislation relevant to Northern Ireland. The committee plays a valuable role in scrutinising regulations relevant to Northern Ireland. Its reports and engagement with affected stakeholders inform the work of government, just as they will inform the work of many Members of the Assembly. These changes to Schedule 6B to the Northern Ireland Act 1998 are aimed at providing the Assembly with greater latitude in conducting its work within a two-month window following the publication of relevant EU Acts, if it wishes to use it.
A timeframe for the scrutiny of EU Acts under the Windsor Framework is provided for in law so that everyone is clear—MLAs, businesses and civil society—about how the process works and what the impacts of those enactments are. Currently, the committee has five working days to vote on whether to hold an inquiry into a replacement EU Act. If an inquiry is held, a report must be produced no later than 15 working days before the end of the two-month scrutiny period, which begins the day the EU publishes the Act in its Official Journal. This instrument gives the committee greater flexibility by expanding the inquiry decision window to 10 working days and alters the publication deadline for inquiry reports to no later than 12 working days before the end of the scrutiny period. These changes will allow the committee greater latitude to choose how to run its inquiries, take evidence and report on them.
Secondly, the instrument takes account of the need to ensure continuing, effective governance arrangements that are fit for the future. This future includes the three new agreements we are seeking to take forward with the EU on SPS, electricity and emissions trading. This change is made by omitting Section 15C of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018. This will allow the UK to agree to decisions and recommendations at the joint committee between meetings in a process known as written procedure. In effect, this will revert the arrangements to how they were when the withdrawal agreement was first agreed, as this mechanism has always been contained within the treaty text. It will enhance the UK’s ability to take necessary decisions without having to wait for a meeting of the Withdrawal Agreement Joint Committee, which typically happens only once or twice a year.
As with the changes to the Democratic Scrutiny Committee’s procedures that I have already set out, written procedure will be an optional flexibility and will not be utilised for every decision. The effect will be to enable the Government to ensure, where there are EU regulatory obligations applicable in Great Britain, that Northern Ireland can keep pace. This could also, for example, cover urgent measures needed to protect the smooth operation of Northern Ireland’s dual market access and its place within the UK market.
I emphasise that these changes do not amend the process of scrutinising those decisions where the Government maintain obligations to Parliament and the Northern Ireland Assembly. The process remains as it is today, including where it is provided for in the Northern Ireland Act 1998 and in the Government’s EU scrutiny arrangements with the European Affairs Committee and the Northern Ireland Scrutiny Committee. By removing this restriction, the governance of the withdrawal agreement will be aligned with that of the trade and co-operation agreement, which has no similar restriction on the use of written procedure. As with the EU-UK Partnership Council, which was established under the trade and co-operation agreement, the joint committee would still remain the default forum for UK-EU decision-making in relation to the withdrawal agreement and continue to meet, just as the Partnership Council does.
Finally, the instrument provides for and clarifies the responsibilities that Northern Ireland departments and Ministers are already under to the Windsor Framework Democratic Scrutiny Committee. This is aimed at supporting the work of the Democratic Scrutiny Committee and the governance arrangements of which it forms part. This instrument clarifies the duty on those authorities to comply with a reasonable request for information from the committee, and that such a request should not be regarded as unreasonable solely on the ground that a Northern Ireland department or Minister lacks primary responsibility for the EU Act in question. This change is made in response to recommendations in the independent review on how Northern Ireland departments should be empowered to provide evidence to and support the committee.
I also note, for completeness, that the instrument makes some technical amendments to existing legislation. Specifically, it amends outdated references within the Northern Ireland Act 1998 and the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018, so that these now refer to the Windsor Framework. This minor change provides clarity and aligns UK domestic legislation with the international context.
In conclusion, this instrument demonstrates the Government’s commitment to implementing the recommendations of the independent review of the Windsor Framework, to ensure that Northern Ireland’s trading arrangements work well, and to take the practical steps necessary as we build a stronger relationship with the EU, from which Northern Ireland will benefit and which will deliver the good growth that we wish to see in every postcode. I beg to move.
Lord Bew (CB)
My Lords, I welcome this SI and am grateful to the Minister for introducing it so effectively and carefully. It is part of a process in which the Windsor Framework becomes more centre stage and the withdrawal agreement takes a step back. This is a vital process: the core of the Windsor Framework is to introduce more suppleness in facing up to the difficult question of Brexit. It is not perfect and there are many, many imperfections, but I think—this might not be a bad day to say it, following the meeting of the First Minister of Northern Ireland and the First Ministers of Wales and Scotland in Cardiff—that there is a danger, within Northern Ireland, of not coming to terms with the fact that the Windsor Framework has actually effected positive changes, and that this is part of the process.
A long time ago, there was a taskforce report following the 1985 Hillsborough agreement, signed by Margaret Thatcher—the noble Lord, Lord McCrea, will remember this. That was far more threatening and destabilising in its impact on Northern Ireland than anything in the Windsor Framework or the initial withdrawal agreement. The taskforce report represented a conclusion involving the two main unionist parties, after some period of rather sterile activism against the United Kingdom Government. It said that there was no set security or sanity in the junior partner in the United Kingdom being permanently estranged from the senior partner. The period since Brexit has opened up a similar period of estrangement, and it is time that this came to an end.
The crucial thing about the Windsor Framework, as underlined by the Minister’s remarks, is that it moves away from the very problematic commitment in the withdrawal Act that the British Government would foster an all-Ireland economy. How you would do that I was never quite sure, by the way, because the all-Ireland economy is based on a model condemned by Piketty, Krugman and Stiglitz—all Nobel Prize winners in economics—which is basically one of low tax for incoming American firms. It is difficult to do anyway. The point is that the Windsor Framework unhooks the British Government from a commitment to further the all-Ireland economy. In that sense, given the problematic aspect of the withdrawal agreement, many difficulties and flaws remain, but I welcome the fact that the Minister has come today and, essentially, refreshed certain aspects of the Windsor Framework. I am grateful to the Minister for her introduction.
Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Lab)
My Lords, I am deeply grateful for being given permission to take part in this debate. I welcome these regulations, like I have welcomed the Windsor Framework on many occasions, because it deals with special arrangements to prevent a hard border on the island of Ireland. I do not want to see borders anywhere between the UK and Ireland and between Northern Ireland and Britain. Therefore, it is important that the challenges and impediments presented by the Windsor Framework are ironed out—hence the appointment 18 months ago by the then Secretary of State, Hilary Benn, of the noble Lord, Lord Murphy, to deal with particular issues regarding implementation.
The noble Lord was fairly circumscribed in what he could do, but some of those recommendations looked at democratic scrutiny and the democratic deficit. He also proposed that Assembly Members on the Democratic Scrutiny Committee would have a greater amount of time for scrutiny. A committee that I am a member of, the Northern Ireland Scrutiny Committee, met the Democratic Scrutiny Committee on several occasions and it raised with us the lack of time that it has been given to do scrutiny, so I was very pleased when the noble Lord, Lord Murphy, proposed that the instrument would extend by five days the time by which that Democratic Scrutiny Committee of the Northern Ireland Assembly must vote on whether to hold an inquiry. That recommendation was accepted by the Government and now we are giving it legal effect. I welcome that.
I also ask this of my noble friend the Minister. Our Northern Ireland Scrutiny Committee and the noble Lord, Lord Murphy, proposed a hub. I note that I am sitting beside my noble friend Lady Anderson, who has met me on that specific issue to seek an update on the hub. How far is it progressing and what work has been done already? When will there be a report to the Northern Ireland Scrutiny Committee and to your Lordships’ Chamber on the progress that has been made? In summary, I support this instrument and the changes that it seeks to introduce as they will bring greater accountability from the work carried out by the Democratic Scrutiny Committee.
Lord McCrea of Magherafelt and Cookstown (DUP)
My Lords, I suppose it comes as no surprise that I have a different opinion on the Windsor Framework. Rather than it being the answer to many problems, it has also created many problems in its impact on Northern Ireland businesses and the rest of the United Kingdom. I am fed up, when ordering something from the mainland, to be told, “It cannot be posted to your address”. That has happened countless times, but that would not be accepted in any other part of the United Kingdom. Why are we supposed to be thankful, when we are looked upon as the poor relation within the United Kingdom?
As regards the theatrics of what happened today with Michelle O’Neill, I remind everyone that the First Minister has no power whatever to sign any memorandum of understanding as the First Minister. She can do so as the deputy leader of the Sinn Féin party, but she has no authority to sign anything on behalf of the Northern Ireland Assembly or the elected representatives of Northern Ireland in Stormont.
This SI flows from the Murphy review. We have great respect for the noble Lord, Lord Murphy. It was to strengthen the place of the Windsor Framework Democratic Scrutiny Committee, yet one aspect has been deleted. Members of the other place have already drawn attention to this. It is Section 15C of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018.
Baroness Suttie (LD)
My Lords, I thank the Minister for her detailed introduction to these regulations. From these Benches we welcome them and very much welcome any measures to implement the recommendations contained in the important report by the noble Lord, Lord Murphy, which we very much supported.
As the Minister will be aware, there remain a great many concerns about the Windsor Framework in Northern Ireland, as the noble Lord, Lord McCrea, has illustrated very well. However, from these Benches we have always recognised that it is a pragmatic solution to a far from optimum situation stemming from the hard Brexit approach adopted by the previous Conservative Governments.
I have two quick questions for the Minister. Can she say whether there is a timetable for implementing the rest of the recommendations contained in the important report from the noble Lord, Lord Murphy? Can the Minister, to follow on from the speech of the noble Lord, Lord McCrea, say whether there plans for a wider strategy on how to ensure parliamentary oversight here in Westminster for secondary legislation stemming from the Windsor Framework and other legislation resulting from dynamic alignment with the European Union?
The Minister will be aware that there are already lots of debates on regret Motions on regulations relating to the Windsor Framework. Indeed, I believe there is another one tomorrow evening from the noble Lord, Lord McCrea. She will be aware that even more will result from the EU Bill, so it will be very useful for us to understand the Government’s thinking about Westminster’s oversight role in the House of Commons and in the House of Lords in this regard.
The Earl of Effingham (Con)
My Lords, this instrument makes changes to the Northern Ireland Assembly’s Windsor Framework Democratic Scrutiny Committee, which scrutinises EU law that is applicable in Northern Ireland under the Windsor Framework, implementing some of the recommendations made by the independent review of the Windsor Framework.
His Majesty’s loyal Opposition are of the strong opinion that the Government must explain why they are removing the safeguards introduced by the previous Government prohibiting the use of written procedure in the joint committee, which were meant to ensure full ministerial accountability for its decisions. This instrument removes Section 15C of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018. The Explanatory Memorandum to this instrument says that this provision was being made:
“to facilitate decision making between the co-chairs on time-sensitive issues during the period in between formal meetings, noting the bulk of decisions at the Joint Committee relate to the Windsor Framework”.
However, the Explanatory Notes for the European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Act 2020, which introduced Section 15C into the 2018 Act, stated that the prohibition on the use of written procedure in the joint committee by the UK’s co-chair was to ensure that,
“decisions made by the Joint Committee are made by a Minister in person. The purpose of this provision is to ensure there is full ministerial accountability … for all decisions made in the Joint Committee”.
That was well highlighted by the noble Lord, Lord McCrea.
Introducing the use of written procedure in the joint committee by the UK’s co-chair was not recommended by the independent review. In line with the noble Lord, Lord McCrea, we have one important question: will the Minister explain in more detail the rationale for allowing the written procedure? Is there a risk, as has already been discussed, that it would allow changes to slip through inadvertently without even the minimal scrutiny currently in operation?
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
My Lords, I am very grateful to all noble Lords who have contributed to today’s debate. The instrument is a key element of the Government’s commitments made following the independent review, and I hope that it demonstrates that we continue to take action to ensure that the Windsor Framework works for the people and businesses of Northern Ireland, which is this Government’s intention for it to do.
In relation to a couple of the points that came up in the debate, the noble Lord, Lord Bew, raised an important point. I fully agree with him that Northern Ireland’s dual market access is a unique opportunity that has potential to drive real growth for Northern Ireland. The Government are committed to taking all necessary steps to protect the internal market while implementing the Windsor Framework in good faith, including having regard to all aspects of the Northern Ireland economy.
In relation to the points raised by my noble friend Lady Ritchie, I am happy to meet to discuss progress on the hub.
With regard to the point raised by the noble Lord, Lord McCrea, the robust parliamentary oversight frameworks already in place remain entirely unchanged. I hope that provides him with some reassurance. The written procedure simply ensures that, when the UK’s interests depend on swift action between the scheduled meetings, bearing in mind that they might take place only once or twice a year, we can take that action and Parliament will continue to be provided with explanatory memoranda on decisions made in the joint committee. I clarify that, in our view, this does not weaken the accountability of the Government at the joint committee. The scrutiny process for joint committee decisions made by the Government is not changed by this SI. That includes the role for Parliament and the Northern Ireland Assembly, as set down in law and in writing, which is very important.
Lord McCrea of Magherafelt and Cookstown (DUP)
Will the Minister clarify whether the Government are removing Section 15C or not? We cannot have it both ways.
Lord McCrea of Magherafelt and Cookstown (DUP)
The Minister is saying that the protection is there, but Section 15C was inserted by Section 35 of the European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Act 2020, which was very clear that the reason for precluding Ministers was simply to ensure that nothing could be slipped through and that there had to be accountability. That is its purpose, so to remove Section 15C is to remove its purpose of providing a safeguard. Removing the safeguard cannot be the same as protecting the safeguard.
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
We think that there is a sufficient safeguard in place, but I would be happy to meet the noble Lord to discuss this further if he would find that helpful.
I return to my concluding remarks on the SI. This is not the only action that the Government are taking to protect the internal market. We have announced £16.6 million to strengthen the UK internal market and help Northern Ireland boost trade with Great Britain. This includes a comprehensive one-stop shop regulatory support service, beyond what is currently available on GOV.UK. This will help businesses trade across UK and EU markets and benefit from Northern Ireland’s unique dual market access. We have also established a triage process to support co-ordination between the Government and Northern Ireland departments on relevant EU legislation. This Government are clear that Northern Ireland is and should be a core player in that relationship. Arrangements that necessarily protect Northern Ireland’s place in the union and its internal market prevent a hard border on the island of Ireland and deliver certainty to businesses on the basis of the agreement with the EU.
I recognise and respect that noble Lords may have different views on how we arrived where we are now from Brexit, and on its merits and otherwise. However, on behalf of the Government, I should be very clear that our focus must remain on what we do next to ensure that our relationship with the EU works best for all parts of the UK.
We are focused on looking forward to a new strategic partnership with the EU, which stands to benefit Northern Ireland. I assure the Committee that we will also remain focused on smoothing flows of goods to Northern Ireland where we can, with the arrangements that apply now, with an eye to the new and beneficial arrangements that we are seeking to obtain in future.
I am not sure that I have managed to answer all noble Lords’ questions. I will ask my office to write to all those who have taken part in today’s debate as I am happy to have a continued conversation about these very important matters. I commend these regulations to the Committee.
Boiler Upgrade Scheme (Amendment to the Energy Act 2008 etc.) Regulations 2026
(1 day, 7 hours ago)
Grand CommitteeRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Baroness Curran
That the Grand Committee do consider the Boiler Upgrade Scheme (Amendment to the Energy Act 2008 etc.) Regulations 2026.
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (Baroness Curran) (Lab)
My Lords, these regulations were laid in draft before Parliament on 13 July 2026. The boiler upgrade scheme is the Government’s flagship scheme for supporting the decarbonisation of heat in homes and small non-domestic buildings across England and Wales. The scheme provides grants towards the installation of eligible low-carbon heating technologies, primarily heat pumps, helping households overcome the upfront costs associated with transitioning away from fossil fuel heating systems.
In 2025, the Government consulted on expanding the range of technologies supported through the scheme, including the potential introduction of heat batteries. Heat batteries are a type of thermal energy storage system that can use low-carbon electricity to generate and store heat, and release that energy when required. Following consideration of the consultation responses, the Government confirmed their intention to support heat batteries through the scheme once the appropriate standards are in place. The amendments made by these regulations are an important step towards implementing that decision. The Government are supporting the future inclusion of heat batteries in the boiler upgrade scheme to increase consumer choice, as they have the potential to provide an alternative low-carbon heating solution for consumers in homes where heat pump installation may not be appropriate.
These regulations amend the power of the Secretary of State to make regulations to establish schemes to facilitate and encourage the renewable generation of heat in England and Wales. These schemes can be established only in relation to the listed sources of energy and technologies. These regulations add thermal energy storage systems to the list of those sources of energy and technologies. This amendment provides the necessary statutory basis for thermal energy storage systems to be supported through government schemes that derive their powers from Section 100 of the Energy Act, such as the boiler upgrade scheme. Subject to Parliament approving these regulations, the Government intend to bring forward a statutory instrument to amend the Boiler Upgrade Scheme (England and Wales) Regulations 2022 and to enable support for eligible heat batteries through the scheme.
The regulations also amend Regulation 22 of the Boiler Upgrade Scheme (England and Wales) Regulations 2022. This is a technical amendment that clarifies the powers available to the scheme administrator where an installer has received an ineligible payment. The change will enable the scheme administrator, Ofgem, to recover any amount owed through a combination of repayment and offsetting against future grant payments to that installer, improving the administration of the scheme and the protection of public money.
The changes made by these regulations will ensure that the legislative powers underpinning the boiler upgrade scheme can accommodate heat batteries. In doing so, they deliver an important step towards the Government’s commitments to support heat batteries through the scheme, to increase consumer choice and to help more homeowners across England and Wales decarbonise their properties. I beg to move.
Lord Moynihan (Con)
My Lords, I thank the Minister for introducing this statutory instrument.
The passage of time points to the boiler upgrade scheme’s own record. Regrettably, there have been years of missed installation targets: the original goal was 600,000 a year by 2028, but barely a tenth of that figure has been met. It is now self-evident that expanding the scheme’s budget and eligibility in 2026 will escalate spend on a mechanism that has structurally underperformed without any intention to reform it coming from either the Government or the Liberal Democrat Benches. At this point, I should declare my interest as the chairman of Buckthorn, Acteon and Amey.
The clearest recent articulation of this comes from the shadow Business Secretary and former shadow Secretary of State for Energy, Claire Coutinho, fronting a report from the think tank Onward. It argued that UK electricity prices are too high and that cheap power itself, achieved partly by using more gas and cutting green levies, will do more to drive heat pump and EV uptake than continued subsidy and mandates.
It is compelling economic sense, and it is the belief on this side of the Committee that this approach would make electrification more attractive, while delivering prosperity and a better environment. In other words, no one is arguing that heat pumps are bad, but we believe that a BUS-style subsidy is now proven to be the wrong lever and that removing green levies from bills would achieve similar ends without state spending.
Moreover, my colleagues in another place have consistently pressed Ministers about the stronger evidence that costs associated with the wider agenda for the decarbonisation of heat, including mechanisms such as the clean heat market mechanism boiler tax on manufacturers, are being passed to consumers via higher gas boiler prices. In other words, the current approach taxes conventional boiler households to subsidise heat pump adopters, and this is regressive.
There are a number of specific points, and I am grateful to the Minister for having raised them. The first was a constitutional process concern. This SI amends primary legislation via secondary legislation. That is not unusual but, because it touches Section 100 of the Energy Act 2008, it requires the affirmative procedure. Regulation 2 modifies the list of sources of energy and technologies as set out in Section 100(4) of the 2008 Act to include “thermal energy storage systems” and, as stated:
“By virtue of section 105(3A) and (3B), these Regulations attract the affirmative procedure”.
Instruments that amend an Act of Parliament rather than just delegated regulations routinely draw scrutiny from committees such as the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee or the JCSI over the appropriateness of using a Henry VIII-style power for what is a fairly narrow technical expansion.
A related 2026 BUS amendment instrument, SI 2026/390, had to be reissued because the original published version did not reflect the version signed by the Minister and had to be removed and replaced. That is not this specific SI, but it illustrates the concerns about drafting quality that Members of Parliament in the other place and committees have been raising about the pace of legislation on the boiler upgrade scheme.
My second point—I am grateful again to the Minister for raising this—relates to the question of heat batteries or thermal storage. This came out clearly in the Government’s consultation on the eligibility of expanding the BUS, which took place in November last year and which underpins this SI. I would be grateful if the Minister, in responding, could update the Committee on whether any product standards yet exist. Currently, as I understand it—and things may have moved on since November—there are no product standards for the thermal energy storage performance of heat batteries. These technologies will become eligible for scheme funding only once the relevant standards have come into force, which means that the law will permit funding for a technology category that cannot actually be certified or verified yet.
On efficiency and running costs, some respondents raised concerns about direct electric heating’s lower efficiency relative to a heat pump, its running costs and a lack of evidence on the performance and suitability of the various technologies. Some respondents preferred excluding the heat battery category altogether, arguing that funding should stay focused on technologies with proven carbon savings rather than diluting the budget across less tested electric heating options.
The Minister rightly pointed out the importance of the Regulation 22 payment offset amendment, which is a much more mundane and fairly straightforward change clarifying that the administrator may take one or a combination of the actions available to recover payments, provided that the total does not exceed the sum of payments due. As I understand it, it has not attracted any public objections, but it is worth flagging and I am grateful the Minister did; it is a tidying-up clause that gives Ofgem a somewhat broader discretion to recover overpayments and clawbacks. A point that scrutiny committees sometimes probe is whether it expands administrative power beyond what was originally debated, but, as the Minister said in her opening remarks, that would not be the case on this occasion.
I believe that the Government should stop increasing the cost of gas boilers for families through their boiler tax and stop wasting money forcing people into buying heat pumps that they do not want to make marginal reductions to our already limited contribution to global emissions. The Government must, above all, make electricity cheaper and back consumer choice, if they truly want families to adopt electric heating technologies instead of simply forcing people into changing the way that they live their lives to meet their self-imposed, unachievable net-zero targets.
That is why we have called for the scraping of the boiler upgrade scheme along with the clean heat market mechanism that places an obligation on gas and oil boiler manufacturers to install a minimum number of heat pumps at an estimated cost of £340 million in the first year. This goes far further than the boiler upgrade scheme introduced in 2022 under the Energy Act 2008, which encouraged the use of renewable heat by providing financial support for families to install heat pumps to replace fossil fuel boilers. As the Minister said, this instrument amends that Act to extend financial support eligibility to heat batteries, electric heating tech and thermal energy storage systems.
Many of us on this side of the Committee who have studied this consider it to be a case of excessive government intervention and cost to ease the effects of other government interventions. Energy prices are currently high, not despite our transition to renewable sources and green policies but because of them. The Government have acknowledged the fact that policies are to blame by removing VAT from energy bills. Similarly, their focus on renewables, inextricably linked to firm power—oil and gas—has caused the cost of using gas-fired power plants to rise, as they are forced to operate on an ad hoc basis dependent on the weather and are thus far less efficient and very expensive.
Taxes and renewables are the two core policies that have led to the increase in energy bills, which are now the highest of any IEA member country, both including and excluding taxes, for industrial and domestic bills. The Government should not be subsidising the cost of renewables by promoting higher bills for some instead of bringing them down for all through more systemic changes, which will be a subject we will return to, no doubt, on the long overdue introduction of the supremely misnamed energy independence Bill, which will increase energy dependence on imports and not decrease them. That said, on a personal note, I welcome the Minister to the Dispatch Box for this SI and look forward to further debates and discussions with her.
Baroness Curran (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for that contribution, and on that very note I welcome his remarks. We debated some of these issues on my very first outing at the Dispatch Box on the Floor of the House, and I think we will debate some of the fundamental points that he made about the direction of energy policy. He is right to contextualise this within that wider debate about energy policy. It is perhaps one of the great debates of our time and will dominate our thinking and discussions in the time ahead. I am tempted to go into a very long discussion about that; I am sure we will have lively debates going forward. He will know, as I said on the Floor of the House, that the Onward report faced some criticism and there were some arguments from the sector about the report’s premises, but I will leave that because I am sure that we will return to it. At the end of my contribution today, I will comment on the general policy of our approach.
I will now address the boiler upgrade scheme. I put on record that I recognise and respect the noble Lord’s detailed points about it and will pay great attention to the arguments that he is putting forward. It is an argument that this Government want to win, and we believe we can win it, but we will do that only by paying attention to the substance of what he said—and I recognise that substance. I will go through the points that he raised. I will not repeat that the boiler upgrade scheme remains the Government’s flagship scheme for supporting the decarbonisation of heat in homes and small non-domestic buildings across England and Wales, because we see decarbonisation as fundamental to the challenges facing the country and as offering solutions to some of the great issues around climate change and its consequences. I will return to that.
I shall focus on the points raised by the noble Lord and the detail of what he said. He acknowledged that the boiler upgrade scheme is directly funded by the Exchequer. It does not put any direct costs on consumers’ bills. Furthermore, our scheme evaluation data shows that people who have received grants from the boiler upgrade scheme most commonly find that their energy bills decrease as a result. Some 50% of boiler upgrade scheme grant recipients reported that their total energy bills decreased when replacing a gas boiler with a heat pump, compared with just 15% who reported an increase. As he acknowledged, eligible low-carbon heating installations currently benefit from 0% VAT, which further reduces costs for consumers.
Lord Moynihan (Con)
Can I return to a question that I raised, which the Minister has answered? She seems to be in agreement but it is a real concern. Without product standards for the thermal energy storage performance of heat batteries, these technologies will become eligible for the scheme but the law will permit funding for a technology category that has yet to be certified or verified. I know the Minister said in response that she hoped that it would be done in the near future. I know she would agree that there are significant safety risks associated with this, and consumers and the industry are very worried about it. Recent incidents have highlighted critical gaps in safety standards, indicating that certification alone does not guarantee safety under real-world conditions. That makes the importance of certification and having product standards all the more important for the safety. Can she write to me at the time when the Government are likely to approve these product standards, and therefore introduce into effect what we are considering in the SI today?
Baroness Curran (Lab)
I thank the noble Lord for that, and of course I commit to write to him and always to keep him as informed as I possibly can. He raises an interesting point, which was exactly the point that I asked during my three or four briefings with the team to prepare myself for today’s statutory instrument. I asked specifically about where we were with safety regulations and product standards. I have to say that I was concerned about the timing of it, because I want to make sure we move forward in this, but we also talked in some depth about the safety measures around that. I cannot recall in detail offhand every single step they took me through at the moment, but they explained to me the rigorous process that it goes through, which sometimes means it takes that bit longer. One example they cited was that you have to ensure that, as with a driver’s test, the installer must be observed by a senior person to get their certification. I can assure the noble Lord that we have this in hand, but I will of course write to him and keep him appraised of our process in that regard.
Voter Identification (Amendment of List of Specified Documents) (Northern Ireland) Regulations 2026
(1 day, 7 hours ago)
Grand CommitteeRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent
That the Grand Committee do consider the Voter Identification (Amendment of List of Specified Documents) (Northern Ireland) Regulations 2026.
Captain of the King’s Bodyguard of the Yeomen of the Guard and Deputy Chief Whip (Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent) (Lab)
My Lords, in speaking to these regulations, I will speak also to the Voter Identification (Amendment of List of Specified Documents) (Local Elections) (Northern Ireland) Order 2026 and the Local Elections (Northern Ireland) (Uprating Election Expenses) Order 2026. These statutory instruments make certain changes to the electoral system in Northern Ireland. They will make participation in elections more accessible to more people in Northern Ireland, and will bring certain rules governing Northern Ireland elections closer in line with those in Great Britain.
The first instrument updates the list of permissible forms of ID that can be used by voters at polling stations at parliamentary and Assembly elections in Northern Ireland. The second instrument makes identical changes to the list for local elections in Northern Ireland. The third instrument will uprate expenditure limits for candidates standing in local elections in Northern Ireland to reflect rising costs due to inflation; an equivalent uplift in the spending limit for reserved elections in Great Britain and for UK Parliament and Assembly elections in Northern Ireland was approved by Parliament in 2023.
Before I proceed further, I draw the Committee’s attention to the correction slip for the local elections draft order, which corrects a minor typographical error. In the last paragraph on page 1, the words “on Him section” have been amended to “on Him by section”. This refers to Section 84 of the Northern Ireland Act, which allows Northern Ireland’s local election rules to be amended by Order in Council, and “Him” refers in this context to His Majesty the King—one would have thought that would be slightly more polite than “Him”.
I turn to the specifics of the first and second instruments. The documents being added to the list of acceptable IDs that can be used by voters at polling stations are a Commonwealth passport, a Proof of Age Standards Scheme card, an HM Armed Forces veteran card and a blue badge from the disabled person’s parking scheme in Northern Ireland and Great Britain. These forms of ID are already accepted at polling stations in the rest of Great Britain. Adding to the list of acceptable IDs will support participation in elections for a range of people in Northern Ireland. The Chief Electoral Officer for Northern Ireland and the Electoral Commission are both supportive of this change.
It is vital to ensure that those who cast their vote are eligible to do so. Photographic ID is an important step in the process of protecting this important principle of elections and maintaining trust in Northern Ireland’s electoral institutions and processes. Producing photographic ID at polling stations has been a requirement in Northern Ireland elections for more than 20 years. It is a well-understood, established part of voting. The list of acceptable IDs in Northern Ireland has historically been more restrictive than the list in Great Britain and is updated less frequently. Expanding the list of acceptable ID will remove barriers to voting and support more people in Northern Ireland—including some of the most vulnerable in society—to participate in our democracy, while retaining important security measures.
I will now set out in more detail the measure in the third instrument relating to uprating local election candidate expenditure. This draft order will uprate the spending limits for candidates in Northern Ireland’s local elections. The limit will increase from £600 plus 5p per elector registered to vote in the district electoral area in which they are standing to £960 plus 8p per elector registered to vote in the district electoral area. This will bring the spending limit in Northern Ireland into line with the spending limits for local elections in England. The current spending limits in Northern Ireland have remained unchanged since 2005. Consequently, candidates contesting local elections face a disadvantage as compared with those contesting parliamentary and Assembly elections in Northern Ireland. They are also at a disadvantage as compared with those contesting local elections in England, where spending limits were uprated in 2023.
Democracy relies upon the ability of political parties, candidates and other campaigners to communicate their views, so that voters can make an informed decision. The current limit means that local election candidates in Northern Ireland are restricted by lower real-terms spending on their campaign, which impacts on their ability to communicate with voters. The Electoral Commission has been consulted on these changes, in line with the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland’s statutory duty, and is supportive of the new measures.
In conclusion, these draft instruments are necessary to support more people in Northern Ireland to participate in and engage with our democracy. Expanding the list of acceptable voter IDs is an important step in updating electoral processes to reflect the modern electorate in Northern Ireland, while preserving the additional security features that are essential to maintain trust in Northern Ireland’s electoral system. Uprating local election campaign spending limits will ensure that those limits remain aligned in real terms with the original limits set by Parliament.
I hope that, following my setting out of the details of these statutory instruments, the Committee will support them. I beg to move.
Lord Weir of Ballyholme (DUP)
My Lords, I broadly welcome the three SIs before us. As the Minister has indicated, they fall into two categories: one aspect dealing with the widening of accessibility in terms of voter ID, and the second aspect dealing with the expense limits.
I have said down the years that the use of voter identification has been positive in preserving our democracy. That is not to say that there have not been other problems with electoral fraud within Northern Ireland. One thinks of a particular example, which would probably be most familiar to the noble Lord, Lord Elliott, where a polling station was kept open beyond its hours, which had a material impact on the course of that electoral result. If one looks at the situation as regards postal votes, there have still been elements of electoral fraud done in relation to them, so we are not dealing with a perfect situation. However, broadly speaking, the electoral ID side of it has been beneficial to democracy in Northern Ireland, but it is not always watertight.
To give perhaps one example, during an election a number of years ago, I remember calling at the house of an elderly lady who had requested a lift to the polling station. Obviously, in wanting to make sure that this was not a wasted journey, I said, “Just before we leave, have you got your photo identification with you?” At which point she said, “Hold on a moment, son”, and disappeared into the back room of her house. She emerged about five minutes later with a small photograph of herself. There was nothing else on it, just a photograph of her, and she said, “Look son, you can see it’s me in that photograph”. So, it is not absolutely watertight in that regard, but in most cases it has worked well.
The changes being proposed today seem to make a level of sense in terms of accessibility. Of the four aspects, I welcome in particular the veteran card. We know that while there are other forms of identification, there will be some veterans who are always a bit anxious about what identification they have with them, so this is something which has a positive benefit.
Perhaps I can ask one question of the Minister in relation to this. I may be asking about something which is not to hand but, while I would be supportive of each of the four elements, does the Minister have any breakdown of the numbers that are used in Northern Ireland for each of those? Specifically, is there any indication of the number of people for whom these would be the sole means of identification, so how much are we guaranteeing widening accessibility? It would be useful to have that information, if not now then perhaps in writing.
The second aspect is, obviously, the level of election expenditure. I have come here from the Chamber, where there are major issues about financial support from outside the United Kingdom and talk of crypto millions, et cetera. When we are dealing with local government elections, the kind of money that we are talking about is an awful lot less, but where we have the limits at present is causing real difficulties because they have not been updated for a number of years.
I know going back, for example, to the 2023 election, for the vast bulk of candidates, their only expenditure was on perhaps a piece of canvass material, something that would be given to the Post Office for a postal drop, and maybe some posters. We are not talking about high-tech, extravagant costs, particularly as costs in terms of printing have accelerated, I believe, at a rate beyond that of inflation. I know that in the last local government elections a number of candidates found themselves unable to do all those aspects, particularly some candidates in Belfast where the electorate tends to be larger per DEA than in other areas. They simply had to say as regards a postal drop that they could not afford the printing and remain within limits. That is a particular problem, not simply because it reduces the level of democracy when people are not in a position to obtain that information, but because some unscrupulous candidates falsify the expense that they go to and try to get their material at an artificially reduced level to remain within the limit.
These are very sensible proposals as regards that level of expenditure. It bring us into line with the rest of the United Kingdom in terms of those levels and, from the point of view of candidates from whichever party, or indeed independents, it puts it within a realistic level for next year’s local government elections—so I support the proposals that have been put forward.
Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Lab)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Weir, on this issue. First, I welcome my noble friend Lady Anderson to the Dispatch Box representing the NIO. This the first occasion on which I have had an opportunity to take part in a debate with her on Northern Ireland.
I support these SIs because they underpin trust in the electoral system and the principle of democratic accessibility by ensuring that people have access to the franchise to exercise their vote. I welcome the fact that the number of identification documents has been increased, and I welcome the blue badge, because many people have blue badges, but until now in Northern Ireland they could not use them for electoral identification purposes.
I recall that in 1985 when electoral identification was introduced the noble Lord, Lord Dodds, and I were candidates in the local government elections, him in Belfast, and me in Down, we were told just a few weeks before the election took place that they were going to be subject to electoral identification and documents. At that stage, it was medical cards, then it moved on to allowance, child benefit or pension books—then photographic ID came into play, as the Minister outlined, 20-odd years ago. It is important that we were in the vanguard for identification for eligibility to vote. Obviously, there were very good reasons for that. Political parties, in the main on the constitutional side, demanded that level of support, shall we say, for those who wanted to exercise their mandate.
I recall—and I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Weir, in relation to this issue of electoral fraud—that some agents are particularly adept at undertaking electoral fraud. When I was a candidate in 2017, people told me that they went to vote for me using photographic ID and could not vote because their votes had already been used. Obviously, some mechanism was used deliberately to falsify their identity. I would like to think, as I am sure other noble Lords would like to ascertain, that means have been found to address those issues to ensure that that level of electoral fraud does not happen again.
I welcome the instrument on spending limits in local government. There is another aspect: many candidates in Assembly and local government elections will use videos and social media to convey their messages because, as we know, many young people today use social media to gain information about elections. Therefore, we should ensure that spending limits cover that form of communication. With those few comments and the query on electoral fraud to which I have already alerted the Minister, I support these SIs and look forward to her response.
Lord Dodds of Duncairn (DUP)
My Lords, I will speak briefly on these statutory instruments, which I welcome broadly for the reasons that my noble friend Lord Weir and the noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie, outlined. I have a couple of queries on which I would be grateful for the Minister’s response.
First, on the identity documents that can now be used in local government elections, were any other documents or materials considered and not accepted by the Northern Ireland Office? Will the Minister outline whether other means of identity were considered but rejected and, if so, why?
Secondly, on costs, the increase is quite substantial. The base figure is well over 30% and then it is nearly 33% per individual elector. Those are quite substantial increases, so could the Minister indicate when these figures were last upgraded and why there has been such a delay in bringing them up to an acceptable level, given that they have been increased by a substantial amount in one fell swoop? I remember, at the last local council elections, candidates and parties of all persuasions complaining bitterly about the restrictions on spending compared to elections elsewhere in the UK, so I would be grateful for that information.
The Minister mentioned that part of this is to bring Northern Ireland into line with or align it closer with the rest of the UK. In that regard, I raise an issue that I have raised before—postal ballots. This pertains in Northern Ireland but not in the rest of the UK as, if someone does not receive a postal ballot that they have applied for and has been accepted as legitimate, it is possible to get a replacement issued by the electoral authorities in England and Wales but, in Northern Ireland, that has been refused for decades now, for some reason. When this has been raised previously, there has been some allusion to the issue of security, but in very vague terms.
When one considers the amount of postal ballots that are sent out in Northern Ireland and across the country, the amount that would sent to replace lost ballots would be very small in comparison. I cannot understand why there is some problem with bringing Northern Ireland into line with the rest of the UK on an issue that concerns people’s right to vote. If somebody applies for a postal vote in good faith, and it does not arrive but there is still time to get another one by contacting the electoral office or going to collect it, it is very difficult for them to understand why they should be denied their vote, through no fault of their own where they have taken steps to receive a ballot. One or two people have been in touch with me about this. I would be grateful if the Minister could reply to that point.
Lord Bew (CB)
My Lords, I will speak briefly to thank the Minister for her introduction of these SIs and to support them in both general and specific terms. I add one coda: these SIs come without an impact assessment, which is understandable enough in this context, but I keep thinking that we ought to have one at some future date.
Today’s debate and the more general public debate about foreign money in UK elections are taking place for understandable reasons, but the fact of the matter is that Sinn Féin is easily the richest political party in Ireland. It is also the case that it is easily the most likely to receive money from outside Ireland from the United States of America. It has been my duty, as a professional historian, to read the very interesting memoirs of republicans, whom I knew well. Not one does not boast of an election fixed here or there at some point by the application of superior resources, semi-bullying or whatever. That is why I say that there is a case for a delayed impact assessment. These are good measures that ought, on the whole, to improve the honesty of elections in Northern Ireland and bring them closer to the rest of the United Kingdom, but I have this yearning for a real impact assessment.
Baroness Suttie (LD)
My Lords, it is always a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Bew, with his historical perspective. I thank the Minister for her detailed introduction to these instruments. We on these Benches support all three measures; I shall, therefore, be extremely brief.
Liberal Democrats have always had significant reservations about the introduction of voter ID at polling stations. We believe that it is extremely important that nothing is done to discourage people from voting. However, I understand that the particular circumstances in Northern Ireland required voter ID to be in place well before voter ID was introduced to the rest of the UK. I am, therefore, fully supportive of measures that increase the number of acceptable documents that can be used in polling stations in Northern Ireland, such as the Armed Forces veteran card, PASS—Proof of Age Standards Scheme—cards and the blue badge for the disabled persons’ parking scheme.
I have a couple of quick questions for the Minister. First, I understand from the Explanatory Memorandum that “the permitted identity documents” will be kept
“under review in consultation with the Electoral Commission and the Chief Electoral Officer for Northern Ireland”.
Following on from the question from the noble Lord, Lord Dodds, can the Minister say how frequently she expects additional forms of ID to be added, if appropriate?
My second question goes slightly beyond the scope of these SIs. Given the Prime Minister’s enthusiasm for devolution, can the Minister say whether the Government are giving any consideration to reviewing local government in Northern Ireland, both in terms of expanding the powers and budget that local authorities in Northern Ireland have and on the wider question of the wider devolution settlement in Northern Ireland? I do not necessarily expect her to reply to that this evening, obviously, but perhaps it is something that we could discuss in a future debate or in more detail at a later stage.
Lord Caine (Con)
My Lords, before I turn to the measures before us, this is the first opportunity that I have had to pass on publicly my sincere condolences to the family of Stephen Walker, a journalist in Northern Ireland of great professional integrity whom I knew for around 30 years. I commend both of his biographies—one of John Hume and the other of David Trimble. Stephen was only 61 years of age when he died a few days ago; it is very sad indeed.
Secondly, I warmly welcome the Minister to the Dispatch Box. She will recall that, when we first faced each other, following the general election just over two years ago, I expressed some regret that Northern Ireland did not have a full-time Minister in your Lordships’ House. I am very pleased that that has now been rectified, and I sincerely congratulate her on her elevation to Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State.
I turn to the three regulations that we are debating today. They bring Northern Ireland’s voter ID and spending rules into line with the rules that apply in the rest of the United Kingdom, mainly England, and as such we do not oppose these measures. I have one question to put to the Minister on the issue of the veteran card. What assessment have the Government made of the possibility that veterans in Northern Ireland may be reticent to carry such a card and use it for voter identification? There has been some reluctance in the past, as Members of the Committee will know, for veterans to identify themselves in such ways. Of course, that reticence is no reason not to grant electors the option to use a veteran cards if they wish to do so, but it would be helpful to know what work, if any, the Government have done on this.
As the Minister knows, the Representation of the People Bill, which is currently being debated in the Chamber, will amend legislation to allow for bank cards—that is, non-photographic ID—to be used as a form of voter ID. Have Ministers made an assessment on the potential risk to electoral fraud in Northern Ireland of using bank cards? I ask this very conscious of the fact that it was a Labour Government in the early 2000s—in 2002, I believe—who legislated to move from paper ID to photo ID for Northern Ireland, given the historic experience of high levels of voter personation there.
On spending limits, we accept that the update is sensible, but there is a question of coherence. I understand that, on 29 August, the Cabinet Office and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government announced a review into candidate spending limits, with the implication that they are too high. How does this measure before us today relate to that review?
I assure the Minister that I personally regard votes at 16 as completely insane. If the Government are committed to pursuing this madness, what work are they doing to ensure that younger voters have access to voter ID?
Slightly more broadly, in July this year, the Chief Electoral Officer for Northern Ireland published a paper on the future of electoral registration and the canvass, in which he declared the once-a-decade canvass to be no longer fit for purpose. Can the Minister say whether the Northern Ireland Office has had an opportunity yet to study his recommendations? I appreciate that they were published only in July, but do they agree with them and do they have a timetable to take them forward?
Finally, with the indulgence of the Committee, I turn to issues beyond these regulations. This is the first opportunity that I have had to ask questions of the Minister since the President of the United States visited Ireland, in his usual understated way, at the weekend. Can the Minister say what the position is of His Majesty’s Government on the President’s remarks in support of a united Ireland? Do they, like my right honourable friend the leader of the Opposition and me, regard those comments as deeply unhelpful and irresponsible? What discussions have Ministers had, or plan to have, with the United States Administration following those remarks? Can the Minister reaffirm the position of the Prime Minister using exactly the same words when he said in Belfast recently that a border poll is off the table? Can she reiterate that it is for the people of Northern Ireland alone to determine the constitutional future of Northern Ireland? Finally, can she confirm that it is the clear wish of His Majesty’s Government, as it is my party, that the people of Northern Ireland will always express their desire to remain part of the United Kingdom?
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
My Lords, there was me thinking we were just going to talk about elections in Northern Ireland.
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
I immediately confess that one of my ministerial responsibilities is for elections in Northern Ireland. Given the imminent elections, I think that in part answers some of the questions about the timing and further reviews that we may need to undertake. We have an urgency before us to make sure that there is a level playing field for the elections that are about to happen.
I thank all noble Lords for their thoughtful consideration and input today. I want to take this opportunity to provide some further detail on some of the points that have been raised. I start with the questions raised by the noble Lord, Lord Weir, on electoral fraud. He asked several questions; I will have to reflect on some of them and come back to him. On the breakdown of veterans’ cards and the number of veterans who likely to use this form of ID as well as wider forms of ID, that information is not published. We are not sure whether it is collected by the Chief Electoral Officer for Northern Ireland, but I shall ask and write to the noble Lord with a follow-up.
The issue of absentee voting was raised by the noble Lord, Lord Weir.
Lord Weir of Ballyholme (DUP)
Just to clarify, although I raised the issue in relation to the veteran card, it was in reference all four forms of identification. I appreciate that the Minister probably does not have the figures in relation to those to hand, but perhaps she could write to me on them.
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
Absolutely; it is about take-up as well as who is likely to have access to those pieces of ID.
On absentee voting, Northern Ireland security checks are among the most stringent in the whole of the UK. As in the rest of the UK, applications are checked to ensure that the name, address and national insurance number of the applicant are valid. Requiring a digital registration number means a further level of security that does not exist elsewhere; I hope that that is reassuring to the noble Lord, Lord Weir, and my noble friend Lady Ritchie.
Noble Lords, including my noble friend Lady Ritchie and the noble Lord, Lord Dodds, touched on the potential issue of electoral fraud. The Government, the Chief Electoral Officer and the Electoral Commission are all clear that there is no current evidence of organised electoral fraud in Northern Ireland. Research commissioned by the Electoral Commission following the 2024 general election suggested that public confidence in the electoral system is growing, but this does not mean that we should not always be vigilant about current initiatives—especially as the use of technologies develops—and about what people can and cannot access.
On the addition of new IDs and communication, my noble friend Lady Ritchie was absolutely right about making sure that people have enough time to know what is coming in front of them. I assure her that the Government have been working closely with the Chief Electoral Officer for Northern Ireland and the Electoral Commission on these changes. They will publicise the changes in their literature and voter information campaigns. This is why it is so important that we do these SIs now: so that both voters and future candidates are aware of the changes that are in front of them.
The noble Lord, Lord Dodds, asked whether any other ID documents are being considered. The Government have not seen any demands or had any requests for additional pieces of identification, so we have not considered any and dismissed them. However, as and when other forms of ID appear, we will keep electoral legislation under constant review in case there is additional demand.
The noble Lord also mentioned postal ballots and their reissue. Given my ministerial responsibilities, I would very much welcome the opportunity to have a meeting with the noble Lord to discuss what can and cannot be done in that space.
The noble Lord, Lord Caine, raised two issues—well, more than two, but I will come on to his last one right at the end. On ID for voters at 16, we will consider what measures in the system may need to be updated to ensure that 16 and 17 year-olds are able to vote at polling stations in Northern Ireland as the legislation that is currently being discussed in the Chamber progresses through your Lordships’ House.
On a change to make bank cards eligible voter ID, let me be clear that there are no plans for that to happen in Northern Ireland, given the wider context; the noble Lord will know that context well, and the Committee will be aware of the specific challenges that we have faced in Northern Ireland. There has been a requirement to show photographic ID in Northern Ireland since 2003; this is not the same as the requirement in England. The voter ID system in Northern Ireland is well established, and the Electoral Commission agrees that it is well understood and trusted.
I want briefly to touch on some other issues before I come on to the really easy question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Caine. On the cost of where we are, many Members of your Lordships’ House have, I think, stood for election. It is very easy to underestimate printing costs, especially if you use a trade union printer—as you should—in order to ensure that there are appropriate terms and conditions and that payments are paid to the people actually doing the printing. That has to be reflected in the cost of what we are doing.
Noble Lords raised videos on social media and the demands that are on all of us. Some of these things are mitigating election campaigns, especially for those who are standing not as independents. However, inflationary costs need to be considered. The noble Lord, Lord Dodds, rightly raised how much these costs have gone up and the cost increases that we are allowing. These allowances have not been uprated since 2005. Although this is a significant one-off hitch, we need to keep this under review. However, it is important to get the figures done now.
Lord Dodds of Duncairn (DUP)
That is precisely my point. I do not argue with the need to uprate them, for the reasons that the Minister has set out, but why has it taken so long? Why has it been 21 years since there was any change in these limits, given the massive increase in costs that there has been? Can she give a guarantee that, as with the forms of identity, costs will be kept under periodic review and that we will not go for another 20 years without any change in the spending limits?
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
It is very easy for me to say “yes” from this Dispatch Box, so I will. There is an issue about how the limits have not been uprated in that time. However, we have been very clear that, in advance of next year’s elections, the uprating must come into effect. This is the first requirement of this Government to ensure that there is a level playing field for elections.
The noble Lord, Lord Bew, raised an important issue about foreign money in elections. The Rycroft review has made significant recommendations on this, all of which the Government have accepted. There is always, as with everything else, a Northern Ireland element to it. I look forward to having discussions with the noble Lord about it as this continues.
The noble Baroness, Lady Suttie, raised adding new ID. This is under constant review regarding any new request for ID. We will review as circumstances change and as people use ID in different ways, not least on their phones rather than as physical ID. She also asked an interesting question about the devolution of local government in Northern Ireland. I would prefer to get through next year’s elections before we talk about what comes next but, given the priorities of the Prime Minister, we will undoubtedly have these conversations about what devolution in England means for the rest of the United Kingdom.
The noble Lord, Lord Caine, raised an important point on the canvass and the NIA response. I have not had advice on this yet but I expect to and I look forward to discussing it with him. I will write to him with that view. On the constitutional settlement of the status of Northern Ireland, President Trump is entitled to his opinion, as is everybody else, but there is no evidence to suggest that the majority of people in Northern Ireland wish to separate from the United Kingdom. The Prime Minister is personally committed to the Belfast/Good Friday agreement, as am I. The noble Lord will be aware, as we all are, that the only mechanism for a border poll is determined under the Belfast/Good Friday agreement by the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland.
On that easy, cheerful note—I loved the news at the weekend—I know that all noble Lords agree that encouraging participation in our democracy is paramount. I hope that the Committee agree that these instruments enable us to ensure the integrity of the electoral system in Northern Ireland by maintaining the safeguards that are already in place while ensuring that the system adapts and keeps pace with modern practices. I am therefore pleased to be able to introduce these measures.
Local Elections (Northern Ireland) (Uprating Election Expenses) Order 2026
(1 day, 7 hours ago)
Grand CommitteeRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent
That the Grand Committee do consider the Local Elections (Northern Ireland) (Uprating Election Expenses) Order 2026.
Relevant document: 11th Report from the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee
Voter Identification (Amendment of List of Specified Documents) (Local Elections) (Northern Ireland) Order 2026
(1 day, 7 hours ago)
Grand CommitteeRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent
That the Grand Committee do consider the Voter Identification (Amendment of List of Specified Documents) (Local Elections) (Northern Ireland) Order 2026.
House of Lords
Introduction: Lord Leveson of Liverpool
Introduction: Lord McTague
International Financial Fraud
(1 day, 7 hours ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
To ask His Majesty’s Government what progress in combatting international financial fraud they hope to make during their two-year presidency of the Financial Action Task Force.
Captain of the King’s Bodyguard of the Yeomen of the Guard and Deputy Chief Whip (Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent) (Lab)
My Lords, the UK assumed the presidency of the Financial Action Task Force in July and has made tackling fraud its key priority. Under UK leadership, FATF is developing practical steps to help countries prevent, detect and disrupt fraud, particularly scams linked to organised crime groups operating across borders. This work will also focus on strengthening co-operation between Governments, law enforcement, banks, technology companies and online platforms.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
I am glad that the British Government are taking the lead in combating international financial fraud and money laundering, particularly now that cryptocurrency and its problems are so much in our minds. I note that one of the Government’s priorities as president is improving information sharing. The British Government are responsible for a large number of Crown dependencies and overseas territories, many of which are offshore financial centres. They do not share information fully, and I note that the British Virgin Islands, for example, are on the FATF’s grey list, which deals with countries with strategic deficiencies in efforts to prevent fraud and money laundering. What do the Government intend to do to make sure that our leadership against financial fraud includes making sure that our overseas territories and Crown dependencies are up to the mark?
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
The noble Lord raises an important point. The overseas territories and Crown dependencies are committed to meeting international standards on tax transparency, anti-money laundering and illicit finance. They have committed to introducing publicly accessible registers of beneficial ownership, going beyond international standards set by the Financial Action Task Force and putting them ahead of most jurisdictions. The UK Government respect their constitutional autonomy on domestic tax matters while supporting the implementation of these commitments, including through technical assistance and engagement with organisations such as Open Ownership. The overseas territories and Crown dependencies are also independent members of FATF and therefore are subject to those standards that are set out. They have committed to combating financial crime in their relevant jurisdictions.
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, as a former Minister for the Overseas Territories, I worked closely with our OTs. Many of them represent the best of British and we should stand by and support them. They operated a scheme of exchange of notes, which allowed for legal authorities and tax authorities to get through. Can the Minister reassure me that overseas territories that need support will be supported by His Majesty’s Treasury? Some do not require a SAMLA register: Tristan da Cunha does great lobster, but it is not a centre for financial services. Can the Minister reassure me that we will look at this tactfully and strategically?
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
I will have to take the noble Lord’s word for it on whether the lobster is any good; being Jewish, it is not really something I would have tried. However, the noble Lord is absolutely right. Where our Crown dependencies require our support, they will get it. Where it is not appropriate for them to operate in that space, it would seem a tad illogical for us to deploy resources in that way.
Baroness Whitaker (Lab)
My Lords, will my noble friend encourage positive engagement with the draft international anti-corruption treaty during our presidency?
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
How could I say anything other to my noble friend than yes, of course?
Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)
My Lords, the Minister may have seen the RUSI paper published in July by Veronica Stratford-Tuke on the UK’s efforts on anti-money laundering, counterterrorism financing and the risks. It says:
“The UK does not appear to have appropriate mechanisms to work through trade-offs between its financial crime risks and competing political objectives”.
Will the noble Baroness acknowledge that that is a problem and see that there is a problem in the Financial Services and Markets Bill, given that it is a Bill to deregulate the financial sector and aim to grow it?
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
I have seen the report. I disagree with the noble Baroness’s suggestion that we would prioritise political decision-making. Let me just touch on what the Government have done. In terms of fraud action, there are 400 new specialist investigators at the national fraud squad. We have established the National Cyber Security Centre and its early warning service. We have established the Online Crime Centre with the NCA as a public/private initiative. The measures in the Online Safety Act to protect against fraud are now being fully implemented. We have funded the UN and Interpol’s Global Fraud Summit. This Government are doing more than just talking; we are taking action.
Lord Vaux of Harrowden (CB)
My Lords, about two or three years ago, FATF removed Cambodia from the risk list. Cambodia is widely seen as one of the most corrupt countries in Asia and is one of the major sources of fraud and scams globally. Given that decision, does the noble Baroness think FATF is fit for purpose?
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
The noble Lord will know better than I do that FATF assesses every country, including ours. Where there are concerns, it puts in place an action plan to make sure that people are fully compliant with their commitments under the standards of FATF. Given that we are now the global president for the next two years, I would very much believe us to be fit for purpose.
Baroness Kramer (LD)
My Lords, stopping the money laundering means stopping the enablers. Will the Government rethink their legislation to transfer from professional bodies to the FCA the direct AML supervision of professional firms? Have they now recognised that the FCA lacks the resources and the expertise but, worst of all, that it has no capacity to provide the myriad small firms with adequate support rather than general guidance, thereby creating huge loopholes?
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
I appreciate the noble Baroness’s expertise in this area and, while I understand her concerns, the Government do not share them. We have invested a significant amount, not least through the economic crime levy, to protect against AML, which includes an extra £110 million per annum.
Lord Sikka (Lab)
My Lords, according to a former Minister, 40% of global illicit financial flows pass through the UK, its Crown dependencies and overseas territories. Can the Minister explain why UK Governments continue to fail to curb the flow of illicit financial funds?
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
The noble Lord—my noble friend rather, although maybe not based on that question—has significant expertise in this area. While I appreciate his concern, this is of course something that the Government take very seriously, which is one reason why we have been elected to chair the FATF presidency for the next two years. It is also why we are taking action on anti-money laundering and in the fraud space. We are very aware that 47% of all crime in England and Wales is through fraud and we are working to protect the victims of this crime.
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
My Lords, fighting financial fraud is very important, but it imposes huge costs on honest and reputable businesses without always catching the criminals. How do the Government gauge whether regulations and their enforcement, which she described so graphically, are proportionate?
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
I occasionally agree with the noble Baroness, and in this instance, I find that I do. One of the issues here, though, is the wider cost of fraud to UK plc: it is currently £14 billion a year. While I appreciate the concern about the impact on individual companies, the reality is that there were 6 million attempted frauds in the UK last year, 80% of them were online and 70% had an international dimension. I appreciate the concern, and there is a reason we have been very targeted in the economic crime levy about who is paying for it, but there is a genuine issue here that is undermining us in every corner of the economy.
Lord Woodley (Lab)
My Lords, I raised this last week, talking about the billions of pounds in fraud. Can the Minister kindly tell me when they are going to recover the millions of pounds of fraud from the noble Baroness, Lady Mone?
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
My noble friend will be aware that there are current, ongoing legal cases, so I cannot comment on an individual case.
Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)
My Lords, I want to return to the question of the overseas territories, recognising the difference between Tristan da Cunha and the Cayman Islands, other than merely the question of lobsters. I speak as a member of the Constitution Committee, where we have urged the overseas territories time and again to come up with bilateral compacts, recognising the differences between the territories and allowing us to judge progress or otherwise in each of them according to their own lights. The slowness of reports coming forward is proverbial, and I wonder if my noble friend the Minister can inject some energy into that process.
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
My noble friend is aware that I tend to inject energy everywhere I go, so I will endeavour to do so here. There are two issues, one of which is about the role of FATF, which undertakes a review of every jurisdiction, as I said. There is a responsibility on us too, but I will have to write to the noble Lord about where we are with the bilateral conversations.
Public Sector Fraud Authority
(1 day, 7 hours ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Baroness Coffey
To ask His Majesty’s Government why they have transferred the Public Sector Fraud Authority from the Cabinet Office to the Department for Work and Pensions, given the function and powers of the Minister of the Cabinet Office set out in Part 1 of the Public Authorities (Fraud, Error and Recovery) Act 2025.
The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office, and Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Baroness Twycross) (Lab)
My Lords, the Public Sector Fraud Authority’s repositioning into the Department for Work and Pensions reflects the Government’s commitment to tackling public sector fraud. Both organisations will use their unique expertise to tackle fraud and error in welfare and across the public sector. The Treasury will continue to co-sponsor the Public Sector Fraud Authority. A transfer of functions order will ensure that functions under the public authorities Act 2025 are transferred to the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions.
Baroness Coffey (Con)
My Lords, I start by saying that this is not intended to be a dig at the First Secretary of State, who I thought was poorly treated by the previous Prime Minister. However, the Public Authorities (Fraud, Error and Recovery) Act, which we passed only last year, was billed as key to tackling billions of pounds of fraud beyond HMRC and the DWP. It gave many powers solely and specifically to the Minister for the Cabinet Office with regard to tackling fraud and the Public Sector Fraud Authority. How effectively can the powers in this legislation now be deployed? I am surprised to hear that an Order in Council will be sufficient. It is better to get on and just use these powers and not worry about one day’s bad publicity.
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
The functions under the Public Authorities (Fraud, Error and Recovery) Act will still be able to be used. They will be appropriately transferred, as I said to the noble Baroness, to a relevant DWP Minister and they will be able to be exercised in the way that the Act intended. In addition, the Public Authorities Fraud Investigation and Enforcement Service, which was established as a result of the Act, will continue to legally pursue cases of fraud against government while the transfer takes place.
Lord Pack (LD)
My Lords, in response to the Public Accounts Committee’s report earlier this year on using data to tackle public sector fraud, the Government committed to supporting a review of relevant legislation, to be concluded by March next year. Can the Minister tell us what forward planning the Government are doing to ensure that any proposals from that review can be put promptly to Parliament? In particular, will she commit that any necessary secondary legislation will come to Parliament before the end of 2027?
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
This will all take place when parliamentary time allows. I am happy to make sure that the noble Lord gets a briefing from the relevant team about the progress and where it is all going. We want to make sure that we get this right, but I am happy to arrange for a briefing for the noble Lord.
Lord Vaux of Harrowden (CB)
My Lords, when we were debating this Act only about a year ago, the Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Anderson, explained with her usual clarity that the purpose of the PSFA is to drive cross-government collaboration to tackle fraud across all public authorities. In what possible parallel universe can the DWP be the best department to drive cross-government collaboration? Does the Minister perhaps have some examples of where that might have happened?
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
The DWP is one of the departments that routinely work to tackle fraud, so there is considerable expertise in the department. The Public Sector Fraud Authority will continue to work with all departments and public bodies across the public sector to drive counterfraud performance and accountability, deliver cross-system services and increase counterfraud capability. In our view, this will be further bolstered by its repositioning in the DWP, in that it will be able to learn from existing, mature counterfraud capability in the department to optimise its services, and vice versa.
Lord Redwood (Con)
How much fraud did the PSFA find last year and how much more does it think it will find with the enhanced methods of going about it?
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
The PSFA has a strong record of delivering beyond its annual financial target. In the 2024-25 financial year, it delivered over £480 million in audited counterfraud benefits, which is a return of £34 for every £1 invested. The PSFA has delivered a total of £1.2 billion in savings since its establishment in 2022. Clearly, it could go further, and we are absolutely determined to make sure that it does.
Baroness Wheatcroft (CB)
Fraud was rife during Covid, both in the loans that were granted when they should not have been and in PPE contracts, for instance. Can the Minister tell us how much has been recovered of that fraud and how much is still outstanding?
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
The noble Baroness is right to highlight that there were particular issues in relation to fraud during the pandemic. I will need to write to her about the amount that has been recouped so far, because the figures change on a regular basis. It involves considerable amounts but, obviously, more can be done. I will write to the noble Baroness and make sure that a copy of my letter is placed in the Library.
Baroness Finn (Con)
My Lords, can the Minister confirm whether any investigation, information notice, recovery action or other statutory power has been exercised by DWP Ministers or officials since responsibility for the PSFA was transferred, and whether the Government have taken legal advice on the susceptibility of any such decision to judicial review, if the statutory transfer of functions has not yet taken effect?
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
It is in the process of being transferred. My understanding is that this is not holding up enforcement, but I will need to write with a detailed answer to the noble Baroness’s question.
Lord Watts (Lab)
My Lords, has the Minister noticed that the opposition parties are very keen on fighting fraud in the welfare system, but they are very slow to fight blue-collar fraud and their own fraud?
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
I could not possibly comment on that. What I can say is that public sector fraud wastes public money, drives up the deficit and damages the public sector. We are clear that we want to tackle it, and put structures in place to do this. My noble friend is correct, however, that it is not just public sector fraud that affects the public, and we are determined to do whatever we can to keep the public and the public finances as safe as possible from fraud and error.
Lord Cromwell (CB)
My Lords, these interventions are all very commendable, but are the Government going to get behind the idea of letting those agencies fighting fraud on our behalf retain more of the money they recover so that they can exponentially increase their effectiveness?
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
That is a really interesting proposal. I understand from my amazing noble friend Lady Anderson that a number of trials are under way. I am very happy to meet the noble Lord to discuss this, having offered letters to other people—obviously, I am happy to meet any noble Lord at any point.
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
My Lords, I was responsible in the Cabinet Office for the fight against public sector fraud—and energetically so. I share my noble friend Lady Coffey’s concern about the move to the DWP, which risks focusing the fight against fraud too narrowly. Is this because it was too awkward a portfolio for the First Secretary of State?
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
Of course not; I find that an absolutely appalling question. The Public Sector Fraud Authority’s repositioning reflects the Government’s absolute commitment to tackling public sector fraud. Both organisations will use their unique expertise to tackle fraud in welfare and across the public sector. The co-sponsoring by the Treasury of the Public Sector Fraud Authority will enable a cross-government perspective as well, and the transfer of functions order will make sure that its functions are transferred to the DWP Secretary of State.
Lord Fox (LD)
My Lords, does the Minister agree that whistleblowers have a big role in uncovering public sector fraud? Does she also agree that there is an awful lot more the Government could do both to encourage whistleblowers and to protect their identities? Will she agree with the measures my noble friend Lady Kramer has been talking about for a long time and bring in an office of the whistleblower to make this happen?
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
The noble Lord is correct; DBIST is undertaking a review into how this can be achieved.
Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe (Lab)
My Lords, will the Minister acknowledge that our most famous whistleblower here in the House of Lords is probably the noble Lord, Lord Agnew, who was very dissatisfied indeed with the way that fraud was being pursued? Can we ensure that his views are again sought to see whether he feels that sufficient change has been introduced?
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
I would be very happy to arrange a meeting with the noble Lord, Lord Agnew, and I thank my noble friend for that suggestion.
Public Inquiries
(1 day, 7 hours ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Baroness Hoey
To ask His Majesty’s Government what criteria are used when deciding on which subjects to carry out public inquiries.
The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office, and Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Baroness Twycross) (Lab)
With apologies to your Lordships’ House, it is me again. Public inquiries can establish facts about what happened in order to learn from events and reduce the likelihood of recurrence. When deciding whether to establish an inquiry, Ministers consider a number of factors including its objectives, whether and why alternatives are not appropriate, the inquiry’s likely duration, the likely costs—including those that are deliverable and realistic—and whether the public interest outweighs those costs.
Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)
My Lords, why does the Ministry of Defence continue to oppose the requests for a public inquiry from the 29 bereaved families of the Chinook helicopter crash on the Mull of Kintyre? The Ministry of Defence stated that the evidence had already been considered and no further investigation was warranted. However, it is now reviewing thousands of documents and asking the families themselves to help identify the evidence relating to airworthiness. Will His Majesty’s Government please tell the families how this can be reconciled with a Government committed to a duty of candour in the Hillsborough law? Does this not demonstrate precisely why the MoD should not be left to investigate its own conduct, and why an independent review is now necessary to restore the families’ and the public’s confidence? Surely, seeking justice should have no expiry date.
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
I agree with the noble Baroness that seeking justice should not and must not have an expiry date. The hearts of all of us across your Lordships’ House go out to them, and we extend our sympathy. I understand there have been ongoing discussions and that my noble friend Lord Coaker has met with some of the bereaved families, and I think that there are ongoing discussions within the MoD as well.
Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms and Chief Whip (Lord Kennedy of Southwark) (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, we will hear from the Cross Benches next.
Lord Carter of Haslemere (CB)
My Lords, given that statutory inquiries are held when events have caused public concern, and often cost tens of millions—if not hundreds of millions—of taxpayers’ money, does the Minister agree that reasons should always be given by Ministers for rejecting inquiry recommendations, so as to ensure due openness and accountability to the public?
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
The noble Lord is right in the sense that we think that it is really important that people understand when and why the Government would accept the need for a public inquiry. They are a really important way to investigate issues of concern, particularly around state failures, so that we learn lessons and that events do not happen again. As was reflected in the work of your Lordships’ House’s the Statutory Inquiries Committee, a public inquiry is not always necessarily going to provide the answers and resolution that people expect. One of the things that the Government are doing through the Public Office (Accountability) Bill, in particular through the duty of candour, is to make sure that, among the different types of reviews and inquiries, a statutory inquiry is not the one that has protected characteristics in relation to the responsibility of public servants to tell the truth. The Bill will extend the duty, and we hope this means that people will not necessarily see the need to have a full public inquiry to get answers.
Lord McColl of Dulwich (Con)
My Lords, can the Minister explain the way that people are chosen to sit on these various inquiries? The reason I ask this is that we had a Select Committee on obesity, which is very much a medical problem. Yet, although there were eight medical Peers available at the time, not one of them was asked to sit on the committee. Would the Minister look into ways of correcting that sort of anomaly, so that rather more balanced outcomes could be produced?
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
That is generally a matter for the House, but I think that your Lordships’ House has noted the point.
Lord Pack (LD)
My Lords, for decades the compensation schemes that have flowed from the issues that triggered public inquiries have often had a poor track record. The most recent scheme for victims of infected blood, for example, had to be created because of the many failings of four previous schemes over 40 years, and it seems there is no consistent learning from past mistakes. My noble friend Lady Brinton has campaigned to set up a single compensation body that would oversee schemes and would have that institutional memory, which would indeed save time and money as well as get compensation to victims more quickly. Would the Minister agree to look at that proposal?
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
I would be very happy to meet the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, about the proposal. I understand her concerns about some of the issues that happened with the infected blood compensation schemes and the support schemes previously, having been briefed on those since I became a Minister in the Cabinet Office. We share the ambition of your Lordships and of the Infected Blood Inquiry that fair compensation is delivered as quickly as possible to every eligible person. That has not always felt as easy when there have been compensation schemes, and we want to actively look at ways we can make that feel more victim-centred rather than too bureaucratic.
Lord Doyle (Non-Afl)
My Lords, given recent scandals, it is perhaps not surprising that the public regard judge-led statutory public inquiries as the necessary standard. However, this is not always proportionate. Have the Government given consideration to how they can build confidence in other routes for the public, so that people can still get to truth and justice?
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
We have an inquiry team within the Cabinet Office that has a formal role advising departments and Ministers both on potential new inquiries and terms of reference, and it also gives advice across government on different routes. We are keen to look at what more we can do to advise the public and campaigners of the different options available. I would be happy to update your Lordships’ House at a future date when we have made more progress with this work.
Baroness Finn (Con)
My Lords, the Government accepted a number of recommendations from the Statutory Inquiries Committee’s report, Public Inquiries: Enhancing Public Trust, including on the format of future inquiries, proper consultation of victims and survivors and stronger Cabinet Office capability. When will the Government implement those commitments, and will the House be updated at that point?
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
I am very happy to update the House on progress. Since the work of the House of Lords Statutory Inquiries Committee, we have undertaken a number of different actions, including launching a publicly accessible tracker reporting progress on delivering inquiry recommendations. We have also amended the Ministerial Code to ensure that Cabinet Office policy expertise informs decisions on establishing public inquiries, and we are looking further at what additional changes can be made to improve the inquiry system. That includes publishing guidance, which is a priority. This will take account of the changes to inquiries that will come into effect following the passage of the Public Office (Accountability) Bill.
Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)
My Lords, on the earlier question about the importance of publishing a public audit of inquiry recommendations that will and will not be implemented and why, does the Minister agree that, without such a duty of candour, it could fuel mistrust in inquiries, which start to look like expensive ways of shutting down public debate and kicking concerns into the long grass, with no action, no accountability and no transparency?
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
We are determined that the duty of candour will address some of the concerns that people have had about public inquiries in the past. The length of some public inquiries causes additional trauma for some of the people involved in what are often huge injustices and sometimes major state failures. We are clear that we need to make sure that people get the truth. There have been some issues in the past: for example, some people lied to the Kerslake review into the Manchester Arena attack, but, obviously, the statutory inquiry that followed got answers. We need to make sure that people get the answers, and that is what we think the duty of candour will deliver.
Lord Robathan (Con)
My Lords, when looking at public inquiries, could the Minister also look at the issue of the veterans Bill that will come forward? This is the same sort of thing, as it is exposing veterans of conflict in Northern Ireland to inquiries 30 and 40 years later. There is something very odd about this. Could she please look at that as well, because most of us feel that it is unwarranted and disreputable?
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
I will speak to my noble friend Lady Anderson and my noble friend Lord Coaker regarding the point that the noble Lord raised.
Young People in Scotland: Employment Opportunities
(1 day, 7 hours ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Cameron of Lochiel
To ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the impact of the Employment Rights Act 2025 on employment opportunities for young people in Scotland.
The Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade (Lord Sarwar) (Lab)
My Lords, the Government have published a comprehensive assessment of the Employment Rights Act in consultation with experts. The assessment shows that the Act could benefit 18 million workers across the UK and could increase employment. Our analysis further shows that young workers stand to be amongst the biggest beneficiaries of these reforms. Scotland is also expected to benefit more significantly, with around 55% of workers projected to gain from the Act.
Lord Cameron of Lochiel (Con)
I begin by warmly welcoming the Minister to his first Question at the Dispatch Box. In the latest labour market trends published by the Scottish Government, the unemployment rate of those aged 16 and over in Scotland was estimated at 5.1%, up 1.4% over the year, and above the UK rate of 4.9%. We know that the Employment Rights Act will take effect over the coming months. The views of these Benches on the deficiencies in that legislation are well-known. What contingency measures are Ministers putting in place, should the Employment Rights Act lead to even higher levels of unemployment among young people in Scotland?
Lord Sarwar (Lab)
I thank the noble Lord for the question. He and I debated these issues in a very different Parliament not so long ago, and I am sure that neither of us imagined we would be debating in this Chamber today. As he knows, a lot of these responsibilities are devolved, so we have to make an assessment of the impact of the Employment Rights Act; but let us not forget that the Scottish Government are responsible for schools, high schools, colleges, universities, apprenticeships, the apprenticeship levy rates and so much more. Therefore, although we are confident that the Employment Rights Act will not have a detrimental impact on young workers, we need fundamental reform in Scotland in those other areas.
Lord Bruce of Bennachie (LD)
My Lords, does the Minister acknowledge that numerous tax and regulation actions are undertaken by both the UK Government and the Scottish Government that have an impact on job prospects for young people in Scotland, yet both Governments operate separate, unconnected programmes in Scotland to address youth unemployment? Would it be better if the two Governments worked together to find ways of jointly attacking the problem of youth unemployment, and, given that the Minister has experience of both this House and the Scottish Parliament, is he not the right Minister to lead that initiative?
Lord Sarwar (Lab)
I thank the noble Lord for that question. He can pay me all the compliments he likes—I will happily take them. Of course, on principle we should work together whenever it is in the national interest, and there will be different responsibilities of the Government here at Westminster and the Government in Scotland. For example, we have responsibility for the Employment Rights Act and the campaign to make work pay, along with increasing the national minimum wage for young people. We have the jobs guarantee scheme, and we have committed an additional £2.5 billion over the next three years to the youth guarantee scheme, as well as reforming the growth and skills levy. Of course, responsibility for how that levy is spent in Scotland is for the Scottish Government. Therefore, I accept the principle of the argument the noble Lord is making, and we stand ready to work with the Government in Scotland to deliver for Scotland’s amazing young people.
Baroness MacLeod of Camusdarach (Lab)
My Lords, the unemployment figures for young people in Scotland make pretty grim reading—the NEET figures are going up. In the West Highlands and Islands of Scotland, there are great employment opportunities, whether it is renewable energy, fishing, tourism or dry dock facilities. However, there is very little infrastructure, there are very few houses, and there seems to be an ignorance of the problems facing the area. Can my noble friend mobilise his department and other Whitehall departments and work, as the noble Lord, Lord Bruce, has said, with the Scottish Government to make sure that those sins of omission are corrected?
Lord Sarwar (Lab)
I thank my noble friend for that question and agree with her wholeheartedly. I repeat what I said to the noble Lord: we stand ready to work with the Scottish Government on these issues. I will give the example of an area that is of course of real importance to my noble friend: the Western Isles. There we have a particular challenge, with a ferry service that is not competent, meaning that there is loss of trade almost every week. Services are being taken away—for example, around our skills system—and resources are being taken away from the university based there and in the highlands. In addition, too many young people are being forced to leave the Western Isles because they cannot get adequate housing to bring up their young families. This shows that we need a joined-up approach, and the Government stand ready to do that. However, I again urge the Scottish Government to take much more action on all these issues, rather than undertaking stunts in other parts of the country such as the one they engaged in today.
Lord Weir of Ballyholme (DUP)
My Lords, I welcome the Minister to his place. To some extent he has touched on this in his previous answer, but does he agree that the Scottish First Minister would be better placed dealing with practical priorities such as co-operating with the UK Government on issues such as youth unemployment, rather than engaging in performative pantomime politics such as meeting the leaders of Plaid Cymru and Sinn Féin today?
Lord Sarwar (Lab)
I emphasise again that of course, I and the First Minister of Scotland have a different view on the constitution of the UK and the constitution in Scotland. However, to be honest, the most meaningful thing the First Minister of Scotland, and indeed the First Minister of Wales and the First and Deputy First Ministers of Northern Ireland, can do is deliver for their populations. When in Scotland we have rising youth unemployment, ever-longer NHS waiting lists and too many children leaving school without the opportunities they deserve, those are the issues the Scottish Government should be grappling with every day, rather than gathering in Cardiff to sign a piece of paper and perform a stunt, acting against the interests of the good people of Scotland.
Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)
My Lords, I, too, welcome the noble Lord to his ministerial position; I think this House is greatly enhanced by people who served in the Scottish Parliament, personally, and I wish him luck in his role. The area where I live, the Scottish Borders, has the lowest average working wage, and we also have too high levels of outward migration of those in the workforce, including young people. Working across the border, businesses have to navigate both devolved and reserved legislation, and when Governments are not working together in an area such as the Scottish Borders, that exacerbates the problem rather than resolves it. What initiatives can the Minister take with his colleagues here to ensure that in the Border area, cross-border work is enhanced rather than diminished?
Lord Sarwar (Lab)
I thank the noble Lord for his question. The Borderlands Inclusive Growth Deal is a good example of local authorities, the Scottish Government and the UK Government working together to drive investment into the Borderlands area—exports out and investments in—to create more opportunities. Let me emphasise again: in far too many parts of Scotland, young people are forced to leave because there is no access to local skills, well-paid local jobs or local housing. Many of those young people leave and never go back, and that is unfair for far too many parts of our country.
The Earl of Kinnoull (CB)
My Lords, the Interministerial Group for Business and Industry last met on 3 February by videophone. The communique lays out the four items that were discussed, which did not include this very important area. Will the Minister, whom I welcome to his position, tell us when the interministerial group will meet again and whether he will undertake to make sure that this issue is on the list of items to be discussed when it does?
Lord Sarwar (Lab)
I thank the noble Earl for his question. We were due to meet last week, but, sadly, Ministers in the devolved Administrations had to rearrange. I look forward to meeting very soon, and I will ensure that youth unemployment is high up the agenda.
Lord Barber of Ainsdale (Lab)
My Lords, does my noble friend agree that, as ACAS research has shown, commercial and competitive success in delivering job opportunities is much more likely to be achieved in workplaces where people feel valued and respected and their voice can be heard—key objectives being delivered by the Employment Relations Act, in Scotland as in England and Wales?
Lord Sarwar (Lab)
I wholeheartedly agree with my noble friend. Let me again demonstrate how important these reforms are. In April 2026, the Government strengthened statutory sick pay, introduced day-one rights to paternity leave and unpaid parental leave, and launched the Fair Work Agency. Further measures will be delivered in phases through 2026 and 2027, giving businesses and workers time to prepare. Let me emphasise a point I have not had a chance to make so far. The significant rise in the national minimum wage for young people is good, I believe, for employers and workplaces and for employees. I think it is perfectly fair that if a person is doing the same work, they should rightly expect to have the same pay.
Lord Jack of Courance (Con)
I welcome the Minister to his place. I know him well and I have done business with him in the past, and he is very welcome in this House. Does he agree that increasing taxes is a drag not only on job creation but also on growth?
Lord Sarwar (Lab)
Let me first emphasise that that was political business in the past, in case I get in trouble with the relevant authorities about my entry in the register of interests. Of course, you have to look at all these areas with the right balance to make sure we have the right fiscal arrangements in place, the right levels of pay and the right conditions. We also have to make sure that there is a more joined-up approach. To give an example, it is right that we increase the pay for young people—most disproportionately, young people working, for example, in the hospitality and retail sector; but if we are honest, nor is there a balanced or level playing field in our business rate system for the retail and hospitality sector.
Hospitality Industry: VAT
(1 day, 7 hours ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Hunt of Wirral
To ask His Majesty’s Government, following a letter signed by more than 800 hospitality industry leaders calling for VAT on hospitality to be reduced from 20 per cent to 10 per cent, what assessment they have made of the impact of rising costs on (1) hospitality businesses, (2) investment, (3) employment and (4) opportunities for young people.
The Parliamentary Secretary, HM Treasury (Lord Pitt-Watson) (Lab)
My Lords, I begin by recognising and thanking the hospitality businesses for their enormous contribution to jobs—it is nearly 3 million jobs—and to growth, communities and the economy. I think it is nearly a £100 billion contribution to the economy. They have seen rising costs, some to do with national insurance and many to do with rising food and labour costs. But the Government are providing targeted support to the sector, including lower business rates multipliers, a £4.3 billion business rates support scheme and the Great British Summer Savings scheme, but they are doing that while ensuring sustainable public finances. I must come back to that, because HMRC estimates that reducing VAT on accommodation and food and beverage services to 10% would cost around £11 billion a year. I think this figure is already known publicly.
Lord Hunt of Wirral (Con)
My Lords, the Minister has acknowledged that over the past two years hospitality has experienced higher cost, but it is nothing but higher cost, imposed in particular by this Government, from employment costs and business rates pressures to regulation, and now it faces the prospect of potentially sky-high holiday taxes. In February the Prime Minister, when Mayor of Greater Manchester, said he favoured halving VAT on hospitality to 10%,
“because of the social value that your businesses bring to places and towns that need that life injected into them”.
Will the Prime Minister now listen to himself and the 800 hospitality businesses and industry leaders who have written to him, and will he now cut VAT to support, in particular, our small business sector?
Lord Pitt-Watson (Lab)
I cannot comment about changes in taxation, particularly in the run-up to the Budget, but if I might just correct the noble Lord, the point I made in my first Answer was that there has been support given, particularly to pubs and music venues. Support has been given particularly to smaller businesses—750,000 properties—and in reductions in national insurance to 900,000 people who work for smaller businesses. The corporation tax here in the UK is the lowest in the G7 and it is reduced for small businesses, so I reject the thought that no help has been given.
Baroness Kramer (LD)
My Lords, back in November 2025 my party called for a 5% cut in VAT on hospitality because the situation was so dire, with at least a third of the industry operating at a loss. Will the Minister now look again at the VAT cut? Will he also follow through on those other issues where small businesses need help, such as a different regime for NICs for part-time workers? Will he look at their energy costs, because most of them cannot access the attractive energy packages as they are not available to the small firms? The change in business rates favours the corporate chains but actually disadvantages most of the small independents. They are the backbone and they are the employers, especially of our young people.
Lord Pitt-Watson (Lab)
I entirely echo the noble Baroness’s congratulations to the hospitality industry. I will be more than happy to answer the questions she has asked after the Budget, but I think most of them anticipate changes in tax, which it would be inappropriate for me to discuss at this point.
Lord Harper (Con)
My Lords, I apologise to my noble friend on the Front Bench, and to the House, for jumping the gun in my attempt to ask a question. I listened carefully to what the Minister said. I think he accepted that the industry is under a great deal of pressure, because he talked about some of the areas where the Government are attempting to help. Can I press him on the point that my noble friend raised? Given that the industry is under pressure, how on earth will allowing mayors around the country to impose a tax on people going on holiday help anybody with the cost of living?
Lord Pitt-Watson (Lab)
As the noble Lord may be aware, those sorts of rights exist for mayors and other local authorities in almost every other European country. In the UK they will need to consult locally before they introduce any such tax, but many mayors will believe that the extra revenues can raise the economy of their local area and provide better facilities so that the hospitality industry, along with everyone else, will prosper. As I said, this is part of a devolution agenda, but it is one where there will be consultation before any additional charge is introduced. It will be proportionate, of course, in the sense that it is a percentage of the cost, so it would cost more for an expensive hotel than for lower-cost accommodation.
The Earl of Clancarty (CB)
My Lords, picking up on that point, does the Minister agree that a tourist tax spent in the main on arts and culture would be logical, since that is what tourists come here for? If our cultural attractions are properly maintained and developed, that will in turn significantly help the hospitality industry.
Lord Pitt-Watson (Lab)
That is a really good question that mayors and local authorities around the country will have to think about—how they make their towns attractive to tourists and nice places to come and visit and therefore support the hospitality industry and the wider community.
Lord Watts (Lab)
My Lords, does the Minister agree with me that everyone would like a tax cut? Any individual, company or sector will want tax cuts, but you have to be responsible. The Truss Government were not responsible and that set the bond markets off and caused a lot of the problems that we are experiencing now.
Lord Pitt-Watson (Lab)
I thank the noble Lord for that question. It brings me back to the fundamental question that we have to think about, which is that we can live only within our means. A VAT cut of 10 percentage points would cost £11 billion. That is about the same cost as the Royal Navy. We need to ask ourselves what the priorities will be. As we look to the Budget, I know that the Chancellor will be looking at absolutely everything, but I thought that benchmark might be helpful for your Lordships’ House.
Baroness Manzoor (Con)
My Lords, the Prime Minister stated his support for the tourist tax, but the impact assessment of it has not really been made and some parts of the country will do better than others. Can the Minister say what assessment the Government have made, despite the fact that it is potentially a devolution area?
Lord Pitt-Watson (Lab)
The assessment is that this should be in the power of the local authority. It will be devolved. On any cost-benefit analysis that has been done, given that I was alerted to this Question only two hours ago, I do not have that with me. If I could write to the noble Baroness, I would be happy so to do.
Lord Fox (LD)
My Lords, I do not believe the Minister had the pleasure of participating in the Employment Rights Bill, and I will not relitigate the entire debate, but the legislation undertakes to substantially change the zero-hours regulations that affect many of the businesses that the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, mentioned. Does the Minister acknowledge that the consultation now and the decisions that will be made as a result of that consultation—how those changes are applied, and in particular the threshold at which they are applied—will materially affect these businesses and existentially affect some of them? Does he undertake to make sure that when those regulations are published, they take into consideration the health of this sector?
Lord Pitt-Watson (Lab)
I will try to answer more broadly about employment. The UK employment rate is in the top half of OECD economies. It is above the G7 average. Unemployment is in the bottom half of the OECD. Participation among 16 to 64 year-olds is higher than the average participation rate in every year but one of the last 50 years. The Government are increasing funding for employment support to more than £4 billion a year, including £2.5 billion investment in the youth guarantee and the growth and skills levy in the next three years, supporting 500,000 opportunities to earn and learn in the hospitality industry and all other industries. As I say, we are faced with many challenges ahead of us, but I believe that what the Government are doing in this area is correct.
Lord Johnson of Lainston (Con)
My Lords, the Minister raised the importance of copying Europe with the tourist tax, but many European countries—all of them, I think—have a VAT discount on tourist shopping, one of the things the last Government sadly did away with. This has a huge impact on the retail, hotel and hospitality sectors. The Minister is not going to give me a sneak preview of the Budget, but can the Government at least look imaginatively at trying to find a way to attract tourists back into this country to spend their money? Then socialist mayors around the country can charge them even more for their hotel tax.
Lord Pitt-Watson (Lab)
As the noble Lord says, I am not going to give him a sneak preview of the Budget.
Lord Vaux of Harrowden (CB)
My Lords, the greatest impact of this tourist tax will be on those who have to go on holiday during the most expensive weeks of the year—in other words, families with school-aged children. Does the Minister agree? Can he give us an indication of how much it is likely to cost such a family? I assume the impact assessment does this.
Lord Pitt-Watson (Lab)
We have not made a specific assessment of that number, no.
Baroness Griffin of Princethorpe (Lab)
My Lords, is my noble friend the Minister aware that mayors in my former region of the north-west have for several years been championing the tourist tax to boost their local economies and local employment?
Lord Pitt-Watson (Lab)
I absolutely am. Indeed, I was at one time a councillor in a Conservative borough in London that also championed a tourist tax. It is a good idea, but the decisions about the tourist tax should be local decisions for the local authority to make.
Lord Mackinlay of Richborough (Con)
My Lords, the Minister uses a European example: most countries abroad seem to have a holiday tax, so it must be a good idea here. I know this Government love most things EU-related, but many EU countries have a lower rate of VAT on hospitality, for a very good reason—because it is a good thing. The Government have already crossed their own Rubicon with a lower rate of VAT for this summer period for many families to enjoy things as a cost of living cut. Surely a lower VAT rate on hospitality follows the same example and thinking that the Government have already found.
Lord Pitt-Watson (Lab)
I think I am struggling to get across my main point here. If I could halve VAT for every industry in Britain and it had no knock-on consequences, that would be wonderful. But this has £11 billion of knock-on consequences. The thing that noble Lords need to think about is not whether it would be nice not to charge people money. Of course we would rather not charge people money. But if the Exchequer loses £11 billion, where is that funding going to come from?
Lord Lee of Trafford (LD)
My Lords, I declare an interest as president of the Association of Leading Visitor Attractions. Given that tourism is probably the number one industry in more parliamentary constituencies than any other single private sector industry, is it not time, to demonstrate and reflect its importance, to bring tourism into the title of DCMS?
Lord Pitt-Watson (Lab)
I will pass on that thought to the DCMS Minister. I thank the noble Lord.
Air Traffic Control Disruption
(1 day, 7 hours ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Moylan (Con)
My Lords, last week was a catastrophe for many families and businesspeople trying to go about their business, sleeping in airports and barely recovering, even days later, back on to the routes that they wanted to pursue. The day before this calamitous event, the noble Lord’s colleague in the other place, Keir Mather, said in response to a Written Question that all 34 recommendations from the inquiry into the previous NATS calamity in 2023 had been implemented. The very next day, it happened again. Do the Government still have confidence in the management of NATS? When are they going to get a grip?
The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill) (Lab)
My Lords, I first make it clear that this was an unacceptable event, and I apologise to passengers and others affected. The event was less than a week ago, last Tuesday afternoon, and the Secretary of State, the Aviation Minister and my department were all completely focused on alleviating the effects of this while it was going on—relaxing controls on night flights and so on—while of course making sure that safety was not compromised. The Secretary of State and the Aviation Minister met the chief executives of NATS and the Civil Aviation Authority the following morning, and the Secretary of State has commissioned a report into this event from NATS and asked it to report to her this Wednesday. The noble Lord should think this a very quick response, because the Government, as with everyone else, do not want these things to happen and regard it as unacceptable, but need to understand why it happened and what needs to be done to prevent it again.
Lord Addington (LD)
My Lords, we have had three of these major events in a short period of time. When are we going to get a system to give some compensation to, or look after, those who have been inconvenienced? It is a great way to encourage people to get something right if they have to pay for it when it goes wrong.
Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)
I think the noble Lord was not intimately involved with the passage of the civil aviation Bill, which went through this House just a few short sitting weeks ago. On that Bill, there was a discussion, on an amendment principally proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Young, about whether there should be compensation. As the Minister handling the Bill in Committee and on Report, I took great succour from the statements of the noble Lord, Lord Harper, who was the Secretary of State during the last of those events. He said this:
“The conclusion that I came to was that, if you were to change the position so that NATS was responsible for paying compensation, almost half the bill would land on the taxpayer, just over 40% of it would effectively end up on a different group of airlines—not necessarily all the ones hit by it—and a little bit would effectively land on the staff. The conclusion that I reached was that that did not really get you to a significantly better place than the current position, accepting that the current position is suboptimal”.—[Official Report, 16/6/26; col. GC67.]
That is what he said at the time, and that is currently the view of the Government.
Lord Young of Cookham (Con)
My Lords, I have the deepest respect for my noble friend Lord Harper, but three former Secretaries of State for Transport took a different view from the one the noble Lord has just read out. When NATS makes mistakes, the airlines pick up the tab. Last week, the airlines had pilots in the wrong place, planes in the wrong place and pilots running out of hours. Is it not a manifest injustice that the airlines have to pick up the tab for the failures of NATS, which recently paid a dividend of £171 million?
Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)
The noble Lord is of course echoing the case he made during the passage of the civil aviation Bill, which the Government disagreed with. Of course the event is unacceptable and we need to get to the bottom of it. The noble Lord, Lord Moylan, said it was another event and of course it is, but it looks, certainly at the moment, as though it is not the same event as in 2023. The Secretary of State and the department are relentlessly focused on finding out what the cause was and on preventing it happening again, which is the way to avoid costs such as the ones the noble Lord referred to being incurred.
Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)
In the absence of any back-up, as I understand it, is it sensible that eight airports were operated by only one system?
Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)
The noble and learned Baroness is certainly right that these systems have to be and should be more resilient than they are. The Secretary of State has recently written to the Civil Aviation Authority with its priorities for the next period of time, and top of the list of priorities for National Air Traffic Services is making it more resilient, for precisely that reason. How it is organised and how many airports it covers is a different question and relates to the geography of the United Kingdom. We have not heard it previously suggested that somehow the geography of what NATS covers ought to be different. It ought to be reliable.
Lord Grayling (Con)
My Lords, the Minister knows that I was one of the former Secretaries of State sympathetic to my noble friend Lord Young, and I hope his point will be considered again by the Government. More seriously, has there been anything so far to suggest that the trouble last week could have been caused by an external influence? Even if that proves not to be the case, does the Minister agree that the resilience of our system is exceptionally important? We saw last week what happens if the system breaks down. Will the Government commit to reviewing exactly how resilient it is, in what are somewhat troubled times?
Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)
The Secretary of State and the department are assured that there is no evidence at the present time of external influences. Therefore, we are waiting for the immediate report from National Air Traffic Services and the independent review that the Secretary of State commissioned at the same time from the Civil Aviation Authority. For more or less precisely the reasons the noble Lord set out, we need to be assured that this system is absolutely resilient. He is right that we live in troubled times; one of the things that needs to be reviewed is not only the absolute resilience of the system but its resilience against unfriendly actors and third parties.
Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe (Lab)
My Lords, I declare an interest in that I used to be a government director of the PPP for NATS. In those days, the airlines made up 51% of the ownership of the operation. Has that changed? Do they still have an interest? Have they been canvassed on the views that have been expressed in the Chamber?
Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)
My noble friend is right that the ownership has changed. The airlines and one or two other institutions now account, I think, for around 40% of the shareholding. The work that the Secretary of State commissioned the morning following the incident originated because it was the right thing for a Secretary of State to do—both the immediate report from NATS, due on Wednesday, and the CAA report. I have no doubt that the board of NATS will consider this in due course, but it is right for public accountability that the Secretary of State decided to commission those two reports. I am sure the board and the shareholders of NATS know, but I do not think she asked permission and I do not think that is what the noble Lord is suggesting—but that would not have been right in any event.
Baroness Finlay of Llandaff (CB)
Given that this constituted a major incident, what provision was made to ensure that the airport was cleared of passengers by making transport available to move them out of the airport? Some passengers could not deplane for more than five hours because the airport was over-congested. In a major incident, the usual policy is partly to have the crowd dispersed.
Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)
The noble Baroness is right that, in these circumstances, people who are affected, particularly those waiting on planes, should be affected for the least amount of time and enabled to find the best possible care and assistance that they need. That is a responsibility of the airports concerned and of the airlines. Those entitlements are set out in UK law. During the civil aviation Bill, in this Chamber we discussed giving the Civil Aviation Authority stronger powers to take action to ensure that consumers are properly dealt with. I do not know the detail of what the noble Baroness has said, but I will go away and ask.
Representation of the People Bill
(1 day, 7 hours ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage
That the Bill be now read a second time.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (Baroness Taylor of Stevenage) (Lab)
My Lords, I am very pleased to open this Second Reading debate on the Representation of the People Bill. Noble Lords across the House bring great experience of electoral law, electoral administration and the practical operation of our democracy. I look forward to the contributions that will be made today and to the constructive scrutiny that our House will bring to the Bill.
This Bill renews our democracy for a new generation, opening up participation and strengthening the integrity of our elections. It restores confidence, reinforcing trust with stronger political finance rules and better protections against harassment and intimidation, closing down opportunities for those who would seek to undermine our democracy. But it would be wrong to introduce this debate without acknowledging and reflecting on events of recent times.
When I catch the 6.15 am or the 6.31 am train from Stevenage to London in the mornings, I share the carriages of that train and then the Underground with people whose interests are at the heart of our community: tradespeople, in their steel-toecap boots; public sector workers, including those in blue light services, heading for their early shifts; and small business owners getting an early start to prepare for their day. It is a fundamental principle of our democracy that every one of their votes is exactly equal to the votes of millionaires, crypto bros and industry magnates. It is that which sits front and centre in this Bill.
We must put politics back under public control. We all share concerns about the rise of big money and its ability to dominate public power. At its heart, this Bill is about renewing the foundations of our electoral system so that it remains fair, secure, transparent and accessible in the years ahead. At the Last Night of the Proms on Saturday, the conductor, Sakari Oramo, referred to another version of AI, which was authenticity and integrity. That must sit at the heart of electoral reform, so that we restore the confidence of the 6 am crew that their voice really counts.
Delivering on our manifesto commitment, this Bill extends the franchise to eligible 16 and 17 year-olds for UK parliamentary elections and other reserved and excepted polls. It enables more automated forms of electoral registration, broadens the forms of voter identification that may be used at polling stations, and makes a range of changes to the conduct and administration of elections, referendums and recall petitions. The Bill strengthens the rules on political donations and expenditure, including measures to reduce the risk of foreign money entering our politics. It improves transparency in digital campaigning material, strengthens enforcement and information sharing by the Electoral Commission, and requires tougher sentencing where offences are aggravated by hostility towards candidates, elected officeholders, campaigners or electoral staff.
Opportunities for those who seek to undermine or illicitly influence our democracy must and will be closed down. This Bill responds directly to a changing and increasingly hostile threat environment and takes action to tackle risks by strengthening safeguards, closing loopholes and hardening defences. Taken together, these measures will help deliver a modern, secure and inclusive electoral system. They will support public confidence, protect our democracy from those who would seek to undermine it and open participation to a new generation of voters.
The Bill is ambitious but practical. It addresses the everyday operation of democracy: who can take part, how they register and vote, how campaigns are funded and conducted, and how the rules are enforced. The balance is important. The Government are not seeking reform for their own sake. The measures in the Bill respond to real changes in political campaigning, how people participate in politics and how threats to democratic confidence can arise. Some of these changes are technological, some are administrative and some reflect the need to ensure that our democratic arrangements command confidence across generations. The Bill therefore looks both to the integrity of the system and to the experience of those who use it: voters, candidates, parties, campaigners and electoral administrators.
The Bill is not the totality of our ambition for electoral reform; work will continue. As a first step, the First Secretary of State and the Secretary of State for MHCLG have written to the Electoral Commission to review spending limits, which we believe are too high. We are establishing a cross-government task and finish team to consider threats to UK democracy, including political funding, illegitimate influence and broader threats to political equality.
As noble Lords would expect, the Bill has not remained frozen in aspic since its introduction; it has continued to develop through scrutiny, engagement and the Government’s consideration of how best to give effect to its objectives. During its Commons stages, the Government brought forward both substantive and technical amendments to strengthen the Bill in response to points raised by Members and to ensure it better delivers its policy intent.
For example, the Government brought forward amendments to strengthen the “know your donor” requirements and further tighten the rules relating to donations made by unincorporated associations. Those changes were designed to improve transparency and ensure that the political finance regime keeps pace with the risks it is intended to address. These risks cannot be overstated. The threat to our democracy from foreign influence and hidden sources of political funding are an ever-growing danger—one that we cannot afford to delay tackling.
Responding to further evidence of the threat we face—namely, the conviction of Nathan Gill, as well as cases such as Christine Lee—we commissioned Philip Rycroft to review foreign financial influence and interference in politics. His report was thorough and challenging, and the Government have accepted its recommendations. Safeguarding the integrity, transparency and fairness of our electoral system is a fundamental priority, and the Bill provides an important vehicle for taking that work forward.
A number of recommendations from the Rycroft review were therefore implemented through amendments made to the Bill on Report in the Commons. Those amendments form a significant part of the Government’s wider response to the risks identified by the review. The first of those changes concerns crypto assets. The current political donations framework does not sufficiently reflect the particular risks that crypto assets can present, including the difficulty of identifying the true source of a donation. That creates a risk that malign actors, including state actors, could seek to obscure the origin of the funds. The Bill therefore introduces a ban on the use of crypto assets as a means of making political donations. To support that change, the Government have amended the Bill to clarify the meaning of a donation under the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000. That will ensure that property, including crypto assets transferred to a party to meet an expense, is treated as a donation, so that the law cannot be circumvented simply because value is transferred through property rather than cash.
The Bill caps donations to registered political parties by overseas electors at £100,000. This also applies to individuals who were formerly resident outside the UK, who are subject to the cap for a minimum of a calendar year after arrival here. That responds to concerns identified by the Rycroft review: first, that the origin of funds from overseas donors can be harder to trace; and, secondly, that democratic fairness may be put at risk if individuals are able to make unlimited donations into the political system while having only a limited connection to public life in the United Kingdom.
Further amendments change the test for company donations so that it is based on profit rather than revenue. That change follows careful consideration of the Rycroft review and engagement with stakeholders. Profit provides a clearer indication of a company’s financial position and helps ensure that donations come from companies undertaking genuine economic activity.
The Bill was also amended to implement the Rycroft recommendation that the Electoral Commission’s information-sharing powers should be extended. This will enable the commission to receive relevant information from relevant public authorities as defined in the Bill, supporting more effective regulation of political finance and a better understanding of emerging risks. The Government also amended the Bill to extend the commission’s powers to require disclosure of information outside a formal investigation, allowing the commission to more proactively monitor compliance, support timely regulation during election periods, and take a more proportionate and effective approach to enforcement.
Beyond the Rycroft recommendations, on Report the Government introduced a targeted regulation-making power into the Bill to allow key political finance restrictions, including those relating to crypto assets, overseas elector donation caps and company donations, to be extended beyond political parties via secondary legislation in the future. This is to ensure that malign actors cannot circumvent the rules by providing to other non-party regulated donees.
While much of the consideration of the Bill so far has been focused on strengthening the political finance provisions, the Government tabled further amendments on Report to extend the maximum duration of longer-term postal and proxy postal voting arrangements from three years to five, and to better align the duration of anonymous elector registration provisions with those changes. These changes will provide greater clarity and consistency while reducing repeated administrative burdens on people who may already be vulnerable.
The Government have also amended the Bill to clarify when an overseas elector may be removed from the electoral register. Overseas electors must satisfy specific eligibility requirements when they register. Although registration lasts for three years, circumstances may change during that period. These amendments ensure that an individual who no longer meets the requirements can be removed, helping electoral registers remain accurate. Taken together, the Commons amendments strengthen the public scrutiny of political finance, reduce avoidable administrative burdens and ensure that the Bill responds sensibly to modern forms of participation, campaigning and donation.
As the Bill has progressed, our desire to engage with all interested parties and our willingness to listen to opposing viewpoints has continued. Following the strength of feeling expressed at Second Reading in the House of Commons, the Government tabled an amendment in Committee to repeal the Government’s powers to designate a strategy and policy statement to which the Electoral Commission must have regard. That repeal supports our manifesto commitment to strengthen democracy and uphold the integrity and independence of the Electoral Commission.
The Government have committed to tabling an amendment during the Bill’s passage through this House to strengthen accessibility at polling stations for voters with disabilities. We will develop that amendment in the spirit of the new clause brought forward on Report in the Commons, working with interested Members of both Houses to ensure that any new provision is proportionate, practical and deliverable.
In addition to introducing a robust regime that ensures that donors contributing above the £100,000 annual cap must demonstrate a genuine and ongoing connection to the United Kingdom, we are considering how we will strengthen the residency requirements, including ensuring that the length of time spent in the UK aligns with broader government policy. We will continue to engage with political parties bilaterally and through the Parliamentary Parties Panel, and we will provide the House with further details in due course. I am keen for that spirit of constructive engagement to continue as the Bill proceeds through this House. I have hosted a drop-in session for all Peers, and I have been pleased to meet a number of noble Lords separately. Throughout the passage of this Bill, my door will remain open to those who wish to discuss any aspect of it with me.
Outside this House, we have worked and will continue to work with bodies such as the Parliamentary Parties Panel and stakeholders across the electoral sector to ensure that the Bill operates effectively for political parties, electors and administrators. We have also engaged with Ministers and officials in the Scottish Government, the Welsh Government and the Northern Ireland Executive, recognising that implementation will require continued close working with the devolved Governments and legislative consent in those areas within the responsibility of the devolved legislatures.
I also recognise that successful implementation will matter as much as the legislation itself. Electoral administrators, returning officers and those who support the running of elections locally will be central to making many of these reforms work in practice. The Government will continue to engage closely with them as the Bill progresses and as the necessary secondary legislation, guidance and operational changes are developed. We want reforms that are ambitious but also workable, clear and capable of commanding confidence on the ground.
Democracy is not sustained by institutions and legislation alone. It depends on people believing that their voice matters, that the rules are fair and that the outcome of an election reflects the free choice of the electorate. That confidence must never be taken for granted. This is a substantial and important set of reforms to electoral law. I know that noble Lords will bring expertise, rigour and practical insight to its consideration. I look forward to engaging with those debates in the constructive spirit in which the Bill has been developed. I beg to move.
Baroness O’Neill of Bexley (Con)
My Lords, it is an understatement to say that this is a constitutionally significant Bill. Particularly at a time when the political landscape is so turbulent, this is where your Lordships’ House proves its worth—with careful, considered scrutiny to improve the Government's legislation as best we can. Indeed, the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, is driven by the need for this thorough scrutiny, and I thank him. I thank all those who are speaking today; I am sure that a number of very important matters will be raised, and we will be listening to them very closely.
The Bill seeks not only to give children the right to vote in all elections but introduces automatic voter registration, reforms political finance law and tackles foreign interference, while potentially leaving the door open for foreign citizens to vote. I also flag that the Bill was drafted with minimal engagement with other political parties. The Electoral Commission has said that
“any legislative change on elections should be informed by the experience and insight of the electoral community, including electoral administrators, political parties and the wider regulated community”.
There was no consultation with political parties on the 2025 election strategy, nor after the initial Rycroft recommendations. Why did the Government not wait two months until the Rycroft review was completed before proceeding with Second Reading of the Bill in the other place?
If the Government wanted to fast-track their manifesto commitments on the voting age, why could they not separate the election measures from the political finance measures, as indeed the last Labour Government did with the Representation of the People Act 2000 and the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000? This is not how election rules should be reformed. As Sir Winston Churchill said at the Second Reading of the Representation of the People Bill in 1948:
“It has become a well-established custom that matters affecting the interests of rival parties should not be settled by the imposition of the will of one side over the other, but by an agreement”.—[Official Report, Commons, 16/2/1948; cols. 859-60.]
Some of the provisions are indeed deeply troubling and risk setting dangerous precedents. Bills such as these should not be hyper-partisan, particularly in complex areas such as political finance. Even just the perception of partisan, targeted legislation risks breaking down long-standing political conventions and, crucially, trust in the system. We will all have heard the reports this weekend of crypto donations to Reform UK. It is our current understanding that these donations would be caught by the overseas contributors cap, but I would be grateful if the Minister could clarify how this proposed cap would work. Do the cap’s provisions apply to long-standing domestic electors and not just to overseas electors and overseas electors who return to domestic registration?
Can the noble Baroness confirm the requirement for a full calendar year of prior UK residence when making a donation? The legislation commences these provisions retrospectively from March 2026, but the calendar year of UK residence requirement may predate March 2026. If an elector has dual permanent residence at home and abroad, would this class the elector as an overseas contributor? It is important that laws are clear. I would be happy for the Minister to write to me on this matter if she so wishes.
As to the Bill’s other provisions, let me be very clear that we will not stand in the way of the Government’s manifesto commitment to lower the voting age. Noble Lords opposite may see themselves as having a monopoly on progress, but I gently remind them that when the Reform Act 1832 was passed—they know the answer—the Conservatives won the general election in 1841. It was the Conservatives who championed the Reform Act 1867, and we once again defied expectations following the Reform Act 1884, when the Liberals lost their majority in 1885 and the Conservatives returned to power in 1886. When women finally got the vote in the following decades, they were more likely to vote Conservative than men—very sensible. And when the voting age was lowered to 18 in 1969, the Conservatives won the general election the following year. From the days of the Primrose League to our Young Conservatives today, we will never be afraid of making our case to the British people.
However, the Government’s position in this Bill is inconsistent with their policies elsewhere, which raises serious questions. The Government must decide whether they see 16 and 17 year-olds as children, in line with the Children Act and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. If not, then why not 15 year-olds or younger? What exactly is the Government’s rationale? Will they change other laws as a result? Children currently cannot stand for election, be deployed in the Armed Forces or buy alcohol or cigarettes. The Government have raised the age for buying fireworks, vapes and knives or for using sunbeds to 18 and are proposing to raise the age for obtaining a driving licence from 17. Where do the Government draw the line and why?
We are also concerned about automatic voter registration. We believe it is up to individuals to register, to be inspired to register rather than be forced, and to undergo proper checks to protect the system from fraud, which is why individual registration was introduced in the first place. Do we really trust algorithms to keep accurate registers when there may be out-of-date entries on other databases, for example? How will it prevent those with residence but who are ineligible being registered, such as certain second home owners or unqualified Commonwealth and EU voters? So much for tackling foreign interference. Voters’ rights are rightly based on citizenship and not residency. No EU member state allows non-national citizens to vote in its national elections. Can the Minister confirm that eligibility to vote in general elections will remain the preserve of British citizens only?
What is more, the Bill will water down requirements for photographic identification at polling stations, yet we still require photo ID to drive or for under-25s to buy alcohol. Again, what is the rationale? Where is the consistency? Amid the legitimate concerns in the recent Gorton and Denton as well as Birmingham City Council by-elections around family voting, is this really the time to water down safeguards against electoral fraud?
This brings me to the rise of sectarianism in our country. In the other place, the Government, alongside the Liberal Democrats and the Greens, voted against an amendment to ban political campaigning materials in foreign languages. The Government have not said whether any assessment has been made of sectarianism in election campaigning. This is counterproductive to integration and brings into question whether this Government are serious about social cohesion.
There are, of course, some aims in the Bill which we welcome. We support initiatives to safeguard candidates, campaigners and elected representatives from unacceptable acts of abuse, intimidation and violence while protecting the right to robust debate on strongly felt issues. The previous Government took several actions on this and we are happy to build on this work. Similarly, we will be constructive when it comes to election advertising regulation. The Elections Act 2022 introduced imprints for digital material, and the Conservative Party already voluntarily labels digital content which is AI generated.
As I said earlier, the kinds of reforms proposed in the Bill should be based on consensus and cross-party consultation. Clearly, there are areas we agree on, but there are also areas of serious concern, not just about the proposals themselves but about the way in which the Government have introduced them. I would be grateful if the Minister could address the points raised and I look forward to hearing the valuable insights of other noble Lords on this hugely significant and wide-ranging Bill.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
My Lords, in the light of the mega donations we have heard about to Reform in the past week, I start by emphasising the difference between liberal democracy and popular democracy—or illiberal democracy, as Viktor Orbán and others call it. Liberal or constitutional democracy recognises that democratic processes are open to abuse and require rules and regulations to ensure that all citizens, regardless of background or income, are able to play a positive part. Transparency in campaigning and finance is vital to maintain public trust. Safeguards against foreign interference, the buying of votes or dominance of the media by the wealthy are justified to ensure acceptance of the outcome and to prevent corruption.
Popular democracy dismisses all this. Populist leaders claim that they understand what the people really want and that regulations are there only to protect the establishment. If they spend money from doubtful sources in huge amounts, that is justified by the need to counter the weight of the mainstream media and the power of the established elite. If others question their arguments, they dismiss reasoned argument as fake news.
None of us should take our democracy for granted. In the 2024 election, less than 60% of our citizens turned out, and some 6 million to 8 million citizens were missing from the electoral register. Public disillusion with Westminster politics and with democracy itself is dangerously high in this country. Liberal Democrats argue that everything we put in this Bill must be geared to rebuilding public trust in our democratic institutions and encouraging every citizen to play an active part. Paragraph 84 of the Bill’s Explanatory Notes declares:
“The Government wants as many people as possible to engage in the United Kingdom’s democracy”.
Liberal Democrats share that objective and aim to amend the Bill to go further in pursuing it.
Thankfully, Hungary’s experiment with illiberal democracy, with the massive corruption that went with it, has now been defeated, but we are watching democracy in the USA being undermined by gerrymandering, challenges to voting lists and attacks on the impartiality of election administrators, as well as by enormous flows of money. I hope that most of us in this House share a deep concern about current developments in the US and a commitment to sustain our liberal democracy against the threats it now faces.
In a previous debate, the noble Lord, Lord Hannan, argued that the right to spend money in political campaigning was a part of free speech, repeating the argument the US Supreme Court made in overthrowing congressional limits on campaign funding. The noble Lord, Lord Frost, who will be speaking in this debate, dismissed the Rycroft report as “absurd”, which is to say, “fake news”. Money in politics is vital to political campaigning, but large donations—millions of pounds or dollars—distort and corrupt the democratic process. Commentary on this year’s US congressional elections frequently starts by telling us which candidate has raised the most money, as a key factor in whether they win or lose. We will support extending spending limits of campaigns and imposing clear conditions and limits on donations to prevent our democracy sinking into a similar funding race.
I find it striking that populists who campaign to defend British sovereignty get so much of their money from sunny places abroad: Gibraltar for the Brexit campaign, and Thailand, Hong Kong, Montenegro and beyond for the Reform Party. It is gross hypocrisy to claim to represent the sovereign voice of the British people when they depend on shady money from sunny places.
Some of the changes in this Bill aim to reverse the damage inflicted in the highly partisan 2022 Elections Act. The noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill of Bexley, has repeated the argument that there was an established convention dating from 1948 that changes in election regulations must be subject to consensus among the parties involved. I was the Liberal Democrat leader in 2022, and I remember no consultation from the Conservatives whatsoever. If there were such an established convention—I asked to see any evidence of this but was told they could find none—the Conservatives decisively broke it during the passage of that Act. I hope we all now behave better than that.
The Conservative Party must own and admit the damage done to our country’s democratic institutions and to public trust under Boris Johnson as Prime Minister. It must own and admit its own shortcomings in allowing Russian money and influence to penetrate deeply into the party. I have just read an article by Dominic Grieve, then chair of the Intelligence and Security Committee, on Boris Johnson’s determination to limit the investigation of major donations to the Brexit campaign, as well as to delay publication of the ISC’s Russia report until after the 2019 election and to redact much of the damaging detail. Some of those involved in promoting the Conservative Friends of Russia and cultivating Russian donors now sit in this House.
Rycroft distinguished between money that flowed directly to political parties and efforts to shape “the wider influencing environment”, including
“attempts to create division and distrust among the wider public”.
Direct donations may seem easy to regulate, but I recommend chapter six of George Cottrell’s recent book, How to Launder Money, which lists a variety of ways to donate to a politician or party without being caught: from high speaking fees and book deals to paying travel expenses and funding associated foundations and think tanks. As a fundraiser for the leave campaign and now for Reform, he is an expert in this. Oddly, he does not include paying extraordinarily high fees for TV work in the way that the loss-making GB News subsidises Nigel Farage.
The wider influencing environment is a grey area in political regulation: non-party campaigners are hard to define; political movements that are not parties are not covered; and social media has become a powerful form of influence. Money from abroad is hard to trace. It is not only Russia and China that seek to influence UK campaigning; the Hungarian Government, under Viktor Orbán, reportedly provided almost all the funding for the Roger Scruton Legacy Foundation to support James Orr’s promotion of Christian nationalism. The Times last week reported that Daniel Pipes’ Middle East Forum, a strongly anti-Muslim American organisation, was funding both Tommy Robinson’s movement and Daniel Thomas’s Patriotic Platform that organised the demonstrations in Dover and Portsmouth.
The significant surge of American money into British politics, now also from the Trump Administration itself, threatens to upset the balance of our domestic debate. The Bill may not be able to close all these loopholes, but we must try.
This unregulated flow of money to the fringes of party politics is not entirely new. I recall many years ago a former treasurer of the Conservative Party telling me that when potential donors wanted to remain anonymous, he would suggest they donate to a friendly think tank instead. But it has become a more contentious issue as social media and private polling have opened up more space for unobserved funding to tip the balance of the political debate.
The Rycroft Report’s recommendation on think tanks is clear, and we strongly support it:
“The Government, working with the Charity Commission as appropriate, should ensure it has the capability to monitor the think tank landscape … to make transparent the engagement of foreign-funded think tanks in the policy process”.
I look forward to the speech from the noble Lord, Lord Young of Acton, on this.
Others on these Benches will examine the proposals on regulation of social media, on intimidation and abuse of candidates, on moves towards automatic voter registration and other aspects of the Bill. They will also address the deficiencies of our antiquated voting system, now that we have five to six parties competing in national and local elections. Noble Lords may not be aware of the magnificent Liberal Democrat victory in a recent Cornish by-election, in which the victor won just under 19% of the vote.
Liberal Democrats welcome the extension of voting to 16 year-olds, as a contribution to building participation and trust in our democratic institutions within the younger generation. But it will need to be supported by an expansion of civic education in our schools, well beyond the very limited space provided within our current curriculum. I have talked to a number of secondary schools, and I am shocked by how little they are taught about democracy or our political institutions. We will look to the Minister and others for assurances that changes are now under way.
Effective regulation, I hope we all agree, is a vital part of constitutional democracy. We on these Benches will bring forward amendments to adjust Britain’s structure of regulation to the growing domestic and foreign challenges we face.
Lord in Waiting/Government Whip (Lord Katz) (Lab)
My Lords, before we move on, I wanted to highlight the five-minute advisory time limit for Back-Bench contributions. I ask all noble Lords to stick closely to that guidance, as it will enable the House to rise at around 10 pm.
Lord Evans of Weardale (CB)
My Lords, I will focus my remarks on Parts 4 and 5 of the Bill, relating to election finance and to the work of the Electoral Commission.
In 2021, the Committee on Standards in Public Life, of which I was then chair, issued a report on the regulation of election finance. The report recommended a number of necessary—albeit modest—changes to election regulation to simplify the rules, increase transparency and reduce the risk of bad actors gaining influence through financial donations. Regrettably, the then Government under Boris Johnson failed to respond to the report and failed to act on the recommendations. The report was effectively buried. One can only speculate as to why. I am therefore delighted that the current Government have revisited this important issue, and I was pleased to have the opportunity to discuss the process of review by Philip Rycroft which underpins many of the measures in the Bill as presented.
The measures in Part 4 of the Bill go a considerable way towards meeting the recommendations that CSPL made in 2021. But if anything, as the Minister said, the need for change in this area is even more urgent now than it was five years ago. Public trust in our political system is under great pressure, the risk of foreign money infiltrating our election system remains, the risk of huge individual donations unbalancing the political process has grown, and hostile states, including, but by no means only, Russia, are energetically seeking to influence our public life and subvert our institutions. We must protect them for our national security and for the health of our democracy.
One of the absolute cornerstones of our democracy is maintaining the integrity of our elections, so that it is clear that they are fair, transparent, independent of government and resilient against improper attempts to influence the outcome. We are fortunate to have an independent Electoral Commission which, broadly speaking, has the confidence of the parties and the public. I am therefore delighted to see that the Bill would abolish the right of the Government to set out a strategy and policy statement for the Electoral Commission. The Government of the day do not own the electoral system and have no business imposing their own strategy and policy objectives on the Electoral Commission.
I also welcome the measures that reduce the risk of dirty or untraceable money getting into our electoral system. Given the strict demands on the banking sector—with which I was very familiar when I was a non-executive director at HSBC Holdings—and on other parts of the professional services industry to ensure that they know their customers, it is increasingly anomalous that there is so little duty on political parties to know their donors. The Bill requires parties to assess the risk posed by their donors, but without expecting them to do so to such a level of detail that it would be unreasonable in terms of the resources deployed.
Similarly, preventing donations being made from cryptocurrency is only prudent, given the untraceability of crypto assets. There is a reason why cyber criminals normally want their ransom payments made in crypto. The new measures relating to unincorporated associations are also vital. Unincorporated associations currently provide a convenient route to obscure the source of funds going into the election system. That must change.
On the well-rehearsed and, indeed, now very fashionable question of a cap on individual donations other than from overseas contributors, my long-held view is that there should be such a cap and that it should apply to companies, trade unions and other bodies as well as to individuals. I welcome the fact that companies, unions and individuals are willing to donate freely to the political process, but we need some degree of proportionality as to the influence of any particular voice. A donation cap—and I personally would set it at quite a high level—would help to do that, but it is vital that such a cap should not be so designed that it penalises or advantages any one party. So, cross-party consultation on this matter is essential, if we are to have a stable and credible system, and that applies to the other measures in the Bill.
Even if all the measures in the Bill were passed into law, there would still be a need to reform regulation of the election system, which is complex, fragmented and subject to different statutes. As has been argued elsewhere, there is a strong case for a root and branch review of election law. The Bill is not based on such a review, but it does propose some sensible and proportionate improvements that will reduce some of the risks that the current system faces.
The Lord Bishop of Lichfield
My Lords, this is an important and timely debate, as any opportunity to re-establish trust in politics is one that we must embrace eagerly. We are sadly familiar with the phrase, “A plague on both your houses”, used in a political context. The word “both” may be rather out of date, but the sentiment expressed encapsulates the frustration that many voters feel with the entire political system, thus overlooking many principled, honest and hard-working MPs, Peers and their staff.
I will mention two points in particular. First, in my visits to prisons, I meet many men with time to think and to think deeply. Most people come to serve their sentence in prison only after a string of failures: personal failures and the failures of services, systems and institutions, including the Church. To have that direct and painful experience of system failure and yet, through disenfranchisement, to have no means to participate in efforts for their correction or renewal, can further erode any sense of civic engagement and belonging. I hope that this House will consider whether votes might be extended to at least some convicted prisoners as one dimension of the penal journey to rehabilitation.
Secondly, I stand here embodying my belief that the Church has much to bring to civic engagement and the search for the common good in which all people can flourish, but I am deeply saddened to see our faith, or any faith or belief, being used to divide, to exclude or to intimidate. Recently, we have seen cases of pictures of church buildings being used in election campaign material without permission, and I fear we may see more images of churches, mosques, synagogues, mandirs, gurdwaras and other places of worship being used improperly. I and my colleagues on these Benches would like to see greater deterrence against this kind of malign misuse. I hope that the Government will see fit to work with the Electoral Commission and with faith leaders to strengthen the guidance given to candidates and to campaign managers in this area.
This is the last time that I shall address your Lordships’ House before I retire at the end of this month. My maiden speech here was in a debate on parliamentary democracy in the UK, introduced by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb. I spoke then of the contributions that faith communities can make to the flourishing of democracy in our diverse society, an important issue to which we need constantly to return. It has been my privilege since then to make occasional contributions—alas, more infrequent than I might have hoped—to the workings of this House, and it has been an honour to be able to lead your Lordships in prayer. I thank all your Lordships for the quality, the expertise and the civility of your debates, and I thank the staff and the former and present Lord Speakers and their deputies for their unfailing helpfulness and courtesy. I wish your Lordships well in all your deliberations.
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon (Lab)
My Lords, it is a pleasure and an honour to follow the right reverend Prelate, and of course we all wish him well in his retirement. We will miss him, and his views on democracy are very well established. I agree with him in relation to prisoners, but that is a personal view.
Democracy is fragile, and too many people have lost faith in our politicians and in our Parliament. We must give citizens confidence that our system is fair, inclusive, transparent and accessible.
I commend the Government for taking action to prevent overseas money influencing our politics, but the influence wielded by domestic mega-donors also threatens our political system. It is a challenge to democracy and corrupts our politics. I welcome the letter from the Housing Secretary and the First Secretary of State to the Electoral Commission asking for an immediate review of political spending caps. This is very urgent. I therefore ask my noble friend whether the Government commit to a timeline for announcing and legislating further measures to cap donations.
As well as deciding what electoral law should be, we must consider stronger penalties for breaches of the law, including confiscation of the entire donation and a substantial fine. It would be good to have the views of my noble friend the Minister.
One important aspect of electoral funding was not properly addressed by Rycroft and is absent from the legislation. The use of think tanks funded by unknown sources and foreign money to influence our politics should concern us all, as it does the Liberal Democrats. Does the Minister agree that think tanks, like charities or political parties, should be required to report and publish information on their donations?
I fervently believe that further work on reforming our electoral law system is crucial and must take place before the election. The Government must review electoral law swiftly and carefully to ensure that it is fit for purpose at every level and then urgently bring forward further legislation. I suggest that perhaps they could do this in the next Session of Parliament to close loopholes, address new issues that have arisen and ensure that our elections are free from undue influence.
I am delighted that the Bill will lower the voting age, but this must be accompanied by education to install political, digital and media literacy. We need this education as soon as the Bill is enacted to ensure that our young people have the information and confidence to participate in the next elections.
I welcome the Bill’s provision to remove the requirement of home addresses to be published on the notice of election agents, and recent changes for candidates to opt out of publishing their home addresses on ballot papers. However, home addresses should be kept private by default. Women candidates are more likely to withhold their addresses than men, which can impact on their ability to prove a local connection. A change to prevent the publication of a candidate’s home address and instead replace geographical location with the constituency, district or ward would put all candidates on an equal footing and ensure both transparency and safety.
As the Electoral Commission’s recent report states, the rising abuse and intimidation of electoral candidates is changing politics. This must not be normalised and requires a change of culture. This Bill is an opportunity to change the culture, so I urge the Minister to take forward five further issues that were not voted on in the Commons: strengthen requirements for running for office by including domestic abuse in the list of offences and disqualification orders, as in Apsana Begum MP’s amendments, which received cross-party support; embed a code of conduct for political campaigning, building on the recommendation from the Speaker’s Conference and the ongoing work of the Electoral Commission, which is engaging parties to create a code; require the Electoral Commission to disseminate candidate safety resources; introduce an elections code of practice for social media platforms; and include an elections advertising code of practice. Claims in non-broadcast election advertising, including social media and targeted digital ads, are currently exempt from the code overseen by the Advertising Standards Authority. Thus, no independent body is responsible for assessing whether factual claims in electoral advertising are accurate. We need to close that gap to ensure fair and factual, robust debate and political expression.
Finally, I will be moving an amendment on compulsory voting, which I believe is a proven method of increasing voter turnout at elections, ensuring that citizens use their vote to influence the shape of our country and empowering them to bring about change.
I end by thanking many organisations for the excellent briefing they have provided, including the Women’s Democracy Group coalition.
Baroness May of Maidenhead (Con)
My Lords, I first add my best wishes to the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Lichfield on his retirement and thank him for the contributions that he has made to this House. It has been said by other speakers, including the right reverend Prelate, that this is an important piece of legislation if we are to restore trust in our democracy, and there are aspects of it with which I agree with the Government. I must confess that I do not agree with the Government on their proposals to extend the franchise to 16 and 17 year-olds. I will say merely this. I think this was introduced with political motivations, but I will just say gently to the Government that I suspect that it may very well backfire on them.
I also welcome any attempts to tighten up the rules on electronic campaigning material, but I just say this to the Government: I fear this is an area where it is going to be difficult for legislation to keep up with developments. I worry about the ability to use AI-generated material, which can put words into the mouths of any candidate, or indeed anybody involved with a political party or an election, which are untrue and have never been said by them. Keeping up with the developments of AI in this field is going to be difficult, and I ask the Government to make sure that they continue to keep a watchful eye on this particular area.
The one aspect of this Bill on which I particularly wanted to comment and to support the Government’s moves is on the use of crypto assets. The Bill describes a crypto asset as
“a cryptographically secured digital representation of value or contractual rights that uses a form of distributed ledger technology and can be transferred, stored or traded electronically”.
I prefer the Bank of England’s statement in its primer on crypto assets:
“A way of storing value electronically outside of centralised systems and away from regulators”.
The Bank of England goes on to say:
“Development is under way to make cryptocurrencies easier to use, but for now they can’t really be considered a legitimate form of money”.
I have to say that I am generally a sceptic about crypto assets and cryptocurrencies, beyond even the aspects in relation to this piece of legislation. I first came across them as Home Secretary when they were the “currency of choice” for criminal gangs. They are a currency of choice for hostile state actors as well as those organised crime gangs. It is absolutely right that the Government are moving to find ways to ensure that crypto assets cannot be used as donations to political parties. But I would simply say this to the Government: I have seen the briefing from the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Anti-Corruption and Responsible Tax, which points out that there are loopholes in what the Government are doing here in this piece of legislation. Crypto assets are banned for donations to political parties but not to candidates. There is not a sufficient attempt to look at how exchanges can be used to turn those crypto assets, supposedly legally, into donations.
I think there is more that the Government should be doing, and I would urge the Government to look at this in particular. Crypto assets are used by people who want to avoid anybody knowing what they are doing, and in terms of our democracy and donations to political parties or candidates, we actually want the transparency of knowing who is making those donations. It is crypto assets in their various forms that will enable people who we do not want to see affecting our politics and affecting our democracies, who do so with evil intent and with intent of foreign interference. I welcome the fact that the Government are acting; I simply ask them to do more.
Baroness Hodge of Barking (Lab)
My Lords, I think Parliament is at its best when we can get up on both sides of the House and say we agree. In that context, we make much better laws. I welcome many measures in the Bill, and my thanks go to Philip Rycroft for his excellent report on countering foreign financial influence and interference in UK politics. I am grateful to the Government for the changes already made that reflect many of his recommendations, such as the proposals to ban crypto asset donations; the call for company donations to be assessed against profits, not revenue; and the proposal to cap foreign donations at £100,000. Similarly, strengthening the Electoral Commission’s powers, improving “know your donor” checks and introducing slightly tougher enforcement are welcome changes.
Our Prime Minister said that the Bill should be seen as the start, not the end, of his ambition. In that spirit, I wish to raise concerns on which I ask the Government to urgently reflect as we consider the Bill—first, the unprecedented announcement that two crypto billionaires donated an astonishing £72 million to one political party in 24 hours. The amount is staggering, but the fact that it happened at all brings into stark focus the frightening threat to the integrity and health of our democracy presented by the growing trend that sees our politics funded by huge donations from a wealthy small elite. Anybody who believes that the donations were made simply to establish a level playing field is frankly both naive and wrong.
The truth is that large individual donations will at best influence and at worst control the policies and actions of political parties. Look at Reform with Farage’s statements on crypto, saying we should unquestionably embrace it, pledging to cut taxes for crypto traders and promising to lift the cap on the ownership of stablecoins. Look at Nathan Gill accepting bribes and then delivering speeches and interviews in support of Russia.
It is not just Reform. Under the Conservatives, large donations bought access to the Prime Minister, meetings with Ministers and even a tennis match with Boris Johnson. My own party also stands accused of undue influence by the trade union barons in our policies and actions. Hovering in the wings is Elon Musk, talking of investing £100 million in UK politics, who might well try to donate to the populist, extreme-right Restore party.
We must not allow money to capture and dictate our politics. We must act now. The Reform donations have created urgency. We cannot allow our democratic politics to be infected by the corrosive influence of money, with rich individuals often donating to secure public policies that bring them private profit. The Government should bring forward amendments to cap donations from individuals, cap the annual campaigning expenditure of parties and bring down the cap on what parties can spend during the election campaign.
Channel 4’s exposure alleged that Reform would be prepared to circumvent the law and accept donations from a foreign donor. Regrettably, other parties are guilty of similar behaviour. During the 2024 election, the Conservative Party sought a donation from Mohamed Amersi, a man exposed in the Pandora papers and by “Panorama”, and who invented the term “access capitalism.”
A journalist got hold of the email exchanges between Amersi and the Conservatives. I have those emails. They contain a plea from the then treasurer, the noble Lord, Lord Leigh, for a donation—an email from a party official saying that because Amersi had not been on the electoral register for long, “We cannot accept a donation from yourself … the donation must come from Nadia’s account”. Nadia is Amersi’s girlfriend. The email continues, “We are incredibly grateful for this magnificent pledge of support.”
I also have a copy of the SWIFT notification confirming the transfer of £200,000 from Amersi’s Swiss bank account to the Tories and an email from the noble Lord, Lord Leigh, to Amersi, not his girlfriend, saying, “Thank you, Mohamed”—the Conservatives evading the law to accept a donation from a foreign donor. Shockingly, when I took the evidence to the police, they refused to act.
Loopholes such as that must be closed. Political parties must not be able to use think tanks to evade campaign spending controls. “Know your donor” provisions must be strengthened. Enforcement must be toughened, with harsher sentences and a more appropriate threshold for charging. We must clean up our politics and bring to a halt the growing, corrosive and dangerous influence of money in our precious democracy.
Lord Patten (Con)
My Lords, I do not intend to enter into the rather heated waters of what, if anything, should be done about the allegedly huge sums of money put into our electoral process by individual donors or, indeed, by trade unions. I wish, rather, to concentrate on the sometimes tiny numbers who go to vote, which is another very big issue that demands our attention in the context of the Bill. I have four points to make.
First, I fully support my noble friend Lady O’Neill of Bexley in what she said in opening the debate from this side of the House. It would be otiose to repeat her words, but I greatly enjoyed her sweep of history, back to the Great Reform Act, proving that on every single occasion when anyone in the Palace of Westminster has changed the voting system, the Conservatives always come out best. I hope that this will always continue, and I suspect it will do this time round.
Secondly, I deeply regret the often very small numbers of those already in the UK aged 18 who bother to vote, and I equally regret that the Bill does little to improve the picture—unless the Minister can draw something to my attention to prove that is not the case. After all, not so long ago in this country, brave women and men were prepared to die for the right to vote—a right still denied in many parts of the globe. It seems to me so peculiar that turnout in the 2024 general election was below even that of 2019: just 35% of the vote. Yet people who cannot be bothered to vote can always manage to moan a lot about their lot, and that seems to continue.
Thirdly, I note that the excellent, independent and always accurate Electoral Commission reports a feeling—it is its job to do this—that everyone entitled should be automatically registered to vote. That demands deep interrogation, and it may well be something we need to see. On the other hand, I am equally strongly against compulsory voting, believing in freedom of choice in our free society every time.
Fourthly, it is interesting to see that compulsion is already used in voting in free societies like Australia. The voting age there is already firmly 18. It has been for a while, and you have to vote. That is prefaced by two years from age 16 which help to develop awareness and interest in the political things to come—a sort of democratic apprenticeship. I am very much in favour of looking at what the Australians have done, and done well. Their solution feels about right, as young people move at about 18 into earning and taxpaying in this mobile frontier between age limits that the Labour Party has introduced. I am not in favour of starting registration here at 14. It seems rather pointless. There is no evidence adduced to suggest that this will persuade younger people to vote further on down the electoral line. From all the UK turnout facts I have described, it seems highly unlikely.
I favour a close look at the Australian model in many ways, although not perhaps in its boisterous parliamentary language, its hard-hitting personal attacks and its enjoyable bouts of fisticuffs. I do not think we want to see this in our Chamber or in the other place, where demure behaviour is generally favoured. Australia is a highly valued strategic and economic partner in the Anglosphere. It strongly supports the royal role in the Commonwealth, and I hope Australian representatives will get the chance to have discussions with our representatives in the margins of the forthcoming Heads of Government meeting in Antigua.
Lord Rennard (LD)
My Lords, the current controversy over massive donations from crypto billionaires to the limited company known as Reform is a disaster that has been waiting to happen and a danger to democracy. In 2000 the then Labour Government sought to end the party-spending arms race that had been giving an unfair financial advantage to the Conservative Party. They introduced a spending cap of £20 million for political parties in the 12 months before a general election, but there was no cap on the size of donations and no cap on spending for all the years in between general elections. The cap of £20 million was higher than it needed to be and it was a mistake to allow the Secretary of State to increase it without any form of parliamentary approval.
The Conservatives increased this limit from £20 million to £36 million without consultation just before the last general election. This allowed them to receive £20 million in donations from a single source—Frank Hester. During the passage of the legislation in 2000, I moved amendments providing for a maximum cap of £50,000 on the size of donations from any source to political parties. That would be around £110,000 in today’s money. I also warned then that the legislation would backfire, just as it has done, by introducing the concept of national spending which could be targeted at individual constituencies. This destroyed the concept of a level playing field in constituency campaigning that had applied since Gladstone’s Government introduced the Corrupt and Illegal Practices Prevention Act 1883. We have gone back 150 years. This Bill must be amended to put that right.
It is difficult to make rules apply retrospectively even if actions are taken to subvert the purpose of the legislation, but we can look at the total limits of what can be spent by parties and prevent the targeting of national spending at specific seats. This weekend’s £72 million of donations to Reform could legally be spent in 72 target constituencies over two years, providing for £1 million of national spending in each of them. MPs should take careful note of that; I am not sure that they are aware. In relation to donation caps, they are supporting the proposal for a cap of £100,000 on donations from overseas electors, but the logic of such a cap is that it should also be applied to UK-based electors.
I support allowing young people to vote at the first election after their 16th birthday. That is not surprising, because by the time I was 16 I was the secretary of the Liverpool Wavertree Constituency Liberal Association. I have never suggested that the first thing a 16 year-old will wish to do after opening their birthday cards is to rush down to a polling station and cast a vote, but I know from many political discussions with young people that many sixth-formers are well informed, very interested and as qualified to have a say in the future of their country as many older people. However, we need to do much more to register young people. Processes of automatic voter registration can cut costs and are clearly necessary to include more of the 6 million to 8 million people missing or incorrectly registered.
The Bill brings forward by three days the deadline to apply for a postal vote. Many people do not apply for one until they know the date of the election, so the timetable for the conduct of a general election must also be extended by three days. We also need to do more to assist overseas voters. At present, the time it takes if they vote by post effectively disenfranchises most of them, including members of our Armed Forces serving overseas. We cannot say that their rights as UK citizens are respected when we do not will the means for them to vote.
Lord Wills (Lab)
My Lords, I declare an interest as an unpaid member of the Transparency International advisory council.
There is much that is good about this Bill. We have seen welcome measures strengthening the Electoral Commission and electoral law and improving voter registration processes. However, I shall focus my remarks, as many previous speakers have done, on where the Bill needs to go significantly further: the issue of capping political donations. The recent news about the unprecedentedly large donations to the Reform party has catapulted this into the headlines, but I hope noble Lords will not interpret my remarks as being driven by that; my speech had already been written before that news broke, and what I am about to say should not be interpreted as referring directly to those donations. This is a matter of fundamental principle about our democracy.
Individual wealth and malign state interests have been poisoning our politics for years now, and increasingly in ways that have never been seen before: the firehosing of falsehoods on social media, apparently respectable think tanks purporting to present objective analysis of public policy while actually promoting the special interests that fund them, and toxic networks of lobbyists. Capping political donations is only a start to tackling these challenges to our democracy, but we have to start somewhere and this Bill offers us an opportunity to do so.
Large political donations and the challenges they pose to the health of our democracy have been evident for many years. Research by Transparency International has found that one in 10 political donations originates from an unknown or dubious source, and these risks are exacerbated by the absence of a cap on political donations. In 2015, only 1% of private political donations from individuals and companies were of £1 million or more. By 2024, that was over a third, at 35%.
Significant donors get access to Ministers, including Prime Ministers, to shadow Ministers and to party officials. They buy influence in ways that are denied to the overwhelming majority of voters in this country. This is not how a healthy democracy functions. As a result, the absence of a cap can only feed popular disenchantment with our democracy. This Bill offers a rare opportunity to do something about it and the Government will be judged by how and whether they seize it.
The Government appear to recognise the problem. In the other place, the Minister said that the Government were determined to tackle the UK-based issue of mega-donors in UK politics. She announced that they will be
“working at pace to find a solution without unintended consequences”
and undertook that
“once those solutions have been found, we will want them in force as soon as possible”.—[Official Report, Commons, 2/9/26; col. 340.]
As the Bill progresses through your Lordships’ House, I intend to press the Minister to give more specific commitments on what exactly “working at pace” means: in other words, the timescale and deadline for the work and what exactly its remit will be. In the absence of such an explicit commitment, which I hope might be forthcoming at the end of this debate, I will submit amendments seeking to achieve it.
A donation cap is not demanding in policy terms. Other comparable democracies impose them. Canada caps donations to political parties at 1,750 Canadian dollars annually; France caps them at €7,500 annually, or €4,500 for presidential campaigns; and Italy’s cap is €100,000 per person or company annually. The introduction of a donation cap has been recommended by various authorities for many years. The independent Hayden Phillips review, the former Committee on Standards in Public Life and anti-corruption experts have all recommended it, and a cap is supported by a majority of voters across the political spectrum.
There is no good argument against such a cap. There is no reason, for example, why it should require additional public funding for parties, as is sometimes alleged. Transparency International has modelled the potential impact of donation caps on party-political finances to demonstrate how a donation cap of, for example, £50,000 a year would significantly reduce the risk of the mega-rich buying political access and influence while allowing political parties to campaign effectively without any need for additional public funds. Nor would a cap on donations mean breaking the historic link between the Labour Party and the trade unions, as their political donations could be treated as bundled contributions from members. If the Minister believes that a cap on donations would mean either public funding for political parties or breaking that historic link between the Labour Party and the trade unions, I would be grateful if she could explain why.
In conclusion, I hope the Minister will be able to reassure your Lordships’ House that the Government will use this rare opportunity to do significantly more than they have already undertaken to do to clean up the malign influence of money on our democracy.
Lord Brady of Altrincham (Con)
My Lords, my noble friend Lady May of Maidenhead spoke about the dangers of crypto assets hiding the identity of people making donations to political parties. It is a very important point and it does beg a question that I hope the Minister can answer later and perhaps bring more clarity to in Committee: at what point do non-crypto assets that are derived from crypto assets become acceptable and where will the legislation bite in that regard? I do not have any clear idea of that now and I hope we will gain some clarity later on.
The only other point I will make about the funding of political parties in relation to the Bill is to raise a concern about the application of retrospective restrictions. I echo my noble friend Lady O’Neill in my concern about this: especially, as she said, if it might be seen to be targeting a particular political party—and especially, I might add, a particular political party that enjoys building a narrative of victimhood and wanting to suggest that the establishment is constantly out to get it. There is a serious danger in that approach.
I want to register my strong opposition to the extension of the vote to certain children: 16 and 17 year-olds. My noble friend earlier made the point that there is no demand, and participation is already very low among 18 to 25 year-olds; I think it is about 20% lower than in the population as a whole. It is not as though people at these very young ages are clamouring to be given the vote.
My concern, though, is about the growing inconsistency in our approach as a country and in the Government’s approach to ages of majority. At what point are people considered to be adult citizens able to make their own decisions and choices in life? We already think that 16 and 17 year-olds are too young to be allowed to decide that they want to leave school. They are too young to be allowed to serve in our Armed Forces. Perhaps the most egregious inconsistency of all came in the Tobacco and Vapes Act that we recently passed, where we even moved to the point of raising the age at which people are allowed to buy tobacco by a year every year, which is a wholly novel approach to these matters. Smoking tobacco now with the restrictions already in place is harmful mostly to the smoker; voting can damage the interests of everyone.
The choice of a voting age is necessarily arbitrary, but I would argue strongly that it should be consistent. Wherever we fix the age, it should be that point where people are considered able to exercise their own judgment. There are many different points where you could fix the age. We know that the human brain is not fully developed until about the age of 25, so maybe that would be a sensible place to do it, but I suppose it would be a very significant reduction in the existing franchise. The age of 18 has been accepted for a long time. It is a reasonable compromise, and it is a point where people are likely to be able to exercise their judgment as necessary.
I fully accept the point from the noble Lord, Lord Rennard. Many of us were quite politically engaged at the age of 16—I suspect that we were slightly odd—but it is a minority of people of the age of 16 or 17 who are that politically engaged, that interested and that keen to exercise their democratic franchise. I think it is a big mistake to go down that route. We should look again to establish a single point where we consider a citizen as an adult able to make their own choices and decide their own future. At the moment, we seem to be diverging in all sorts of directions on this issue. I do not think it serves well to assault the very concept of an adult citizen.
Lord Macintosh of Eastwood (Lab) (Maiden Speech)
I thank the Lord Speaker and Members across the Chamber for the warmth and generosity of their welcome. Only today, the Electoral Commission published a warning about the increasing levels of hostility and violence in our politics, and the contrast of the civility, reasonableness and friendship that all sides have offered me has been a real tonic. I thank all Members for that and for reminding me of the importance of practising, as well as protecting, our democratic values.
It gives me great pleasure to make my first contribution in this debate on the Representation of the People Bill. Before I do, I hope Members will allow me to say a few words of thanks, beginning with to the Clerk of the Parliaments, her staff, Black Rod and his team. I have been here only a few days, and already I have been rescued from marching the fellow newbie, the noble Lord, Lord Singh, into the wrong committee room; I have been steered politely out of the Palace kitchens, and I was gently prevented from walking into the Commons during a Division, so I will be very grateful if that level of support continues.
I particularly thank my two supporters, the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, and the noble Baroness, Lady MacLeod of Camusdarach. I have not taken a similarly Gaelic placename, but it is a great pleasure when I am occasionally referred to as a Sgitheanach—someone from the Isle of Skye. My family on my father’s side come from Skye, and I am very proud of them and that my roots are in the Highlands and Islands. I should add that my politics mostly come from my mother, who, at 90, is as sharp, principled and, dare I say it, left wing as ever. When I broke the news of my appointment to the House of Lords, I think she was genuinely torn between her motherly pride and her embarrassment that her son would take a title. She does not regard me so much as red Ken as perhaps ochre or salmon pink.
Without turning this into an Oscar acceptance speech, I also thank my wife, Claire. I am sure Members who have the valuable support of a partner will know how much it matters and how little you achieve without it. I thank her and my children and wider family for keeping my feet on the ground. Claire and I first met when I was still working for the BBC—an organisation whose future is uncertain and to which I hope we will come back at some point. I went on to be elected to the Scottish Parliament in 1999 and was fortunate enough to serve there for 22 years, so Members will not be surprised to hear how much weight I put on the importance of parliamentary democracy and standing up for the rights of the people we serve. The Bill before us introduces a number of reforms that I believe will strengthen those democratic rights.
From my own experience, I want to reflect on just one proposal around which I have already heard expressions of unease. Those Members familiar with the Scottish Parliament will know that we introduced votes for 16 year-olds some 10 years ago. Then, as now, we were concerned about falling participation rates among our young people, and I for one hoped that such a move would encourage young people to exercise their democratic rights. The evidence collected since then would suggest that that is exactly what happened. One University of Edinburgh study, for example, showed that voter turnout among young people who first vote at the ages of 16 and 17 is greater than among those who were not offered that opportunity. Further studies that look internationally confirm that finding and suggest that the fear that young people will, for example, be drawn to populism or electoral stupidity is not borne out—in fact, quite the reverse. What happens is that young people who use their votes at the ages of 16 and 17 have greater confidence that their vote will make a difference and shape their future and our society. So it is very much to be encouraged and is an important aspect of the Bill.
I believe that the Bill will make a huge difference to our country, but, in an increasingly hostile world, what matters is what we do with our democratic rights: the houses that we build, the social care that we transform and the economic opportunities that we offer our young people. What matters today, though, is that we demonstrate that electoral reform and using your democratic mandate does make a difference—that we do not believe in the strongman approach to politics, countering aggression with aggression, or that money can buy you power. We need to show that understanding and empathy are what works, and that collaboration and co-operation make a difference. I believe the Bill will do exactly that. I am hugely encouraged by the attitude of your Lordships across this House, which shows that we can practise politics with kindness and compassion too.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, it is a great privilege and a real pleasure to be the first to congratulate my noble friend on his powerful, eloquent and witty speech. I should not be surprised, however. I have known him for decades. I kent his faither, as we say in Scotland. His father was a very distinguished rector of the Royal High School, as well as a great Gaelic expert, and his mother, who was here when he was introduced—I had the great privilege of discussing with her politics—is a wonderful lady. She was also a head teacher of one of our schools in Edinburgh. He comes from that great background.
My noble friend’s own experience qualifies him well to be a Member of this House. He was a very distinguished Member of the Scottish Parliament and he was a great Presiding Officer—that is Speaker for those who do not exactly understand our system. He was very good at it. I think, not just from what we have heard today but from what I know of his past, that he will speak again on many occasions and contribute greatly on the Floor of this House. I think he will contribute to this House in many other ways, and we look forward very much to every part of his contribution. I thank him very much.
And now to the Bill. We have been talking a lot about these two crypto billionaires and their donations. I do not want to go into that, but this is not new: we have been worried about the huge amount of money coming into our political system from outside the United Kingdom for some time, in particular from the United States and in particular to people, policies and parties on the far right. We must be very careful. It is not new.
That is why I endorse everything that was said by my noble friend Lady Royall, the noble Lords, Lord Wallace and Lord Wills, and others. We need to impose limits, not just on overseas donations but on domestic donations, and not just to political parties but, as the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, said, to think tanks, which have a subtle but insidious influence.
I hope that, in the Minister’s reply, she will acknowledge that a lot of views have been expressed by a lot of Members of this House on all sides and say that she will discuss this with her colleagues and see whether we can bring forward legislation faster and more strongly to deal with the way money is being funnelled in and to prosecute vigorously where this is carried out improperly.
That brings me to one or two other provisions of this Bill. I am strongly in favour of automatic voter registration. I listened carefully to the opposition spokesperson and others, and I can find no reasonable arguments for not having automatic voter registration. We want to encourage as many people to vote as possible, and that would certainly help. I am also in favour of votes at 16. As my noble friend Lord Macintosh pointed out, we have had it in Scotland for 10 years now. When we first introduced it, I went to talk to the 16 and 17 year-old pupils at Portobello High School. They understood the political issues better than most of the adults that I have spoken to about them. In fact, as my noble friend said, there was a 75% turnout in the referendum among people of that generation, compared with a much lower percentage of older people.
I am in favour of compulsory voting. The noble Lord, Lord Patten, spoke about Australia. Australia, Belgium and a number of countries in South America have it and the huge increase in participation from compulsory voting is astonishing. For those who do not like any of the candidates, we could put in the option, as they do in Nevada and one or two other places, “None of the above”. If voters do not like any of the candidates, they can choose that.
Finally, I say to the Liberal Democrats in particular, be very wary about changing the voting system. I know they keep going on about proportional representation, but look at some of the examples. Look at what happened in Scotland with the voting system we had there. It is so perverse. I got elected by mistake. I had to serve four years in the Scottish Parliament because I put my name on the list, having been told I would never get elected—and I got elected. I did not have a speech; I did not have any meetings; I did not put out any leaflets—and I got elected. Then a Green MSP got elected on this list, and they have not had any surgeries during the whole four-year period. So, be very careful before you change the voting system, and understand exactly what is going to happen.
I support this Bill, and I would go further. I say this to the Minister: there are a lot of people on this side—and indeed on other sides as well—who would prefer the Government to go even further and faster.
Baroness Foster of Aghadrumsee (Non-Afl)
My Lords, it is always a great pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes. I join him in congratulating the noble Lord, Lord Macintosh, on his maiden speech. I thank him for the research he put into it and, indeed, the way in which it was delivered.
I too want to welcome this important legislation, with some caveats. I do not support lowering the age of voting to 16 for various reasons, not least that I am not so old that I do not remember what I was like when I was 16. But I have to accept that it will become a reality because it is a commitment in the last Labour manifesto. However, I associate myself with the comments of the noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill, and the noble Lord, Lord Brady, on the inconsistency around the age of a child. When is a child not a child? When it comes to voting, apparently.
In the short time available to me, I want to focus on those elements I agree with and those that I feel need to be augmented. I welcome the elements of this Bill that deal with the Northern Ireland canvass. The current regime requires a register to be recreated from scratch every 10 years and specifies that electors must re-register as part of that canvass to remain on the register. Those who do not respond to the canvass—sometimes for entirely understandable reasons— are removed from the register, despite the fact that the chief electoral officer holds data to show that they remain eligible. Therefore, significant numbers can be lost on the register for no good reason. The changes in this Bill allow the Chief Electoral Officer for Northern Ireland to retain those electors if they are satisfied that they are still resident. That protects the integrity of the register and brings Northern Ireland into closer alignment with Great Britain.
There are also changes on late registration, which I know, as a former elected MLA, is a very frustrating process because it is often a case of “computer says no” and people are left without a vote for no obvious reason. I welcome those changes as well. I understand the reasons behind the strictness—some political parties were very adept at registering 16 people at one address for voting—but the measures that were introduced also hit genuine voters who, for myriad reasons, were registering late, having moved house, for example.
The Bill also amends requirements that were very onerous. For example, the chief electoral officer will ask for additional supporting documentation only if routine data checks do not provide a clear identity match and a clear address. I welcome the change to electoral ID cards in Northern Ireland, but I am concerned about the widening of IDs accepted at polling stations in Great Britain. I am worried that the use of bank cards for ID purposes will lead to abuse. No doubt we will discuss this in Committee. I know it does not apply to Northern Ireland—and I am very relieved it does not.
I very much welcome the development regarding calling out electors’ names at polling stations. I agree with the Government that this is an unnecessary practice, and I am glad we are moving into line with the rest of the UK. It will also be a great relief to those in Northern Ireland with embarrassing second names that used to reverberate around the polling station.
I also join the Government in condemning the harassment and intimidation of candidates, and in removing the requirement for candidates to publish their home address. I welcome any move which supports wider participation in our political process. I well remember that when I approached various talented and intelligent women in Northern Ireland to run for office, they would say to me, “But I couldn’t put up with the amount of abuse you have to endure”. It is incumbent on those of us who have been involved in political elections to enable those who come after us to do the same.
Finally, I want to say a few words about foreign interference in our democratic system, after the weekend we have had. We had attempted interference by the leader of the United States, trying to override the wishes of the people of Northern Ireland and our self-determination, which is protected by domestic and international law.
There are many ways in which malign influences can come to bear—we saw an effort at the weekend, which, to be fair, had limited impact—including in the form of channelling money through different mechanisms. For years, Sinn Féin has used the United States as a place they can go to raise money to distort politics in my part of the United Kingdom. That should be of concern to everybody in this Chamber. The money comes through Friends of Sinn Féin, and it is used to advocate for the destruction of the United Kingdom. I hope to put down an amendment to deal with that issue in Committee.
Baroness Goudie (Lab)
My Lords, I welcome the Representation of the People Bill and the Government’s determination to protect British democracy from any foreign or illicit interference. I support the Bill’s ambition to extend the vote to 16 and 17-year-olds, having joined the Wembley South Young Socialists when I was 17. I particularly support the modification of the voter registration system so that eligible citizens are not left off the electoral register due to mere administrative oversight.
Alongside strengthening the Electoral Commission’s enforcement powers, these measures will make our elections much more secure and inclusive. I particularly welcome the provisions on political donations. The cap of £100,000 a year on donations from overseas electors, and the moratorium on donations via crypto assets—of which I have very few, yet I worry about this all the time—are vital and respond directly to risks identified by the Rycroft review. I welcome all the points made in the review. These tackle the practical difficulties of tracing true ownership of crypto assets, donations and the routes through which foreign money might otherwise reach our political system and influence our country, without proper scrutiny.
There is also the issue of tighter scrutiny of company donations. Company donations should go to the board regardless of the size of the company. They should be agreed by the board, and the chair of the risk committee should also be involved. We should look in particular at global boards to see whether the money is coming from Britain PLC or from other countries. We need much tighter scrutiny of company donations.
I turn to think tanks and campaigning organisations, both of which I have been involved in over the years. Think tanks which seek to influence and develop public policy and campaign for changes in the law should be required to record and publish the amount and source of all the donations received, on the same basis as political parties. This is vital because, as I know, money comes in to think tanks from various sources. We are always grateful to those individual donors and foundation donors, but at the same time we have to be much tougher on that. Single-source donations of more than £11,180 per calendar year to a think tank should be reported to the Electoral Commission, and that information would then be published on the website.
We also need to look more clearly at campaigning organisations, in which all of us in this Chamber have worked and will continue to work. You are not necessarily required to show your accounts or where your funding comes from; you are just running a short campaign, you say—but where do the funds come from to keep us all working? Even if you do not employ anybody, where do the funds come from for the telephones, the media and so on? We need to look at campaigning organisations as well.
This is one aspect of electoral funding ultimately left unaddressed by Rycroft and by this legislation. The use of think tanks funded, as I have said, by unknown sources and foreign money to influence our politics should concern us all. Does the Minister agree that think tanks and charities, like political parties, should be required to report and publish information on their donations? I would add campaigning organisations to that.
The provisions making hostility towards candidates and election staff an aggravating factor in sentencing are particularly welcome. Women in public life continue to face disproportionate abuse and intimidation online and in person, which deters many talented women from standing at all. Any strengthening of protection here is strengthening our democracy. This is vital. Also, why are people scared of women? I really find this terrible and I hope that one day we will find out what their fear of us really is about.
Lord Carter of Haslemere (CB)
My Lords, I declare an interest: I have been advising the charity Spotlight on Corruption on these issues. This is a good Bill, in my view, and the Government deserve credit for it, but as ever the question is whether it goes far enough. The noble Lord, Lord Macintosh, in an excellent maiden speech, said that money cannot buy you power but the question in my mind is whether there is a risk that, actually, currently it can. A central objective of the Bill, therefore, must be protecting the integrity of our electoral system against wealthy individuals, whether here or abroad, donating vast sums to a political party and giving it a game-changing advantage during elections. It is a particular problem in the case of illicit foreign money. Electoral success should not be significantly determined by financial power, since that diminishes our democracy and enables a handful of individuals to subvert political discourse and policy-making.
In the case of money from abroad, the Government have proposed a cap on donations from overseas donors because they recognise, in their words,
“the inherent complexity in tracing the true source of political donations made by overseas electors due to the very nature of their overseas residence”.
Yet they are doing nothing to mitigate the risks of money from impermissible donors abroad—that is, people abroad who are not electors but who make ostensibly legitimate donations via permissible donors in the United Kingdom; in other words, they are dealing with only one part of the foreign money problem, and not the main one at that. Although it is currently an offence to make a donation on behalf of an unlawful donor, such as a foreign national overseas, for the offence to apply, the money needs to be given to the donor with an agreement it will be donated. Crucially, without evidence of that agreement, it is not possible to prove that the donor was just a conduit and in breach of the law. There rarely is such evidence.
The Government will no doubt point to the commencement of Section 54A of the 2000 Act, which has never been commenced, as dealing with this problem. This will require donors to declare whether they have received money from another individual in connection with their donation, and parties will be prohibited from accepting any donation without such a declaration. But its wording is vague and too easy to circumvent in 2026. It prohibits money given to the UK donor
“with a view to, or otherwise in connection with, the making of the donation”.
However, the UK donor might have received the money from a person abroad who was not on the electoral roll and who purported to give it for a different purpose in circumstances where it was obvious to each of them, but no one else, that it was intended as a political donation.
The clearest way to address this loophole, as well as to mitigate the influence of wealthy donors based in the UK, is a wider donation cap than the one currently proposed only for overseas electors. This point has been made by several noble Lords, including the noble Lords, Lord Evans, Lord Rennard and Lord Wills. This proposal was the subject of at least eight amendments in the other place, none of which was accepted. The Government instead propose a cross-government task and finish group which would work at pace to look at this issue, but it is unclear how it could finish anything if it reports after this Bill has been enacted. Would it not be sensible to insert a wide enabling power in the Bill so that there is no need for more primary legislation to create a wider donation cap, if that is what the group recommends?
Finally, I would, in addition or alternatively, impose a tighter cap on campaign spending. After the 80% increase in the spending limit in 2023, both main parties increased their campaign spending by tens of millions. Set at the right level, spending limits promote fairness by preventing wealthier parties massively outspending others. I am encouraged by the Government’s letter of 29 August to the Electoral Commission, seeking its views on limiting the spend on campaigning, but why has the commission been given a July 2027 deadline? Surely it does not take that long to consider what lower level of spending is appropriate.
To conclude, election Bills do not come round often. The Government are addressing some issues in their Bill but not going far enough. They need to take this rare opportunity to finish the job, with a wider donation cap and spending limits, since these two measures combined would create a more level playing field and prevent the abuses currently taking place.
Lord Johnson of Lainston (Con)
I begin by congratulating the noble Lord, Lord Macintosh of Eastwood, on his excellent maiden speech. To reassure him, I continue to get lost after four years, and I think most Members of this House do. The doorkeepers in the other place are very keen to tell us where to go when we are in the wrong place at the wrong time.
I declare an interest: I spent far too much of my adult life raising money for the Conservative Party. I do a lot less of it now, so I do not think I am conflicted. I found I ran out of friends—people were crossing the road to avoid me when I asked them for cash. But when I look at the Bill, I am afraid I see very little to celebrate. At best, it is performative politics. At worst, I am afraid, and I say this with sensitivity for some of the excellent speeches we have heard from the Benches opposite, it is old-fashioned, grubby, party-political gerrymandering.
Giving 16 year-olds the vote is a fantastic idea but, as my noble friend Lady May said, this has been done, as far as I can see, for political reasons. After talking to my children, who will be given the vote for the first time, as people aged under 18, probably at the next election, I assure noble Lords that this will probably—almost certainly—backfire. As my noble friend said in her introduction, we won every election after the franchise was extended, and I am sure we will do the same again.
I am delighted that we are seeing a more rational approach to civil penalties when it comes to people trying to raise money through the local village tombola, or whatever it is. This is proportionate, and I congratulate the Electoral Commission on the work it has done there. However, in other areas, such as social media, I think we are being left far behind. Another of my noble friends rightly raised the issue that AI will allow videos to be created containing deepfakes which will confuse the electorate significantly. There is really nothing in the Bill to cover that.
There is a lot of complicated legislation being proposed around watermarks. As a politician who posts on social media, whether you like it or not—noble Lords are welcome to follow me @LordJohnson_—I know how complicated it can be. Will the Minister address this in a bit more detail? If I repost something, will I have to put a watermark on? Who will be responsible for putting their own watermark on? How will we make sure that we do not limit the free speech of individuals?
I do, however, draw attention and caution to the extra checks that are proposed, and what I think is quite a complex and overbearing regime when it comes to corporate and personal donations. The fact is that we are all very fearful, as treasurers of any political party, about raising money in an inappropriate fashion. It denigrates politics and it reduces the reputation of the Conservative Party if we get the wrong type of donor in the wrong way, and we go to great lengths to make sure that we follow the law. All these laws are already in place. I think that what this does, and I am worried that there is an ulterior motive, is make it harder for the Conservative Party and other parties to raise money legitimately from their existing traditional donor base. As has been raised many times in the debate already, trying to be too cute with electoral law, with party fundraising or other systems always backfires, and I am concerned that this talk about donor caps will add fuel to a potential future Government playing even more dirty politics with electoral reform. There must be a consensus that we should all do the right thing, and it behoves this Government to make sure that they do.
I am slightly surprised that no one has mentioned in enough detail the unions, because the biggest donor in British history is not some crypto billionaire living in Thailand, it is Unite the Union, which has, so far, since 2001, given £52 million to the Labour Party. It appears that the Government do not mind large donations; they just do not like large donations to insurgent parties that challenge their worldview.
Also, in the workers’ rights legislation, which I read with interest ahead of this debate, if you are a member of a union, you now have to opt out of giving to a political party; you used to have to opt in. But it is not as simple as that. You cannot opt out whenever you like—you can opt out only on 1 January. It is the most bizarre, byzantine system to ensure that people who are members of unions, in effect, must donate to the union. Do any noble Lords know how frequently the union must remind this kind donor that they are giving to the Labour Party? The Prime Minister’s first act was to complain about Netflix and other streaming media having to remind subscribers every six months. In this legislation, it is not one year; it is not five years; it is 10 years that the union has to remind the poor sucker that they are giving money to the Labour Party year after year. Will the Minister look at that, considering it is the Prime Minister’s most important priority?
My last point, which has been raised before, is that there is not enough about voter fraud. In fact, we are going to make it worse. We are switching photo ID for an old credit card. There is nothing on family voting. There is nothing on sectarian voting, which is a terrifying cancer in our democracy. There is nothing on the issue of Commonwealth voters in this country. When we talk about overseas voters, we should also address that. In my view, there is nothing to address the appalling violence that our candidates and representatives face. This violence culminated in the tragic bludgeoning to death of an 80 year-old woman over the summer, simply because she was a member of a legitimate political party. I hope the Government will answer those questions in their response.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)
My Lords, I want to make one rather simple point about the Bill: we should keep big money out of politics. Over the weekend, we learned of the formerly Thailand-based Christopher Harborne’s £36 million, plus another £36 million from the late-of-Hong Kong Ben Delo, a man convicted over AML but pardoned by Trump. That is £72 million, made abroad and donated to Reform, which makes its £5 million issue seem rather small fry. That money apparently was legal, but it was distasteful, because we have rich men, plus Fiona Cottrell, enabling one party to out-campaign all others—a couple of individuals owning a party.
More than that, even if—as people have called for—we cap the amount that UK residents can donate and even if we put checks on the source of such money, this would be near impossible to enforce in the case of expat voters who are not registered here for tax and may not have lived here for many years, decades even, or have any intention of returning. They pay no council tax or VAT. They do not use any of our services, walk down our streets or suffer one jot if our police services are cut, if the NHS is underfunded, if education is poor or if our rivers are polluted.
Taxation without representation caused a revolution, but we should now say: no representation without taxation. Even if my noble friend the Minister disagrees with that, I ask whether the Government have considered the challenge of trying to verify the bona fides of those living, for example, in China, Russia or some war-torn country. They might be absconders from our jails or simply on the run from justice. Overseas registered voters, and therefore permitted donors, could have another country’s citizenship, as I am sure George Blake had after he left the Scrubs. They could even sit in another country’s Parliament but still be able to channel serious money to a UK party. They could be employed by that host Government or even one of their agencies. They could be money launderers. They could be in prison. They could even be dead; we ask them to verify they are alive only every three years.
In this country, we ask for ID at voting stations, even though they are only a quarter of a mile from our house and the person voting is probably well known. But a voter abroad has no need to prove to anybody that they are alive and voting freely. As to the source of that donation: it might be their own, but how was it obtained, in a country that has no checks on such things? Or it could, of course, if it is not their own, be passed over from a friend, company, foreign Government or anyone else. I welcome very much what the noble Lord, Lord Carter, said about this. He is on the money there—wrong phrase.
Pretending that the British receiving party could undertake “know your donor” due diligence of overseas voters is as fanciful as thinking that money buys no favours. I am glad to say that Rycroft proposed a cap on overseas donations, which I think means he accepted the arguments I am making, but frankly, £100,000 a year is £1 million in a Parliament for a couple, and that does not hit the target. Anyway, why on earth should somebody with no skin in the game be allowed to advantage one of our political parties when no scrutiny by party, police or the press is realistically possible?
I hope the Minister will agree to look again at the proposed cap—half a million pounds per person per Parliament—and consider the amendments that I will table to restrict donations from those overseas to a limit of £10,000 a year, unless they are registered for tax here. Without such changes, donors in tax havens could bankroll political parties indefinitely; I doubt that is really what we want.
Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)
My Lords, this is a very wide-ranging Bill—almost too wide-ranging—but it has some sensible proposals on electoral administration. It also has a number of proposals for which, as other noble Lords have said, there will probably be unintended consequences, and we need to go into the detail.
I want to deal with what the Government themselves said: that the Bill is all about restoring trust in our democracy. There has never been a time, as we all know, when we need to restore trust in our democracy more. Until 2020, UK democracy was very stable and secure, in that it did not matter where you lived in the United Kingdom because everyone had an equal vote. But in January 2021, we had an assault on the core of universal suffrage. Before that date, it did not matter where you lived; everyone had the same basic democratic right to elect a fellow citizen to make all the laws to which they were subject, or to stand for election for themselves, in devolution to MLAs, or to MPs. But the imposition of the protocol/Windsor Framework meant that while UK citizens can still stand for election to make all the laws to which they are subject in England, Wales and Scotland, UK citizens in Northern Ireland have had their democratic rights truncated, such that 300 areas of law—not just 300 laws but 300 areas of law—are simply imposed on us by a foreign Administration.
In the context of the political union that is the United Kingdom, this is not just an attack on democracy in one part of the country but surely an attack on the integrity of democracy across the whole country. What is more important is that it has also constituted a very specific and insensitive attack on the Belfast/Good Friday agreement. That agreement was for the purpose of trying to persuade terrorists to give up the bomb for the ballot box, so special stress was placed in it on protecting democracy. Specifically, it contained the unique commitment that the people of Northern Ireland should have
“the right to pursue democratically national and political aspirations”.
Far from being upheld by the Windsor Framework, this has been subject to a full-frontal assault, in that the right to pursue democratically national and political aspirations in relation to all the laws to which they are subject was taken from them.
There has never been a better example of a Bill whose purpose is to restore democracy being in complete denial about the existential threat to democracy that the country faces. Rather than giving votes to 16 and 17 year-olds, the Government had the opportunity to restore the full value of the vote to all UK citizens. Yet the Bill does precisely nothing to put that right. This was an opportunity. Indeed, it makes things worse by introducing discrimination where it currently does not exist. At present, the law treats 16 and 17 year-olds the same way across the whole country—except, of course, in Scotland where 16 and 17 year-olds can vote.
However, going forward, the Bill is going to tell 16 and 17 year-olds in England, Wales and Scotland that they are worthy of the right to elect a fellow citizen to make all their laws, but it tells 16 and 17 year-olds in Northern Ireland that they are worthy only of the right to elect a fellow citizen to make some of the laws to which they are subject. They are to be denied the right that this Bill extends to their peers in GB. We are seeing this at the moment with the number of statutory instruments coming through this House. There is no consultation and no say on them, just a dictated imposition. Can noble Lords imagine if this was being done to Cornwall or Yorkshire?
It also creates the absurd situation that a 16 year-old in Great Britain who has never paid any tax or put their life on the line for their country will be afforded more rights when it comes to electing a fellow citizen than a Falklands or Gulf War veteran living in Northern Ireland who has paid tax all their life and put their life on the line for their country. That just cannot be right. This Bill was an opportunity to look at it. The Minister said it was really important that people had to believe that their vote mattered and could be counted. I am afraid that is not happening in Northern Ireland.
I will add one further thing that I know noble Lords will not like. We have gone on about and attacked Reform UK so much today, but if we really care about genuine democracy we should have Reform UK Lords in this place. It is a party that actually has a possibility of being in government—who knows—and there is not a single member of Reform UK in this place. I think that is wrong.
Baroness Leaman (LD)
My Lords, I add my congratulations to the noble Lord, Lord Macintosh of Eastwood, on his maiden speech, and I welcome him to his place. I also thank the Minister for opening this debate; I am glad to speak in support of the principles behind this Bill today.
This is a significant piece of legislation and, on the whole, a very welcome one. Extending the franchise to 16 and 17 year-olds is a long-held Liberal Democrat ambition, and I am pleased to see it finally becoming law. Modernising our creaking registration system, tightening the rules around political donations and strengthening protections against intimidation for candidates and campaigners are all reforms that these Benches have long called for. I also welcome the Government’s decision to give up their power to direct the Electoral Commission through a strategy and policy statement. It is a small clause but an important signal that the referee of our elections should remain independent of the players.
My own daughter is 13 years old. If this Parliament runs its full course, she will be old enough to vote at the next general election. I asked her what she made of the argument that she cannot be trusted with a ballot paper until she can be trusted with a beer. She said she had never needed a pint to form an opinion and does not see why anyone would think she would. More seriously, her enfranchisement brings home something I first learned working for Save the Children: how early young people grasp the stakes of decisions made or not made on their behalf. Giving 16 and 17 year-olds a vote is a recognition that young people already live with the consequences of what this Parliament decides, and it is right that they should have a say in it.
My principal purpose today is to speak about who gets to stand for office, not only who gets to vote. In the House of Commons, my honourable friend Zöe Franklin has argued tirelessly for the reinstatement of the access to elected office fund for England, and I want to put on the record my strong support for that work; I hope that this House will help finish what she has started. The facts are stark. Around a quarter of the population is disabled yet fewer than 1 in 50 MPs declare a disability, and local government is estimated to be around 700 councillors short of fair representation. A fund of exactly this kind existed in England until it was scrapped in 2020, and equivalent schemes continue to operate today in both Wales and Scotland. We are not being asked to invent something new; we are being asked to restore something that worked and that England alone among the UK nations now lacks.
In six years as chief of staff to Ed Davey, I met a great many people with real ability and commitment to public service who were held back from standing for elected office, not by lack of talent but by the practical costs of disability: transport, communication support and personal assistance, to name a few. Warm words about inclusion do not meet these costs; a statutory fund does. I hope the Minister will use this Bill to close that gap once and for all, rather than leaving disabled candidates to wait on a working group that has already run for well over a year now.
The scale of the barriers facing disabled candidates was underlined again this morning when the Electoral Commission published its review of May’s mayoral and local elections and found abuse of candidates rising sharply. Some 40% of those who stood reported harassment, intimidation or threats—up from 34% last year—while disabled candidates were hit hardest of all, with almost half reporting personal abuse. A third of all candidates said it made them consider not standing again. The barrier to standing is not only financial; a second, uglier obstacle sits behind it, falling disproportionately on the people an access to elected office fund would bring in.
It is also why bringing Section 106 of the Equality Act into force matters so much. At present we cannot say whether the people who put themselves forward for office reflect the country they seek to represent, less still whether that is improving. Requiring political parties to publish transparent, comparable data on the diversity of their candidates would let us see whether measures, including the ones in this Bill, are working. For today, I simply welcome this Bill and look forward to working with the Minister and colleagues across this place as the Bill moves through this House.
Lord Leigh of Hurley (Con)
My Lords, there is so much in this Bill to debate and take issue with, so it is a little disappointing to have so little time at Second Reading for each of us. But rest assured that the Bill needs and will receive detailed scrutiny from us all at later stages. Although it is not a disclosable interest, I remind the House that—unlike my noble friend Lord Johnson of Lainston, who seems to have escaped—I am still a senior treasurer of the Conservative Party.
It is a very disappointing Bill and, frankly, follows much of the direction of travel established in the Employment Rights Act, which itself interferes with the established system of politics in the UK. As my noble friend has said, the Act enabled trade unions to take money from their members in a way that would be considered completely unethical and breaches best consumer practices in terms of fundraising. Even more importantly, it allows unions not to publish the accounts of the political fund, so we do not know how their donations are made.
It is disappointing that in respect of this Bill there was no consultation after the general election, despite Labour Ministers promising this. They did have the grace to admit this in the Commons on 3 March 2025. This Government have clearly risked breaking long-standing convention that the Government of the day do not unilaterally impose measures directly affecting political parties. By contrast, the previous Conservative Government, and the previous Labour Government before that, consulted the Parliamentary Parties Panel for major parties—I am sorry if the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, was not a member, but that is recognised on the Electoral Commission website.
I will spend most of my time and my remarks focusing on donations. The noble Lord, Lord Wallace, forgot to mention Michael Brown; he did not make a donation because it was not permissible, but his company—5th Avenue Partners—did at £2.4 million, and the creditors are still waiting for a refund.
Lord Leigh of Hurley (Con)
In fine tradition.
Before I carry on talking about donations, I must address the remarks by the noble Baroness, Lady Hodge. It is disappointing that she did not have the courtesy to discuss with me in advance what she planned to say. If she had done so, I would have pointed out to her that both Mr Amersi and his partner have been on the electoral roll since 2017. She selectively quotes from emails that he must have given her, and it is disappointing that she chooses to rely on Mr Amersi, who has been extensively discussed in the other place. I categorically state that neither I nor any member of the Conservative Party canvassed funds from Mr Amersi in respect of the 2024 election. I look forward to those remarks being withdrawn in due course. Perhaps the noble Baroness would like to disclose fully to the House that my family helped finance her elections in Barking to defeat the BNP.
As it happens, most donations to parties are from individuals, but some companies do donate, and the rules proposed are simply not manageable by a regular volunteer treasurer of a local association. The pages and pages of risk assessment requirements—I do not know whether noble Lords have read them yet—are just not practical and are a classic example of red tape imposed on people wanting to help society by those who simply do not have the same experience. In particular, the real-time aggregation rules in respect of pre-donation checking will be impossible to put into effect. Too little thought has gone into this in the rush to produce 250 pages of legislation. These proposals have clearly been made by someone who has never actually been involved in local or national political fundraising and has not had the courtesy to talk to those who have.
Then there is the profit test for corporate donations; however well intentioned, it is a nonsense. It fails to understand that companies can be in a loss in accounting terms for very many years but can still be cash generative. If a company loses money for years and subsequently makes a one-off profit, it would seem not to be caught. So, what is the purpose of this? I remind the Minister that Ecotricity is one of Labour’s biggest donors. In 2023-24, the group made a loss of £5.6 million. In the same year, it gave £2.8 million to the Labour Party. One would hope the party does the decent thing and returns the money.
There are much better ways to achieve the objectives of the Bill, and we will be spending considerable time exploring them in later stages. Why are foreign-owned companies being denied the right to sponsor conferences and the like in the UK? They employ huge numbers of people in the UK and should not be denied the same rights as British companies to openly advertise and market.
I have not had time to remark on the plan to give children the vote. Yes, they are children, by any and every definition. Weirdly, if the party they vote for is successful, they are not allowed to go out celebrating in the pub with the rest of us, and Labour Ministers have refused to lower the drinking age to 16 on the grounds of “protecting children”. I thank the Minister for her letter to me seeking to answer my concerns that teachers will have undue influence on children, with whom they interact daily, at the time of elections. I note her points, but I do not see how this is going to be monitored. What guarantees are in place that no abuse will happen?
Lord Evans of Sealand (Lab)
My Lords, I strongly support the Bill and many of the powerful contributions noble Lords have made, which I do not propose to repeat, not least those of the noble Lord, Lord Macintosh. I look forward to his observations on the procedures of this House and how they compare with those of the Scottish Parliament. I am not going to repeat what has already been said, but will do something a little bit different. I want to address the larger question behind the Bill, why it is not enough and why we must look to ourselves to do more and to do better. Parliamentary democracy faces an existential threat from populism, of the left and the right.
I spent much of my working life in the Labour Party, including as its general secretary, so let me make an unfashionable defence of mainstream political parties. Democracies cannot function without them. Parties provide essential choice for democracy. Their expertise is sometimes viewed with scepticism, even suspicion, but that expertise is essential to the fabric of our democracy and we need to speak up for ourselves more than we do.
Of course we should regulate parties. We should insist on transparency and punish cheating. But we should not regard political parties themselves as the problem. In fact, they need a helping hand, because we are far from perfect. When people stop believing democratic politics can improve their lives, simple answers to complex problems become attractive. We should be careful who we blame for that. When voters abandon mainstream parties, our first question should not be, “What is wrong with them?”, as it often is. It should be: “What did we do—or fail to do—that has caused them to lose faith in us?”
Politics is the art of competitive storytelling, and we must confront an uncomfortable truth: for many voters, the populists are currently telling a more compelling story than we are. Former MP Shaun Woodward, who served on both sides of the other place, was a good storyteller. He had been a producer on “That’s Life!”, a highly successful consumer programme. He once told me that pinned up in the production office was the slogan: “Always assume minimum information and maximum intelligence”. That should be a watchword for political parties. People may not know the detail of policy, but they know whether they can pay their bills, whether they feel safe and whether their children have opportunities.
I applaud the work of the Electoral Commission, but I worry that its centre of gravity, generated by us, is more about stopping political parties cheating than maximising participation in our civic life. Stopping cheats is essential, but registration is not participation, and participation is not trust. For that reason, I believe removing the strategy and policy statement for the Electoral Commission is a backwards step, not an improvement. I strongly support operational independence, but independence should not mean isolation. Parliament should be able to transparently identify priorities for our democratic system, not least increasing participation.
For example, when I was interrailing, nearly 50 years ago, as an 18 year-old, I was the only person in my school year to be a member of a political party. I was stunned to meet a group of young Swedes who were all members of different political parties. The reason was that they were encouraged and rewarded with points towards university entry for joining a party. It is simple. We need creativity and an entrepreneurial spirit like that to strengthen our democracy.
I join others in asking my noble friend the Minister to consider requiring think tanks to report and publish information about their donations. It seems an obvious loophole. Of course, the recent £72 million donation to Reform should concern us, and it has been mentioned, but we must not mistake the symptom for the disease. Money can amplify populism and social media can accelerate it, but neither creates the original grievance. Like the noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill, I would like to quote Churchill. He famously described democracy as
“the worst form of Government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time”.—[Official Report, Commons, 11/11/1947; col. 207.]
The deeper threat to that democracy is the distance mainstream parties have allowed to grow between us and the people we represent. If politics is competitive storytelling, we must tell a better story and make that story true in people’s lives. Just as we need a national conversation about defence, we need one about democracy. It is that serious. Like the Prime Minister, I hope this Bill can be the start of it. We cannot regulate our way out of a trust crisis. The responsibility for restoring that trust does not lie with voters. It belongs to us.
Baroness Morgan of Cotes (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I declare my interest as a trustee of Democratys, a charity focused on educating the public about threats to our democracy.
There are three areas of the Bill that I want to focus on in the short time available. The first is votes at 16, which is one of those changes that had been a long time coming and was absolutely inevitable once 16 and 17 year-olds gained the vote in Scotland and Wales. I note the comments in the excellent maiden speech given by the noble Lord, Lord Macintosh, about the seriousness with which 16 and 17 year-olds in Scotland approach the vote, and I think we would see that elsewhere.
The second issue is online abuse in elections. The Bill currently does not mention online abuse once. Elections are high-risk periods for our democracy, and the Speaker’s Conference inquiry into the security of MPs concluded that online abuse presents a serious threat to democratic participation. As has been mentioned, the Electoral Commission report today on this year’s local and mayoral elections showed that such abuse is absolutely rife. That is before we get to the threat posed by deepfake technology, which is also a rapidly growing threat to our elections. I fully support the calls by the Women’s Democracy Group and the Online Safety Network, mentioned by others, for a code of practice in making tech firms accountable for taking steps during election periods to address the risks of online abuse of candidates, particularly women. I speak from some limited personal experience, because it has unfortunately got a lot worse for those standing in elections now. The Minister should certainly expect an amendment on that issue.
I want to focus particularly on crypto asset donations. I note that the Government introduced Clause 61 in the House of Commons, but it is not clear whether it is a moratorium or a ban. The Explanatory Notes carefully say that it is a restriction. At the moment, the clause is unclear as to what it is truly trying to achieve, which should be, as we have heard, a safer and more resilient democracy free of foreign interference. There are three key reasons why a moratorium would do the job that I think a majority in this House seems to want.
First, without a clear route to a workable system, we are left with a ban which simply pushes the risk upstream rather than addressing it. Crypto donations would not be made safer or more traceable and the Electoral Commission and other bodies would still lack the powers and skills needed to supervise the system properly. Of course, a future Government could reverse a ban. Building a trusted, functioning system makes it harder to dismantle than a simple ban. Secondly, the tools to build a workable system exist. There is the incoming regime for crypto service financial providers which would offer the opportunity to align that with the political finance regime, so that third-party providers could conduct anti-money laundering and “know your donor” checks on behalf of political parties. Thirdly, there should be a role enshrined for the Electoral Commission and, most importantly, both Houses of Parliament in lifting that moratorium when we are confident that such donations could be permissible.
Sir Philip Rycroft recommended that the Bill legislate for a moratorium and
“a power to end the moratorium only once Parliament and the Electoral Commission are assured that relevant regulation is effective”.
The Government accepted this recommendation, but the new clause currently lacks clarity on the conditions and process for ending it. That leaves a gap between what has been said and what has been drafted. If the Government do not revise this clause, amendments will be laid to ensure that foreign interference in our democracy via crypto donations or any similar thing—meme coins are included as well—is properly identified and stamped out.
I leave the Minister with three questions, which I hope that she might answer today, but if not, I would be delighted if she would write to me. First, what are the Government’s plans for developing and testing the future regulatory system on crypto asset and other kinds of related donations? Secondly, what additional resources, expertise and enforcement powers will be provided to the Electoral Commission, and how will they be provided? Thirdly, will she commit that both Houses of Parliament would be required to approve any decision to lift such a prohibition?
Baroness Paul of Shepherd’s Bush (Lab)
My Lords, like others in this Chamber, I have had the honour of acting as an agent in both local and parliamentary elections. Anyone who has had the opportunity to carry out this task will know that it leaves you with a lifelong and slightly nervous interest in how to run elections.
I will do something unfashionable and speak in favour of our system, not because I am some kind of parliamentary Pollyanna, but because talking it down plays into the hands of those who seek to undermine political trust in our country—those who say that the system is corrupt, that we are all the same, that voting does not change anything and that the system is rigged for one particular outcome or another. This is the kind of talk that is a prerequisite for breeding unrest and for undermining our way of life. It is dangerous, it is not true and we should make it very difficult for others to say so.
I seek to draw attention, indeed praise, how almost every Thursday, somewhere across the United Kingdom, small but significant elections take place. They are professionally administered, supported by dedicated officials and fuelled by party activists who care deeply about the places they live in and the direction of travel for our country. It is a system that works quietly, reliably and with an ease that is too easy to overlook precisely because it functions so well. We enjoy a level of public trust that we should seek to build upon, not diminish, in our conversations and our actions.
Of course, change is important, and we need to keep abreast of change and, in particular, those who seek to undermine us. We must also defend what is good about our system, so I approach the Bill with open questions: do the measures before us strengthen and build on trust, and are they fit for the challenges of our modern age? It is a large Bill, so I will focus on the measures that are intended to increase participation and bring people into democratic processes, because this is the key to democratic confidence.
I note the commitment to the vote at 16 and that this has been accompanied by an amplified emphasis on citizenship and democratic education. Intergenerational fairness is an issue for our times, so this is important.
I welcome the introduction of automated registration updates. This is an important and sensible reform. Public expectations have changed, and people rightly expect government bodies to make better use of information that they share with us, rather than repeatedly requiring the same information to be provided over and over again. This is particularly important for those who experience the greatest churn in their personal circumstances. Anything that helps people connected to the democratic process should be welcomed, but let us make it clear that making it on to an electoral register does not mean that all other rules and eligibility criteria have been ignored; it is that we have worked smartly to improve participation.
The same principle can be applied to the expansion of acceptable forms of voter ID, including the use of bank cards. The purpose of this change is straightforward. The current list of accepted identification excludes some voters who do not hold passports or a driving licence. We know that those affected are disproportionately younger, disabled and those whose circumstances are less secure. From my experience, and to my surprise, on the doorstep I have come across many older voters who do not have access to these forms of ID and who are rightly distressed that they have been excluded from elections. When you think about where they are in their time of life, this makes sense. I therefore support the decision to add bank cards to the list of acceptable voter ID, as a way of seriously widening participation. With appropriate safeguards and clear guidance for polling staff, this is a practical and proportionate way of reducing barriers to voting.
The introduction of voter identification requirements by the previous Government was, in my view, a heavy-handed response to a problem that was never shown to be significant or widespread. Where that does exist, it is illegal, and there are measures in place to deal with it. This very idea was borrowed from America, and the Americanisation of our politics is something that we must resist, particularly in the way our elections are governed. Electoral integrity matters enormously, but we must be careful that measures introduced in its name do not have the unintended consequence of excluding legitimate voters from the democratic process.
We should also be very clear about where some of the more serious challenges to our democracy now lie. They come not from ordinary voters turning up at polling stations to exercise their democratic rights but from deliberate foreign interference, disinformation, deepfakes, inappropriate candidate selection, lack of compliance or intentional disregard by some of electoral law and practice and, of course, the very real potential for the exercise of undue influence through large or foreign-linked political donations.
This is the challenge of the Bill: to take on the vested and foreign interests that seek to undermine our democracy and the voices that want to amplify that, while increasing the participation of our everyday citizens who have the right to take part. Together, we have the capacity to make the changes that are required, as the Bill moves through the House, to balance those two requirements.
Lord Bailey of Paddington (Con)
My Lords, the Bill asks us to strengthen public confidence in democracy and tighten the rules governing political donations, particularly money coming from overseas. Those are worthy objectives, but if that is the principle—that large donations may not purchase political influence—why does the Government’s scrutiny appear to stop at the water?
In the run-up to the 2024 general election, trade unions contributed approximately £5.6 million to the Labour Party. Separately, the Labour Party’s own records show that £4.9 million was received in affiliation income in 2024. Labour itself lists 11 affiliated unions. This financial relationship is not one-way. The latest Cabinet Office returns record nearly £90 million in public sector facility time costs during 2024-25. That is the cost of public employees receiving paid time to undertake trade union activities. It is not a direct government grant to the unions, as much of the work may well be legitimate and constructive. Nevertheless, it represents a substantial taxpayer-funded resource and belongs in the transparency debate.
We therefore have a curious circle: the trade unions help finance the Labour Party, the Labour Party forms the Government, the Government negotiate public sector pay and employment rights with those unions, and public bodies fund the facility time supporting those unions’ activities. What safeguards govern this relationship? What access do affiliated unions have to Ministers and officials? Are their meetings, representations and policy demands disclosed? Why should individual overseas donors face a £100,000 limit, while a domestic institutional donor can contribute millions and occupy a formal place within the governing party structure? Unions represent millions of workers and should be heard, but a Bill that claims to defend democratic integrity must apply one consistent principle: money must not buy privileged access, whoever provides the money.
On the vote for under-18s, 16 year-olds are at a point in their life that is very busy. They have family and school expectations, and they are trying to form a life and a personality. So, we need to think very carefully about putting the vote on top of that. NHS figures show that almost a quarter of 17 year-olds and 18 year-olds are dealing with some kind of mental distress.
Of course, being allowed to vote does not cause you mental distress. I would not try to suggest that; it would be irresponsible. But putting our children in a politically charged schooling system could. It will add to that pressure. For a very long time, teachers have been reluctant to teach civic and political goings-on for fear of being accused of indoctrinating young people. If that happens now, when every single political party has a stake in the outcome of that conversation, you will turn that professional anxiety into a full-on electoral scandal. There will be lots of complaining from all sides of this House about what goes on in schools.
We also have to bear in mind that those young people would now be in an educational system that would be asking their teachers to answer questions about politics. It would put pressure on them to not say the wrong thing, and there would be peer pressure to make sure they are in the right group. It could pull teachers into conversations that they do not really want to have, because there would be no way of answering without coming down on somebody’s side politically.
So we should not rush to change the rules to vote at 16, telling ourselves that we know that young people can have a political view. Of course they can: I have been a youth and community worker for over 35 years and I have worked with many young people who definitely have the wherewithal to have a political view. That is not the question. The question here is: is it right to pass on a solemn civic duty to children at a time when they are desperately trying to form who they will be going forward? I think it is the wrong thing to do.
The evidence internationally is very weak to suggest that it boosts participation anyway. Before we leap to that, we should probably have a check. If this is going to happen, the Government need to make sure that whoever provides this education has strong and visible safeguards and that there is a consensus about the civic education we give to those young people, or we will just make sure that any organisation involved in that conversation will now be exposed to the full force of our politics. I do not know whether your Lordships have met anybody in politics, but they can be rather insistent about the fact that they are right.
Baroness Prashar (CB)
My Lords, I will concentrate on two issues: the importance of civic and democratic education, particularly for those who will acquire the franchise at the age of 16, and the ease of voter registration.
In his review, Philip Rycroft said:
“Many of those I have spoken to during this review have emphasised the importance of voter education as a way of diminishing the influence of mis and disinformation. The public must be allowed to make their own judgements about what they see online. However, there is a role for the state in supporting them to do this effectively”.
He further noted
“the government’s recent policy proposals on improving media literacy, as set out in the recent publication ‘Protecting What Matters’”,
and argued that they should be implemented “as soon as possible”.
Indeed, the Government have said that they will:
“Mandate that citizenship is taught in both primary and secondary schools to highlight the relevance of the democratic process and constitutional principles”.
It would be helpful to know what progress the Government have made in this regard.
Although the Bill has the potential to significantly improve the electoral system, the broader role of civic education and the ability to skilfully navigate social media and AI are fundamental if we are to realise the full potential of what is proposed in the Bill. If it is not done, we will get greater clamour for more regulations and codes and, if we want to avoid regulation creep, we need to embrace civic and media literacy education urgently to empower citizens.
The Government’s proposal to lower the voting age to 16, which will also bring consistency to the voting age for all statutory elections across the UK, is welcome. However, this raises two issues for me. First, there is the need to ensure that all those who are eligible to vote in elections should be able to do so freely and without barriers. The priority therefore should be to ensure that all newly enfranchised voters know how to register and exercise the right to vote. According to the Electoral Commission, voter registration rates of attainers—16 and 17 year-olds—have fallen steadily since the current system of individual electoral registration was introduced in 2014, and research from Manchester University shows that Britain has one of the most difficult voter registration processes among liberal democracies.
Automated voter registration is now the norm and has been proven to lead to more accurate and complete electoral registers. It is also cheaper, simpler for voters, and simpler for election administrators to use. So, will the Government commit to a timeline which sees automated voter registration introduced to support voters by the next general election?
The second issue is the need for access to education material through schools, colleges and communities to support the electoral community to deliver these franchise changes. The importance of equipping young people with the confidence to participate in elections, equipping them with skills and knowledge so they are not manipulated by fake news, misinformation and disinformation, is crucial.
Everything must be done to equip all young people with civic and democratic knowledge and the specific media skills required in the digital age. So, for the purposes of the Bill, we need a provision that requires the Electoral Commission to run education programmes for young people ahead of being eligible to vote, and training for educators in providing such information.
Finally, I am pleased that the Government have accepted all the recommendations of the Rycroft review. There is a powerful case, as we have heard, for cleaning up our funding system and, of course, restoring the integrity of our electoral system if we are to ensure that we do not become what I describe as a “poundocracy” instead of a democracy, where influence can be bought by large donations. The guiding principle should be that a diverse and transparent base is healthy for a robust democracy because it will ensure wider participation and give more people agency and a stake in society. It is important to regard that principle in terms of diverse funding as an urgent issue.
Baroness Thornhill (LD)
My Lords, my five minutes segue neatly and very nicely from what the noble Baroness, Lady Prashar, has just said.
If the Bill is about renewing our democracy, it should be not simply about widening participation, which it is appearing to do very well, but about deepening democracy, which is why I strongly support extending the franchise to 16 and 17 year-olds. I enjoyed the maiden speech of the noble Lord, Lord Macintosh of Eastwood; I agree with much of what he said and welcome him to this House.
Before entering politics, I was an assistant head teacher of a large comprehensive with what now would be called PSHE. I reassure the noble Lord, Lord Bailey, that teachers are asked to deal with far more controversial issues than why they have the values they have in joining a democratic political party.
As noble Lords can imagine, I got to know 15 and 16 year-olds rather well. I spent years trying to persuade teenagers that turning up on time was a good idea, that deadlines were not merely advisory and that adults occasionally knew what they were talking about. I regret to say that the results were mixed.
What I learned was that young people are curious, questioning and far more interested in the world around them than we often assume from their grunts from underneath their headphones. So, yes, let us give them the vote, but—and it is a big but from me—if we are extending democratic rights, we must also think seriously about democratic education, which has been mentioned by a few noble Lords. Citizenship education has been treated as an optional extra when it should be regarded as essential democratic infrastructure, and teachers are, as the noble Lord, Lord Bailey, said, often quite nervous about teaching about politics.
Young people should leave school understanding not only how to vote but how Parliament works, how local government works, how decisions are made, and, very importantly, how they can influence them. Yet, from my experience, I fear we approach such civic education with a certain nervousness.
During my years in politics, like many noble Lords, I was invited to speak to sixth-formers about my role. Almost invariably, before I began, someone would quietly whisper in my ear and say, “Don’t be too party political”, as if it is somehow a dirty secret that you are “a Liberal Democrat!” I understood the intention—schools should never be seen to promote a particular party—but there is a huge difference between party-political advocacy and teaching young people about politics itself. What I found quite excited me. They invariably wanted to talk about politics; they wanted to understand why we disagreed and why we reached different conclusions, and how different values and priorities shaped political policy. They also wanted to know what I earned—that was a common question. In other words, they wanted to understand democracy.
If we want young people to become active citizens, we should not sanitise politics; we should help them to understand it. Political parties competing in ideas, honest disagreement and freedom of speech are not embarrassing by-products of democratic life; they are its lifeblood.
My second point concerns representation. For all the progress we have made in politics, it remains a difficult environment, for some people more than others. Women know this only too well. Over the years, I have had the joy of rubbish dumped on my doorstep, lights smashed on my car and all manner of unpleasant things sent through the letterbox. I was even given the rather charming nickname of #wickedwitchofwestwatford. I was grateful it was not the whole of Watford.
Most women in public life have such stories of their own. We laugh about them and treat them as part of the job, but perhaps we should stop and ask why. Representation is not simply about whether people have the legal right to stand for office; it is about whether they feel able to do so. Every time I have spied a talented woman and they decided not to stand for election because “It’s not really for me”, and every time an elected representative leaves public life because the personal costs have become too high, our democracy loses talent, experience and perspective. Issues such as candidate safety, intimidation and abuse are therefore not peripheral concerns: they go to the heart of our democratic constitution.
I welcome the Bill and I give the Minister notice that I expect to bring forward amendments on citizenship, political literacy and the barriers that can still prevent full participation in public life.
Baroness Smith of Llanfaes (PC)
My Lords, first, I welcome the Government’s decision to extend the franchise to 16 and 17 year-olds. Young people already contribute to our society and have a direct stake in the future, shaped by political decisions made today. Expanding the franchise strengthens our democracy by ensuring that more people have a voice.
Through the Learn with the Lords programme, I regularly visit schools and am consistently impressed by the level of engagement that I encounter. One of my favourite visits was to a primary school, where we discussed how Parliament works and how people can influence political decision-making. Afterwards, around 150 pupils wrote to the then Prime Minister about the winter fuel allowance. It started with one pupil asking me what it was and what had happened. The pupils listened, formed their own views about the issue and wanted their voices heard. The problem is often not a lack of interest from young people but a lack of opportunities for them to participate, and a lack of them being asked questions at all.
I also agree with the Minister’s opening remarks that we must put politics back in public control and respond to real changes in how people participate in politics. My remarks focus on three themes: modernising our democracy, ensuring the safety of candidates and strengthening transparency. First, on modernising democracy, having worked in the European Parliament, the Senedd and Westminster, I have often been struck by how many of our political structures remain rooted in assumptions about who can participate in public life. Job sharing and caring responsibilities are now a normal part of life for many people, yet our democratic institutions have been slower to adapt. Have the Government considered the merits that job-sharing arrangements could bring to elected office and the diversity of people able to serve?
At the same time, although this is the Representation of the People Bill, it does not address one of the most significant questions of representation itself: our electoral system. We live in an increasingly multiparty political environment, where vote share and seat share can diverge significantly. First past the post is increasingly difficult to justify if our objective is genuine representation. Do the Government have any plans to review the electoral system?
My second theme is safety of candidates. I welcome efforts to make democratic participation safer. In particular, I support the cross-party proposal put forward in the other place relating to domestic abuse offenders. Public office is a privilege, and the public rightly expects high standards from those who seek it. I am also persuaded by the case for removing the requirement for candidates and election agents to publish their full residential address.
However, one notable omission remains, as we have heard from a number of Members: online abuse. Social media platforms have become a significant enabler of intimidation and harassment of candidates, campaigners and elected representatives, with women disproportionately affected. If people decide not to stand for public office because of the abuse they expect to receive online, democracy itself is diminished. Can the Minister explain why no provisions have been included in the Bill to address online abuse and whether the Government will consider requiring Ofcom to produce an election-specific code of practice, as we have heard from a range of Members today?
My final theme is transparency. Public trust is the foundation of any healthy democracy. If people are to have confidence in our political system, they must be confident that influence cannot be bought, that elections are conducted fairly and that democratic institutions are protected from improper influence. As a Welsh Member of your Lordships’ House, I listened carefully to the Minister’s reference to Nathan Gill. His convictions serve as a reminder that foreign interference in democratic processes is not an abstract concern. That is why transparency around political donations remains so important. The Government have announced a task and finish group to examine potential reforms, but there remains little clarity about its remit, membership or timetable. Can the Minister tell the House how this work will proceed and when Parliament can expect to see its conclusions?
There is much in this Bill to welcome, particularly its efforts to broaden participation and strengthen public confidence in our democratic system. However, important questions remain about representation, candidate safety and transparency in our democracy. If we are serious about renewing public trust in politics, we must be prepared to address those issues. I look forward to the Minister’s response and to working constructively with colleagues across the House to strengthen the Bill in the next stage.
Lord Hayward (Con)
My Lords, before I turn to the Bill, I thank the Minister for the action that she has taken in relation to another matter. I spoke on the duty of candour in relation to the Hillsborough Bill and I had been pursuing for three years the briefing given to the Minister by officials. At no stage was anybody willing to allow me to discuss it with either the Minister or officials. Within one week of me raising it on the Floor of this House, the Minister has taken the action and I have had a conversation with officials. I would like to put on record my appreciation to the Minister for the action that she has taken. Whether we agree in the end or not is another matter. I also take the opportunity to thank the Minister for her involvement with many Members of this House. In my case, she rang me yesterday for a discussion about aspects of the Bill and I greatly appreciate that.
There are two broad comments I will make about the Bill. One is, I am afraid, that it is far too long. I made the point previously that legislation on electoral law should have been consolidated years ago, and it should be consolidated now. This is a missed opportunity.
That leads me on to my second point about the general debate. I am not talking here about disagreements in relation to policy: ages of voting or whatever it may happen to be. There have been a number of contributions this afternoon where people have said, “We’ll need to change this urgently, next year or the year after”. They have come from all sides of the House. My criticism of this Bill is that it has come at the wrong time, because many aspects of donations or other matters have not been carefully enough considered to encompass the whole range of issues, whether it be donations, subscriptions, access through cryptocurrencies or the like. Those are two broad comments.
I will now touch on two questions of detail. There are elements in the Bill which, to be honest, are utterly unnecessary. They appear to have been drafted because returning officers and councils have come to disagreements, and I will, solely at this point, identify one classic case. I am referring to Clause 32(3)(a), which says
“for ‘an officer’ substitute ‘a senior officer’”.
Now, I ask your Lordships: is that an indication that officials in a council could not agree? You should knock their heads together—it should not be whole clauses in a Bill. There are other more substantial examples that I could give and will give in Committee.
The other aspect to which I think there has been virtually no reference today is the impact assessment. It is a very lengthy document. To be honest, it is a statement of every reason why you should support the Government’s decision. It does not consider alternatives. The noble Lord, Lord Rennard, and I will disagree on many things in relation to registration, but it does not address the alternatives which are available. It just says, “We have decided this, and this is how we are going to do it”.
Associated with that, many of the costings in the impact assessment are barely credible. I will draw attention to just two. One is on page 59. The noble Baroness, Lady Prashar, made reference to the need to educate people and communicate well. The Electoral Commission has put its costs at £39.8 million as a central estimate on an annual basis. The rest of the national costs are supposed to be just over £40 million. Is it credible that if the Electoral Commission reckoned its costs are going to be a figure, the cost to the whole of the rest of the nation is going to be almost exactly the same figure? The reason I have doubts about that example—but I could cite any number of them because I was sad enough to spend the Summer Recess reading the impact assessment—is paragraph 174 on page 61, which says:
“There is also an additional resource implication arising from the collaborative development of this policy, with staff time from other government departments, principally DfE ... There is also a potential impact on education staff. However, these contributions are not considered significant in cost terms and have therefore not been monetised”.
Anybody who believes that they cannot be monetised and should not be monetised is stretching credibility beyond belief.
Lord Rooker (Lab)
My Lords, in the 1990s, when the Labour Party, via the Plant commission, looked at the age of voting, we were very sceptical about lowering it to 16. I have tracked what has happened in Scotland’s local government in the last decade, but, above all, what has really convinced me is my work on Learn with the Lords. When I and 70-odd other Peers tour the colleges and schools of England, the reactions we get from 16 and 17 year-olds are remarkable, and it is completely different from what it used to be. I will take the rest of my time on the commitment Motion.
Lord Mackinlay of Richborough (Con)
My Lords, I had not anticipated to be on my feet quite so quickly. I have been watching proceedings for the period that I have not been in the Chamber this afternoon, and there seems to have been a lot of—I would not quite call it hysteria—grave concern about financing. Of course, that is important, but I would rather concentrate on franchise—what elections are for, who can do it and how they do it. That has been very much opened up as a point that we can discuss within the Bill because of the attempt to reduce age of the franchise to 16. I agree wholeheartedly with the concerns of my noble friends Lady May and Lord Brady about 16, not least because we need to determine what is an age of attainment. If one at age 16 cannot use a sunbed, it is rather strange that one can suddenly vote, but that is a wider debate for when we are in Committee.
I would like to examine postal voting. The postal voting franchise was massively widened in 2001 by the Blair Government, who were, I think, concerned that the volume and numbers of people voting had been on a steady decline. I have to say that the state we are in is not better than where we once were. In the old days, postal voting was available if one was unwell, going on holiday, or had a degree of frailty. I do not know about anybody else in this House, but I find it not that difficult to go down to the Co-op or a convenience store in the evening, so I find it hard to believe that on election day, given that there are 15 hours to do it, one cannot find the time to go and vote.
The opportunities for fraud and for postal vote harvesting are very well known, I am afraid. We have grave concerns about what happens in the actual polling booth, whether that is family assistance and all the rest of it. I do not have grave concerns about that, but I have grave concerns about what is happening behind doors where nobody can see. But that is a wider discussion, and I will probably lay amendments to that effect.
While we are on the issue of franchise, I ask: why do we have such a wide franchise? We have a number of states of attachment and relationship with the United Kingdom. We have British Crown dependencies, and we are familiar with those: the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands. We have British Overseas Territories such as Gibraltar and the British Virgin Islands—those types of very close relationships. We have a slight oddity with former Hong Kong citizens of the right age. They are all fairly small numbers, particularly in the British Overseas Territories, where there is a close relationship, and we still have governors and there is close working with the FCDO. But I looked rather more closely at which of those countries allow voting by British citizens who happen to be there: “very few” is the answer. Gibraltar does. Turks and Caicos most certainly does not; you have to attain an islander status before you are allowed to vote.
They are fairly small numbers, and I am not overly concerned. But I am very concerned about the Commonwealth—a Commonwealth of 2.7 billion people, a third of the entire global population. It includes places that, frankly, until I looked at this, I was not entirely sure existed. I am not entirely sure that I know where in Africa Eswatini is. I think my geography is pretty good, but I am not entirely sure where that is, or Vanuatu. Then there are very large populations such as India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, and medium populations such as Australia and Canada. As long as one has a right to come to the country for work and has a visa, any of these people can vote in a UK election, parliamentary and local.
When we were in the European Union, we restricted the franchise to local elections. Arguably, because the powers that be at the time—they have been blunted, of course—were on the road to making us a single country of Europe, one could have argued, rather more closely, that European citizens should have had the franchise in the UK for all elections. But the franchise of the Commonwealth is a little quaint, in my view. Let us have it, by all means, as long as there is a reciprocation. I have looked a little closer. Ghana, under its 1992 constitution, does not allow British citizens to vote. Australia severed the link, particularly with the Australia Act 1986. Therefore, a British citizen who may be there for a long period, for all intents living there for ever, cannot vote. In Canada, that franchise was lost many decades ago.
We have opened the Pandora’s box on franchise. We are talking about 16 year-olds. I shall open Pandora’s box to talk about the franchise of Commonwealth citizens. I think the time has come for a new thought on this.
Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)
My Lords, in following the noble Lord, Lord Mackinlay, I make no apologies for returning to the subject of political funding, because, of course, we are conducting this debate under the shadow of one number, £72 million, or rather one sum—two times £36 million. This has led to far more attention being paid to the issue of political funding. Your Lordships’ House very often is facing the Government Benches and saying, “You’re heading in the right direction, but you need to go further”. Well, now there is a very clear direction from the country that we need to see this Bill going far further in capping donations to political parties wherever they come from.
There is another factor that I am sure the country does not know about. If it did, it would ask us to please cut the amount of spending that is allowed on elections—particularly given the fact that it was massively increased under the last Government at very little notice, very late in the Bill, with very little attention.
There are specific factors that influence the issue of political funding. I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady May, and share her scepticism about cryptocurrencies. They are good—no, great—for fraudsters and criminals, but there is no evidence that they in any way contribute to the public good. The noble Lord, Lord Evans of Weardale, said, as I have heard him say on many occasions, that we have invited into this country corruption from around the world over many years—from Russia, China and other countries, and we are now seeing money from very dubious sources in the US coming into our UK politics. We need to take action on these issues.
Those two contributions help me make the point that this is not, however, a new problem. Political funding has been a huge issue in British politics for decades. We have had big money choosing what kind of politics we get. We get the politics it has paid for. Where does it come from? It comes from financiers, the City, gambling companies, property developers, fossil fuel companies and other giant oligarchic companies from around the world. This has to stop if we are going to restore trust in our politics.
One specific point that I will raise, as my honourable friend Ellie Chowns did in the other place, is the issue of donations from companies. I rely here on analysis from the Centre for the Analysis of Taxation. Almost £1 in every £10 donated by companies comes indirectly from individuals who are likely to be ineligible to donate directly. Around a quarter of donor companies are opaque, meaning it is not possible to identify who controls them. Currently, the tax system provides an implicit subsidy of up to 39% for political donations routed through companies. It is very easy to get around what the Bill is supposed to be trying to do. So why not ban political donations from companies altogether? The Bill accepts that a company’s right to donate depends on the rights of its individual owners. If they can donate directly, why are we allowing corporate donations at all?
I want to pick up a couple of other points from the debate. It rather stuck in my craw when the noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill, complained about a lack of consultation, given the way in which the last Government’s Elections Act was railroaded through. I was disappointed and surprised that she repeated totally debunked, clearly politically motivated allegations about family voting from Gorton and Denton. I refer your Lordships’ House to the Manchester Police press release of 27 March, which found
“no evidence of any intent to influence or refrain any person from voting”.
We need to stop undermining our own system when there is no reason to do so.
We have heard many powerful testimonies, particularly from the Learn with the Lords programme, about why we should have votes at 16. The noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill, asked why not 15 or younger, and that is a good question. I very much agree with the many contributions saying that we need more political education. However, having visited schools and colleges with Learn with the Lords, I have found that 16 year-olds are, on average, as well-informed about politics as 60-year-olds. That is not to say that both groups do not need a great deal more political education, understanding and help with critical thinking in our current media age.
Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)
My Lords, there are many ways to describe the Bill. Top of my list at the moment is simply “timely”.
I point out to the representatives of the Conservative Party here, with their slightly selective memories of election history, that, in 1928, the Conservative Government extended the franchise so that women were able to vote on the same principle as men. What happened in the 1929 election? The Conservative Party lost its majority. I was originally a historian, so I do check these things out.
I will comment on four different areas: voting for 16 year-olds, caps on political donations, deepfakes and misinformation during elections, and the need for greater regulation and transparency in political advertising.
Like the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, and the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, I have done a lot of work with Learn With The Lords. When we discuss potential voting for 16 year-olds, which I always raise, I typically say that we adults have made such a mess of the world that they are going to inherit that the sooner we give them skin in the game, particularly on issues such as climate change, the better.
The noble Lord, Lord Patten, referred briefly to Australia’s compulsory voting scheme. I just did a bit of historical homework. Believe it or not, that is now 102 years old. It was brought in after the 1922 election, which achieved a 60% voter turnout. In 1925, in the election after compulsory voting was brought in, turnout jumped up to 91%. To this day, the average voter turnout in general elections in Australia is between 88% and 92%, which slightly puts us to shame.
On caps on political donations, when I heard over the weekend of the two donations to Reform, my mind went back to my great-grandfather, in 1931, who was being pressed very strongly by two Conservative press Lords to change government policy. He made quite a well-known speech in which he accused them of having power without responsibility. There are echoes of that in the situation we are in today.
I put on the record my genuine thanks to Christopher Harborne and Ben Delo for bringing this subject into such sharp focus—conveniently, just in time for Second Reading. I am grateful for that, because one of the problems with what has happened was referred to by Mr Harborne himself, when he said he was prompted to put in his additional bid by his competitive instincts. That way lies an arms race, which is the last thing we want.
Should the Bill be retrospective? Actually, I am relaxed about that, because, based on current and recent experience of the particular party to which the money has gone, it will almost certainly fritter it away and waste it. In fact, the party may even make its situation worse rather than better. The history of most disruptor political parties around the world, particularly those that are focused on a charismatic leader who formed it, is that once that leader is out of the way or starts losing his or her faculties, the party fades away fairly quickly. I suspect that this may be the case with that party.
As far as Mr Harborne’s statement of his own priorities and why he gave money to Reform, he said that we face
“three existential threats … nuclear war, AI and climate change”.
If he thinks Mr Farage will solve any of those, let alone all three, I think he has rather wasted his £36 million.
I turn now to deepfakes and misinformation. Misinformation is not mentioned in the Bill at all. Section 106 of the Representation of the People Act 1983 covers only “personal character or conduct”, not political claims.
On greater regulation and transparency in political advertising, there should be a public repository for all paid-for digital advertising. We need to establish a clear, enforceable code of practice to prevent misinformation and disinformation. We need to restrict overseas spending on political advertising at all times, not just at elections. We should give the Electoral Commission the power to obtain information at speed from online platforms at the moment that these things happen, not waiting for a formal investigation, which is what is currently proposed. We will have a busy Committee.
Lord Jamieson (Con)
My Lords, as usual I declare that I am a councillor in Central Bedfordshire. There are positive aspects to this Bill, as outlined by my noble friend Lady O’Neill at the start. However, there are also many deficiencies, and I thank the many noble Lords who have raised such issues as the age of maturity, representation of British citizens abroad, the lack of true engagement, not addressing social media and the risk of bias in these donation rules. There is not time for me to debate all these issues today, so I am going to focus on some of the Bill’s contradictions.
The Minister has said the Bill will address loopholes in donations. However, it fails to address one of the most glaring loopholes. As confirmed by the Minister in a Written Answer, Chinese, Iranian and Russian citizens on the electoral roll in Scotland and Wales can make uncapped donations, whereas in England foreign nationals cannot donate, other than certain EU and Commonwealth citizens who are not entitled to vote. Is it right to limit the amount British nationals can donate while allowing Chinese, Iranian and Russian nationals living in Scotland and Wales on a temporary basis to make donations?
The Bill seeks to address unregistered voters through auto-enrolment and a modified reduced threshold. Have the Government truly thought through the implications of this? In an increasingly mobile society, the scope for errors is significant and the bureaucracy involved potentially huge. There is already an obligation for everyone contacted by an ERO to respond and verify their eligibility. Now we have the reverse situation. They will be on the electoral roll unless they prove that they are not eligible. Students or contractors who frequently move address could end up with multiple registrations and in many instances may not even be aware. You may say that this does not matter, but it does. The robustness of the electoral roll is fundamental to election integrity. The electoral roll is also used for other purposes, such as credit and fraud checks. The Bill is also not clear on what an ERO needs to do to find all these potential new voters, and I would appreciate the Minister giving clarity on this matter.
The Bill will also water down the integrity of voting. Photo ID is working. Why do we need to introduce a less secure form of ID? A bank card is not a secure form of ID, as the Electoral Commission has made clear. By way of an example, my father and I share the same name. How will a poll clerk differentiate us? Yet even the mildest scrutiny of a driving licence would establish that we are different people. In fact, there are an estimated 2,000 J Jamiesons in the UK. The Minister is not here at the moment, but she is even more popular than me, with an estimated 12,000 S Taylors in the UK. I would appreciate the Minister explaining how this improves integrity of voting.
Finally, I will address two issues this Bill is not addressing. First, the fragmented nature of electoral law causes significant issues of operation and interpretation, as my noble friend Lord Hayward has said today and previously many times. It is overly complex and conflicting. Do we really need another Bill that adds to that complexity? Secondly, according to the Electoral Commission, as has been mentioned by one or two other noble Lords, two-thirds of candidates faced abuse at this year’s local elections, which I can attest to from personal experience. We support robust debate, but if good people are unwilling to stand, if candidates are restricted in campaigning, if politicians are constrained in what they say from fear of abuse, it fundamentally undermines democracy and harms our country. We support the measures in this Bill to protect election officials and candidates, but much more needs to be done. In particular, why is online abuse and misuse of AI not a greater priority?
Baroness Linforth (Lab)
My Lords, I will address my remarks to the provisions of the Bill that aim to improve voter participation. In one of my roles in my previous job working for Labour, I was a member of the elections team. This was the early 1990s. I am another one of those nerds that my noble friend Lady Paul referred to. We wanted to maximise the possibility of Labour winning elections, and we provided guidance, advice and leadership to the various Labour Party units led by brilliant professional staff and driven by great volunteers. When I look back on those days, I cringe at some of the things we had to do because government bodies and local authorities were not doing them. We asked our volunteers to look through electoral registers to identify properties that did not appear, and then we visited them to see if we could register the occupants. It was hugely labour-intensive, and I take this opportunity to thank those volunteers for doing this, but we had to, because participation in the democratic process—being able to vote—is possibly the greatest right any citizen has. Back then the Government of the day were lax in compiling the register of electors. It should not have been left to volunteers to make sure the electoral register was up to date.
That is why I welcome the provisions in this Bill allowing for electoral registration officers to register individuals directly, and enabling new methods of voter registration for parliamentary electors and local government electors in England and Northern Ireland to be piloted. I believe that the move to individual electoral registration in 2014 was a retrograde step. I must admit that I find it slightly amusing that we are now proposing making an electoral registration officer a quasi “head of household”. It seems to me that it is a tacit admission that the move to individual electoral registration was a failure. I understand that close to 8 million people are currently missing from the electoral register. That is around 15% of all those aged over 18 in the UK. That is not good enough. We thus need to be able to compare all databases created whenever a citizen interacts with the Government and local authorities, and then use them to plug the gaps in registration. That could be, for example, driving licences, passport applications or council tax data, et cetera. I would also encourage a legal duty for the electoral register to be compared with datasets held by credit reference agencies. These companies often hold information about people not on the electoral register who should be on it. The register of electors should be first among equals. It should be of a gold standard.
If we are going to move to votes for 16 year-olds, I would encourage the Government to link the issuance of a national insurance number at that age to being registered to vote. I favour that a citizen be registered automatically but offered an opportunity to opt out at the point of registration. In this regard, I welcome the proposal to end the presumption that citizens are placed on the open register, and that any citizen would have to opt in to that register. I do not support compulsory voting, but I do want everyone to vote. In these days of highly partisan party politics, that might be a little controversial, but I truly believe that the higher the turnout, the better, whoever a voter chooses to vote for. Political parties should work hard to earn votes, and the institutions of government should remove barriers to voting.
Lord Sahota (Lab)
My Lords, I welcome this Bill because the integrity of our democracy is increasingly under threat, not only from foreign money and misinformation, but from politicians who deliberately seek to divide people by race, religion and immigration status. I want to concentrate on that wider democratic culture.
I am particularly concerned about the direction in which Reform UK under Mr Nigel Farage is seeking to take our political debate. Mr Farage is perfectly entitled to argue for lower immigration and stronger borders. Those are legitimate subjects for a democratic debate. But there is a profound difference between debating immigration and repeatedly presenting immigrants and ethnic minorities as the explanation for everything that is wrong with our country. We saw a disturbing example of this in Southampton. Following the horrific murder of Henry Nowak, Mr Farage called upon British people to respond with what he described as “pure, cold rage”. He spoke of a two-tier culture and anti-white prejudice. Within hours there was serious disorder in Southampton, and some police officers were injured.
Compare that rhetoric with the recent terrible tragedy near Middlesbrough. Seven people died: five young men travelling in a stolen car and two serving police officers. Every one of those deaths was a tragedy, and my heart goes out to all of their families. Imagine, though: had those five young men been from minority communities, Mr Farage’s reaction would have been very different—but he said nothing. Why? Because it did not fit his political narrative of demonising ethnic minority communities. Social media would have been flooded with claims about immigration, integration and the supposed failure of multicultural Britain.
Crimes must be condemned whoever commits them and victims deserve justice regardless of their colour, but political outrage must not be switched on when the alleged offender belongs to one community and switched off when the circumstances do not fit a political story. That is not responsible leadership. History teaches us that democracy is rarely destroyed overnight but is weakened gradually. When minority communities become convenient scapegoats, when independent institutions are treated with contempt, when misinformation becomes the norm and when political leaders persuade voters that their neighbours are responsible for all their problems, then the foundation of democracy begins to decay.
I make, with caution, a historical comparison: the language used by Reform’s leadership reminds me of the Europe of the 1930s. Racialised language is in danger of becoming normalised in our country. Social media has made the danger even greater. One provocative tweet from the world’s richest man can do untold damage to our community cohesion.
That is why the Bill’s provision on political finance and electronic campaign material matters. Foreign money must not be allowed to buy British political influence. The Electoral Commission must be strengthened. Political parties must be required to know where their donations ultimately originate from.
Immigrants and ethnic minorities are listening to this debate and some are asking themselves: if this rhetoric one day translated into government, what would happen to them? They are our neighbours, doctors, nurses and so on. Britain is their home. We must therefore defend not merely the machinery of democracy but its values: fairness, tolerance, truth and equality before the law. That is why I support the Bill and why I believe this House must remain vigilant against any politics that seeks electoral advantage by turning one group of British people against another.
Lord Udny-Lister (Con)
My Lords, my starting point is very simple. The minimum voting age should match the minimum age for standing for an election, and I believe both of those should be 18. Yet, through this Bill, Ministers would be allowing a 16 year-old to elect a Member of Parliament while continuing to prevent that very same young person from becoming one. It is for Ministers to explain to your Lordships’ House why their judgment is sufficient for one purpose but not the other.
My greater concern, however, is whether dependent 16 and 17 year-olds would genuinely exercise a fully independent choice at the ballot box. We know that family voting—or let us be frank and call it what it is: electoral fraud—is becoming increasingly common in this country. A report from Democracy Volunteers recently identified breaches of ballot secrecy in more than one in five polling stations that they observed during the 2024 general election. These findings should concern us all, as they raise serious questions about the privacy and independence of voting, including the risk of one family member directing another’s ballot.
If observers identify breaches inside our polling stations, Ministers should explain how they will protect a dependent teenager completing a postal ballot at home. After all, there is no polling officer at the kitchen table. A young person may face a demand to show their ballot, surrender it or complete it under supervision. Before extending the franchise, Ministers should publish before the House what assessment they have made of this risk and what additional safeguards they are going to implement to prevent the coercion that may inevitably occur. What the Bill fails to ensure is that a parent is not acquiring an additional vote simply because their child becomes eligible, or that a husband does not cast his wife’s vote. Every voting adult should have the confidence of being able to cast their vote in secrecy, and this should be the main concern and priority of the Government.
On voter identification, it is entirely wrong to assume that the possession of a bank card is enough to establish the identity of an individual. This is an area where I intend to move amendments, as it is beyond farcical that, after all the work that local authorities have put into training staff around photographic identification and the issuing of a voter authority certificate, this Bill should now be allowed to undo that work and weaken the integrity of the ballot.
Moving on to the issue of political donations, I welcome tighter controls, but Parliament must test whether they work and how far they actually go in protecting the integrity of our elections. A British company’s address must not legitimise money supplied by a non-permissible donor. Parties must establish the true source of funds, not simply record the name on the transfer. Restrictions must withstand attempts to route money through companies, associations, loans, third-party campaigns and so on. If a party cannot establish that a donation is lawful, then it simply should not be able to accept it.
Deliberate evasion of these rules should and must bring serious consequences, and these standards must apply equally to every party. However, we should be wary of retrospective changes to the law. People should be able to rely on the law as it stands at the time. Reaching back and changing the consequences afterwards is a dangerous precedent and risks serious overreach by the state.
We must not confuse foreign interference with British citizens who happen to live overseas. They are not foreigners and should not be treated as such. If they have the right to vote in our elections, their lawful participation in our democracy by making transparent donations should not automatically be treated with suspicion. For the integrity of our democracy, it is the validation of the source of the donation made that the Government should turn their attention to.
Like others in this Room, I have stood as a candidate in a great number of elections and observed many counts over my lifetime. I do not support measures that risk weakening the very fairness and secrecy upon which public confidence depends. For those reasons, I actually urge noble Lords to reject the Bill.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
My Lords, I welcome this Bill, which should help strengthen our democracy at a time when it is under some strain. The extension of the franchise to 16 and 17 year-olds, following Scotland and Wales, represents an important step in recognising the contribution many of them already make as citizens and in enabling them to contribute to political decisions that will help determine their futures. However, as I know from my own earlier research as an academic, some young people do not feel prepared for this new responsibility.
The Select Committee on Citizenship and Civic Engagement, of which I was a member, emphasised citizenship education’s
“crucial role to play in helping to build active citizens”.
It deplored the way in which the previous Government had allowed it
“to degrade to a parlous state”
and expressed concern that, in emphasising individual character, it was failing to develop much-needed political literacy. It is welcome that the Government will make citizenship education mandatory in primary as well as secondary schools, but the Association for Citizenship Teaching has warned that some of the proposed curriculum changes risk weakening the contribution it can make to
“preparing young people for participation in democratic life”.
I therefore encourage my noble friend the Minister, if she has not already done so, to read the very useful recent report from the APPG for Schools, Learning and Assessment Empowering Students as Democratic Citizens: How Schools and Colleges Can Prepare Young People for Votes at 16. The report cites studies which demonstrate that
“effective democratic education in schools can positively impact young people’s intended political engagement as well as perceptions of political efficacy, confidence, interest and trust in politics—all important factors associated with voting in elections”.
Yet access to such education is generally poor and inconsistent, with more marginalised groups likely to lose out. A year 8 student who gave evidence said:
“Equipping us with political education is … a democratic necessity”.
The Bill’s provision for automatic voter registration is of particular importance to young people—and to private renters—but it needs strengthening so that it becomes a duty and has a clear, speedy timeline.
The Women’s Democracy Group emphasises the need to improve the diversity of political candidates, including through the implementation of Section 106 of the Equality Act, which would require parties to publish data on the protected characteristics of candidates standing for national elections. The Government are committed to commencing Section 106, but have refused to provide any kind of timeline for doing so or for the prior consultation process. Centenary Action argues that Section 106 is a vital tool for helping to move the dial on diversity of representation by bringing greater transparency, and that it is essential that it is enacted as soon as possible in time for preparation for the next election, which could well occur during the centenary year of equal franchise. Can my noble friend give us some idea of when action will be taken on this?
If we are to come into line with Scotland and Wales, we should also extend the franchise to foreign residents, as argued by my honourable friend James Naish MP, drawing on the work of the Migrant Democracy Project, which I met earlier this year. The project argues rightly that
“democracy works best when it is inclusive for all who it serves. All those who call the UK their home have vested political and social interest in how their communities and country are governed”.
Back in 2022, the now Justice Secretary, Alex Norris MP, tabled an amendment which would have achieved just that. Surely an inclusive Representation of the People Bill should not exclude this particular group of people. I therefore ask my noble friend whether she will look at the case for their inclusion.
In conclusion, I support those arguing for stronger limits on political donations and for the establishment of a commission for electoral reform. The widely supported amendment on the latter was deemed out of scope in the Commons, with Minister Eshalomi arguing that
“it is premature to legislate now for one approach”—[Official Report, Commons, 2/9/26; col. 342.]
to electoral reform. But the whole point of a commission is to examine a range of approaches, ideally drawing on the wisdom of a citizens’ assembly. That said, I welcome her willingness to discuss next steps and hope that my noble friend will say the same; in her opening remarks, she implied that she was open to discussing anything with Members of this House. Of course, a commission does not require legislation, but it would mark an important step towards what my noble friend Lord Kinnock recently described as a “profound act of democratisation”.
Baroness Pinnock (LD)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness. As I was re-elected as a councillor in May, I have a direct interest in the formation of electoral law. As such, it will perhaps be no surprise that I will focus my remarks on some really practical issues.
First, voter registration is currently significantly incomplete, despite the best efforts of elections officers. The Electoral Commission estimates that 8 million people are not registered to vote. In my constituency of Spen Valley, that is estimated to mean 10,000 potential voters unable to vote because they are not registered. This has impacts on our democracy; lack of registration is heavily skewed to those who rent and those who move home regularly. This demographic is also likely to be less well off than the average. The further impact is on the boundaries of constituencies, which are based on numbers of registered electors. The reasons for not registering are many, but they include people not wanting others to know where they live and not trusting the opt-out from the open register to safeguard them from, for instance, a violent ex-partner. The move to an opt-in register is therefore a positive move. Automatic voter registration is welcome, but the practical implementation leaves much to be desired. Where is the timetable for action? Where are the proposed pilots, which are essential if there is to be a move to automatic registration? Can the Minister provide those details before its widescale introduction, and will that occur before the next general election?
The other issues I want to raise are small but important. The first is that of postal votes. Currently, there is no specified timetable for elections officers to send postal ballots to Royal Mail for delivery. Given that, in some local elections, those voting by post may constitute a significant portion of votes cast—between a third and a half, depending on turnout—naming a postal vote day or days will aid both voters and campaigners. Voters will get information on candidates and campaigners can get the information to them in time. Then there is the abuse of election spending limits, for local elections in particular. Literature from a national political party that does not name a local candidate, specific local issues or the party in the locality is not counted towards local election expense limits. In a recent local by-election in Kirklees, where I am a councillor, approximately £4,000-worth of such literature from one political party arrived on voters’ doormats. This is more than double the enforceable election expense limit for that election. It is making a nonsense of spending limits, and I urge the Minister to consider with the Electoral Commission changes to those regulations.
Finally, I will raise a concern about the relative sizes of electorates in local wards—not within a council district, as that is well governed by the local boundary commission. This Bill seeks to improve the representation of people, yet in Birmingham, for instance, the councillor to voter ratio is one to 7,000. In my own area of Kirklees, it is one to 4,700; in Manchester, it is about one to 3,500; and for London boroughs the ratio is about one to 2,500. So in one part of the country the ratio is three times greater than in others. There are serious implications of this disparity. The larger ratio comes with a growing loss of real local representation and the remoteness of those elected in making local decisions. I hope the Minister will reflect on these disparities and how they can be addressed.
Lord Sikka (Lab)
My Lords, this Bill does not end the power of the rich to hijack democracy. Corporations and the super-rich do not donate; they invest and get a return for themselves and their class. Numerous laws are bent to advance their interests. The result is that 1% own more wealth than the bottom 70% of the population combined. Private equity bosses are taxed at lower rates than wage earners. No one is prosecuted for the Post Office, Grenfell or other scandals. Frauds at HBOS remain uninvestigated. Government contracts are showered on donors with little transparency. The Autonomy Institute reported that, for every £1 of donations since 2000, public contracts worth £1,294 have been given to the same set of companies. No party really wants to end the political auction that people see every day.
The £100,000 cap on donations by an overseas voter does not dismantle the political bazaars. It can be bypassed through donations by connected persons. There is no way of knowing whether the money came from Musk or Mafia. Thailand-based Christopher Harborne has handed £61 million to Reform since 2019. He was named in the Panama Papers. Ben Delo has handed £44 million to Reform and has a criminal conviction in the US. He was sentenced to 30 months on probation and fined $10 million. Will the Government ensure that individuals with criminal convictions cannot fund political parties?
The Government have promised to implement the Rycroft review proposals on corporate donations, but they will not curb regulatory games. I will give just one example. Some years ago, £5,137,785 was donated to the Conservative Party by Lord Ashcroft, its one-time Treasurer and a Treasurer with a non-dom status. The money originated from Stargate Holdings, a company controlled by Lord Ashcroft and registered in Belize. Complex transactions were used to conceal the origins of the money. The money passed through a series of UK companies—Astraporta UK Ltd and Bearwood Holdings Ltd—and was then paid to the Conservative Party by Bearwood Corporate Services Ltd; none had sufficient profits to cover donations. The small companies used in this chain did not have to publish full sets of accounts, thereby making it difficult for anyone to carry out what we now call “know your donor” checks.
The Rycroft review has now recommended that corporate donations should be based on post-tax profits. This is also highly problematic, as there is no statutory definition of profit. Profits for accounting, tax and management purposes are not identical. Accounting rules are malleable, and scandals show that profit can be manufactured through intra-group transactions. That happened at Carillion and is happening at water companies. Companies can have profits but be cash poor. Does that mean they will borrow money to make political donations? That is what this legislation will result in.
Currently, the Government are consulting on deregulation of corporate reporting, which will make it impossible for anyone to carry out the “know your donor” checks. I hope that someone in the Government will connect the dots.
Finally, there are two ways of cleaning up UK politics, which has to be the ultimate aim of the Bill in front of us. We need a ban on political donations, with parties funded by modest membership fees and possible state money to help them—they are already getting some Short money—or all donations must go to a central fund administered by the Electoral Commission. The money would then be divided in accordance with the share of votes secured by a party. This way, corporations and the super-rich could not directly fund a political party and buy political influence, and we would finally be free of the iron grip of corporations and the super-rich on our politics.
Lord Fuller (Con)
My Lords, it is always a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Sikka, though I must say I think I have heard some of those arguments before.
This is a big Bill, but it misses the big point. Instead of strengthening democracy, it fiddles around the edges. I fought many elections in a career in local government. I often have to remind people that, to become the leader of the council, as I was for nearly 20 years, you have to win three elections very quickly: once in your ward, once among your political friends and the other among the whole council. You have to learn how to count. But the rules are pretty clear; in order to win, you just get more ballots than the next person. The candidate with the most votes win. You can explain that to anyone in a few seconds: plain and simple, done and dusted.
Yet, as I survey the state of democracy in our nation, I see so many complex and contradictory voting systems. There is first past the post, then the supplementary vote for PCCs and mayors in England. We have the single transferable vote in Northern Ireland, although that is also open to EU citizens. There is a hybrid proportional scheme with additional member top-ups of party chums in Scotland. I note that the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, is not in his place, but he entertained us with his accidental election earlier in this debate. There is a closed-loop system in Wales, where only the chums can win. Thank goodness the voters rejected the alternative vote in May 2011 in that referendum, but somehow that method persists with the Scottish Crofting Commission elections—apparently.
They are not the only differences. Anyone can vote in Wales or Scotland, regardless of nationality, as long as they live there, but not in England. Then we get all-outs or thirds for councils, and single or double or multimember wards, and four or five-year terms in some councils but not others. In London—I echo the points made by the noble Baroness, Baroness Pinnock—it takes 3,108 electors on average across the whole of London to choose a councillor, but it takes 15,000 in parts of Essex. There are more councillors within the M25 than in the entirety of all the county councils of England. We heard from my noble friend Lord Mackinlay, who is not in his place, about overseas territories. With all this complication, are you still with me?
I remember the case a few years ago in Cambridgeshire. On the same day, there were elections for five different layers of local government, with three separate voting systems. No wonder people were confused. We are meant to be a United Kingdom, but in terms of the electoral system, there is more that divides us than brings us together.
Given a choice in 2011 in a referendum, voters expressed a clear preference for first past the post. The problem is that, when you depart from the simplicity and purity of the principle of the person with the most votes winning, you end up with funny business—and nothing is more harmful to faith in democracy, the legitimacy of politicians and trust in our institutions than funny business.
But this Bill does nothing to address that or the abuses. Recently, we had the unseemly rush to pass the supplementary vote regulations in the Manchester mayoral elections in June. There was the attempted cancellation of local government elections last year. Thank goodness that has been unwound for next May. Thanks to the Government’s screaming U-turn, handbrake turn, on LGR last week, we have all been spared the unseemly debate relating to the gerrymandering of Labour councillors in the formerly proposed Lincoln unitary, where there would be three councillors per ward in the city of Lincoln but only one in the rural hinterland around. That scheme would have betrayed and disgraced a banana republic. How the Labour Party considers itself fit to pass this piece of partisan legislation, I do not know.
There are other omissions in this Bill. Where are the guardrails referred to by the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, for equality in the value of votes? I am entirely with my noble friend Lord Jamieson that a bank card can just be picked up from the sideboard: there is no security there.
The Bill introduces new jeopardies in the classroom, bringing divisions between teachers and children and among the children themselves. Back in 2018—I am thinking of unincorporated institutions here—the Minister and I together put the Local Government Association on a proper footing. It was previously an unincorporated body. There are plenty of others, such as the Ipswich Suffolk Business Club, a monthly dining club that henceforth would be prohibited from engaging in politics. How many other organisations, clubs and charities would be caught in this crossfire? I do not stand for Reform, but retrospection is clearly wrong in principle.
The Bill puts tinkering before simplicity. It is a missed opportunity that fails to reinforce confidence in the voting system, and it fails to call out the funny business that disavows the principle that you win the election fair and square when you get one more vote than the next man. This Bill should correct it but does not.
Viscount Stansgate (Lab)
My Lords, I am very pleased to make a short contribution to this debate. I begin by congratulating my noble friend Lord Macintosh of Eastwood on his excellent and engaging maiden speech. I declare an interest that, decades ago, I used to organise an annual meeting with the Scottish Parliament on science, to which the noble Lord made contributions. He was a very distinguished Presiding Officer of the Parliament, and I am sure the House will want to hear from him on many more occasions in the future.
I am the 45th listed speaker in this debate; I feel as though I fall into the dinner-break category. I am not the only person to remark upon the exquisite timing of today’s debate. At the weekend, we all heard that two almost incredibly wealthy people had decided to give £36 million each to the same political party. Without a doubt, these are the greatest proposed individual financial gifts ever bestowed upon any political party in British history, and they raise some fundamental challenges to our political system and democracy that we would pass over at our peril. Do we want our democratic politics to be reduced to a fundraising race to the bottom? We can look across the Atlantic and see the divisive impact of big money and big donors in America.
The Bill proposes a limit of £100,000 for political donations made in a calendar year by an overseas contributor, and I am beginning to think that that figure ought to be reviewed. We should also extend the moratorium—I would prefer a ban—on the donation of crypto assets to registered political parties. Crypto assets, almost by definition, make it hard or impossible to be sure that the donation is not tainted in any way by illegal activity and unknown malign actors. Further, there is a bigger question about the appropriate limits on individual donations. The two donors in question have claimed not to want anything in return for their £36 million. If you believe that, then I have got news for you: you will believe anything. There are huge questions to be raised about transparency and accountability. How is their relationship going to be monitored? We cannot have undercover reporters at every single drinks party to let us know what is going on.
I turn to other areas in the Bill. This is an important Bill that seeks to implement manifesto commitments. Many Members in this Chamber have contested elections at local and constituency level. I am one of those who rather wishes that the Bill was a consolidated Bill, but we are where we are. I am interested in some of the comments made about extending the franchise and its political effect—please do not tempt me, as I will run out of time—and I support the right of 16 and 17 year-olds to vote. When I speak to young people in schools—or, as other noble Lords have mentioned, at Learn with the Lords events—I am struck by the fact that they know they have the greatest stake in the future. They are hungry to know and understand the system, and we should do a great deal more than we do even now to help with their education. Forgive me, but, to my generation, the words “tick tock” refer to a grandfather clock or the passage of time; however, to the new generation, TikTok is how they get the news and video clips that shape their view of the world. I therefore strongly support the proposals in Clause 15 for local authorities to have a duty to raise awareness among young people.
On voter registration, I strongly support the spirit of Part 2. In the late 1970s, I was an agent. In the constituency of Kensington North, where I lived, grew up and first voted, I conducted an exercise in voter registration in a ward in the north of the constituency. I was astonished to find that there were 371 people who should have been on that register, so I strongly support what the Bill is seeking to do. But I want to make one point to the Minister: the Electoral Commission will be an increasingly important guardrail for protecting our democracy. Things such as the imprint rules, which have been referred to, and the use of deepfakes can damage trust in our democracy. When she winds up, can my noble friend the Minister assure the House that the Electoral Commission will have adequate resources to do the expanded role it is expected to carry out?
Finally, there is one issue I want to raise with my noble friend that noble Lords might consider very esoteric: the demise of the Crown and its impact on elections. Does the Bill guard against the possibility, however unlikely, that a general election at the very end of a five-year Parliament could be put at risk by the demise of the Crown? To be precise, could there be rare circumstances that cause the postponement of a general election for 14 days beyond the statutory five-year Parliament limit?
My time is up. I hope we can get as much consensus as possible on some of these areas in the Bill, because it will help preserve the stability of our democracy and the representation of the people upon which it rests.
Baroness Deech (CB)
My Lords, the Bill is concerned with fair voting and its extension. Why, then, are Peers—us—still not included in a system that is almost universal? The exclusion of Peers from participating in general elections is an outdated democratic anomaly that has no place in a modern society. Sitting Members of the House of Lords are taxpayers, they are subject to the law, and they are as profoundly affected as any other sector of society by the laws made by the House of Commons—which, in the last resort, they cannot defy. Denying them—us—the fundamental democratic right to vote and classing them as persons with “legal incapacity” unnecessarily strips them of their basic civic voice. Granting Peers the right to vote in parliamentary elections would not diminish the primacy of the Commons; rather, it would align our electoral system with universal suffrage principles, ensuring that every adult citizen can participate in choosing the government that shapes their daily life.
Our wise and well-informed heads cannot vote, but 16 year-olds will be enfranchised. The mandate committed the Government to this. This age limit adds to our muddled approach to maturity. Those 16 year-olds cannot yet buy alcohol, gamble, sign a tenancy agreement, get credit or marry. If they are mature enough to vote, then, sooner or later, those other age limits will have to align. As it stands, 16 year-olds will need to be protected from family voting, coercion, undue influence by their peers and family, and impersonation. They are particularly subject to pressure because they probably still are financially dependent on their parents, live at home, remain in education and have little privacy.
Very soon, young people will be barred from accessing Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Snapchat, Facebook and Twitter, so where are they going to get the necessary information that makes their vote meaningful? They do not read newspapers or even books. A survey by Statista in 2025 showed that only 18.7% of teens read something daily. Newspaper consumption is even lower: only 14% of under-16s read a paper. Where are they to get the information and experience they need to cast an intelligent vote? At 15 years and 51 weeks, they will not be allowed to access relevant media, but the next day they can vote, based on who knows what information. Are school teachers equipped to teach about political participation without straying into party politics?
This takes me to the Bill’s provisions on bank card ID. A 16 year-old can apply for a bank card, but they would have to do so quickly if an election was imminent. I cannot see that bank cards will prevent impersonation. A bank card has a name on it, but no link to the person carrying it. What principle are the Government adopting to ensure that identity is proven and impersonation prevented? What steps will the Government take to prevent fraud and impersonation and ensure that bank cards are secure enough?
Finally, I turn to donations that may be made to political parties. The Bill rightly seeks to prevent foreign money influencing the system, but what is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. British activists and NGOs have a long history of trying to influence American elections and policies—not through money but by lobbying; and American strategists, think tanks, and corporations with UK subsidiaries have influenced British elections.
The position is not wholly consistent because trade union members still have to opt out from, rather than opt in to, funding the Labour Party. There should be individual consent to one’s money being taken to fund the party. Trade union donations are transparent, if forced, and are 100% donations to one party. Moreover, there is no cap on individual donations. If criminal convictions disqualify a person from donating, each trade union member will need scrutiny. There is a law against promising an honour, such as a peerage, in return for a political donation, but sadly this law is too narrow and hard to enforce. We should be on the lookout for cash for honours. This Bill, in all, does little on ensuring the integrity of the voting booth, the knowledge and identity needed to be a voter, and influential donations.
Lord Farmer (Con)
My Lords, I was sad to hear from the right reverend Prelate that this was his last contribution in the House and that he is retiring at the end of the month. I served with him on the Council for Christians and Jews—he was a chairman and I was a Christian vice-chairman—and I was thankful for his leadership, wisdom and kindness. I wish him well in his retirement.
I will speak mainly against plans to lower the voting age to 16, on three grounds: evidence of brain development; the confusion they bring to our policy approach to maturity; and their reinforcement of shopper politics, where building the good society matters less than giving ever more stuff to voters. Young people face an array of wicked policy problems, and successfully tackling just one of these would make a far more tangible difference to their outcomes.
I am concerned about registering 14 year-olds as attainers, given the extra layers of safeguarding required for those at confidential addresses who have fled domestic abuse or other threats. This will intensify bureaucratic burdens without guaranteeing safety. The more systems in which an address is recorded and the more people who may lawfully access it, the greater the potential for error or unauthorised disclosure. The Government consider such data to be sensitive enough to require the special non-disclosure regime laid out in Clauses 7 to 14, but can the Minister explain why they should collect and maintain electoral registration data on children two years before they can vote, putting an additional younger birth cohort at risk?
In Committee in the Commons, the Minister pleaded consistency with current arrangements where 16 and 17 year-old attainers are on the register—yet lowering the voting age is profoundly inconsistent with other policy areas. Staff I meet across the youth custody estate punctiliously refer to 16 and 17 year-olds as children, precisely because of their relative immaturity. Practitioners who support 16 and 17 year-olds’ mental health tell me that they have so many other life issues that they are trying to come to terms with. Military recruitment of under-18s demonstrates that they are not fully autonomous adults but require special protection. They need parental permission, are not sent into combat and are still considered to be in secondary education. Lowering the voting age increases the risk that young people, especially young women in some communities, are pressurised to vote in a family bloc, as we have heard elsewhere.
During Commons stages debates about reducing the voting age, one supporter pointed to young carers having already carried onerous familial responsibilities for over a decade. But what has that got to do with it? Their exceptional hardships are, thankfully, not typical. Neither are the under-18 youth mayors, held up as exemplars for giving all 16 and 17 year-olds the vote. Worthy anecdotes are not evidence of cohort-wide maturity.
Ironically, neuroscience has heightened awareness, as never before, of how very much more maturing the brain still needs to do at 16. World-renowned developmental psychologist Professor Laurence Steinberg found that the sweet spot for resistance to peer influences is 18. By this point, the majority have developed the capacity to stand up for what they believe and withstand peer pressure to do otherwise. Other studies show that the brain’s control system or executive functions that help young people manage their thoughts, behaviour and decisions in pursuit of a goal grow rapidly from late childhood to mid-teens, stabilising to adult levels only in late adolescence, at 18 to 20 years old.
Executive functions govern how effectively a person can regulate their emotional reactions—perhaps to a TikTok video, as we have heard—evaluate the effects of different influences and decide independently. Voting at 18 means that as many as possible are able, as far as possible, to make independent judgments, hold competing arguments in mind, resist others’ views and consider longer-term consequences. The noble Lord, Lord Macintosh of Eastwood, in his commendable maiden speech, highlighted the higher turnout in Scotland, but many 16 to 18 year-olds are still embedded in families and schools where peer pressures can be considerably amplified.
The Commons Minister said that the voting age should be lowered simply because young people are “our nation’s future”. That argument is simply unsustainable. We invest in the first 1,001 days of a child’s life because infants are also our nation’s future. Lowering the voting age means taking an evidentially indefensible step in terms of child protection, requiring a complex legislative and bureaucratic underpinning, perhaps solely for political advantage. More feel-good shopper politics will not solve the problems facing this country, and especially our young people.
Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)
My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend Lord Macintosh on his maiden speech, even though I was unable to be here for it, for which I hope he has forgiven me. As he has not walked out before my speech starts, there is a chance that he might have. I am delighted to contribute to this debate, as part of the process whereby an important manifesto commitment is transferred into legislation. What makes this Bill so important is that it strengthens and future-proofs our democracy at a time when, as in too many countries today, democracy itself is under threat.
I have called on many occasions for the voting age in England to be brought into line with Scotland, where votes at 16 were introduced in 2015. Five years later, Wales made the same change. So there is inescapable logic in extending that to cover the entire UK and applying it to elections at all levels. Votes at 16 is an important democratic development, expanding the electorate and bringing new voices and perspectives into the political process—the comments just now by the noble Lord, Lord Fuller, notwithstanding. But the full benefits of lowering the voting age will not be felt if that right is introduced in a vacuum.
That is why the All-Party Group for Schools, Learning and Assessment, of which I am a member, undertook an inquiry into how the building blocks can be put in place to ensure that young people are prepared for being democratically empowered. The inquiry was concerned with education that supports young people in preparing to vote, but it went beyond that to examine how schools and colleges can foster the democratic skills and knowledge that underpin using the vote and support young people to participate in broader democratic society as critical, engaged and active citizens.
The report was published in July and, as my noble friend Lady Lister said, it stressed the importance of citizenship education in providing the building blocks for young people to understand and develop an appreciation of democratic engagement. Among its recommendations was a call for the Government to ensure that upcoming changes in response to the curriculum and assessment review create a “core curriculum entitlement” to citizenship and that teachers are given the support to enable them to navigate this new aspect of citizenship education with confidence.
If implemented effectively, there is a particular strength in young people registering to vote while still in an educational setting, with schools and colleges able to support them through that process. The Association of Colleges says in its briefing for this debate that colleges are keen to explore the scope for integrating college and school enrolment with voter registration, as has already occurred at several universities. Clause 3 stipulates the entitlement to be registered at 14, signalling an opportunity for schools to embed registration for 14 and 15 year-olds and thus enhance initial citizenship and political literacy education.
I want to highlight the very welcome toughening of rules on political donations and campaign financing in Part 4 of the Bill. The initial provisions were strengthened in another place by the Government adding recommendations by the Rycroft review into countering foreign influence. The restriction being placed on the amount which can be given to a political party during a calendar year by an individual who is a non-UK resident has been set at £100,000, which is appropriate and one that I think the average voter will see as reasonable—unlike the outrageous amounts paid to a political party last week, the timing of which was simply to evade this legislation. As my noble friend Lord Sikka said: these are not donations, they are investments.
That said, I cannot agree with those who called for retrospective legislation to deal with those payments. First, retrospective law is, I believe, fundamentally undemocratic. Secondly, such a move would play into the hands of those who claim this Bill is specifically aimed at one party in particular. It is not, of course, but that argument could quite easily be used against Labour unless the Government tread carefully.
There is also an issue with domestic political campaign donations. At Third Reading in another place, Minister Eshalomi made a commitment on domestic political finance reform, saying that a new cross-government task and finish team will be working at pace to find a solution to the issue of mega donors in UK politics. I ask my noble friend the Minister to expand on the remit of this task and finish team and tell us whether the Government will commit to the introduction of a donation cap and reduce the national campaign spending limit before the next general election.
Time does not allow me to cover the questions of electoral reform, the Electoral Commission and hostility towards candidates. All of those will need to await Committee, to which I look forward.
Lord Norton of Louth (Con)
My Lords, for reasons of time, I wish to advance two proposals that can also be read across to other Bills. The first is on commencement. As the Delegated Powers Committee notes, the commencement clause, Clause 90, is a standard provision. Some provisions take effect on the day the Bill is passed and others on a day appointed by regulation by the Secretary of State. Such a distinction is usual and, as the committee notes, justified, given that:
“A franchise change will need considerable implementation and preparation in advance of the provisions taking effect”.
The problem is one of uncertainty. The fact that clauses are approved—they become part of the statute—does not mean that they will be enacted. Until they are commenced, they are deemed by the courts to be law in abeyance, or what I have termed “law but not law”. Given the sheer number of provisions in the Bill, not least those that amend existing law, we could end up with a patchwork quilt of provisions commenced and others still in abeyance, creating problems for those who administer election law in knowing what law is in effect.
At the very least, we need greater clarity. The Explanatory Notes include a useful table in Annex A adumbrating how the provisions have territorial application in the UK. Could we not have something similar for commencement provisions, or Keeling-like schedules, with colour coding for changes taking immediate effect and those awaiting commencement? More substantively, there is a case for having sunset provisions. That concentrates minds—it provides a useful discipline and lets those who are affected know that there will not be continuing uncertainty. We have in the statute book already a large body of uncommenced legislation. This is not a satisfactory situation. Will the Minister at least give some guidance as to when provisions not given immediate effect are expected to be commenced? I realise she will not commit to sunset provisions, but that is something we may need to consider.
The second proposal is around consolidation. My noble friend Lord Hayward has raised the need for a consolidation measure. Consolidation is highly desirable, but the chances of a Government providing the necessary resources, not least time, to get such a measure on the statute book are slim.
Given that, there is an alternative—a rather modest one, but at least an achievable one—and that is making provision in the Bill for post-legislative scrutiny. Such a provision qualifies under the criteria I have previously adumbrated for putting a provision for post-legislative scrutiny in a Bill—namely, that it is large, complex, makes substantial changes to the law, is contested, and has not been subject to pre-legislative scrutiny. This Bill fulfils those criteria. I think it would provide some reassurance to all those affected by the Bill to know that it will be subject to review. Once enacted, it will qualify for post-legislative review, in any event, three to five years after enactment. Unfortunately, not all departments are rigorous in carrying out such reviews; implementation is somewhat variable. Given that, putting it beyond doubt that its effects will be reviewed is both desirable and achievable. The Government have nothing to lose by making such a provision and a great deal to gain in determining that the law has achieved what it is intended to achieve.
I appreciate I have focused on detail, but, as we know, the devil is usually in the detail. We need to know what will take effect and when, and whether it does what it is intended to do. The Government will argue that getting something on the statute book is necessary. My point is that it is not sufficient.
Lord Teverson (LD)
My Lords, back in 1970, I was very grateful that I had been born in March, because the 1970 general election was the first time that 18 year-olds could vote in general elections, and I had been born 18 years before, in March. I had the excitement of not having to wait until I was 23, five years later or whatever; I was able to vote three months after I attained the age of 18.
More than that, the London Borough of Redbridge, where I lived at the time, had had a “Welcome to Citizenship” event one evening that I had been to, and I was all revved up to exercise my democratic duty on 18 June 1970 in the constituency of Wanstead and Woodford, where Winston Churchill was once MP. So, I turned up, cast my secret ballot and felt I had done my citizenship duty. The rub was that it was a completely wasted vote, because Wanstead and Woodford was a two-party race and my vote counted for nothing whatever in the constituency or even nationally. That was, if you like, a lesson to me, although I only thought about it afterwards when I was fairly incredulous about the results and realised that reform was needed.
If I think back just two years now, to 2024, of course we had the most unequal election that we have ever had in this country, with a Labour Party in government with 411 Members of Parliament, a majority of 172, on an astounding proportion of one-third of the vote. Not only that, in that election we had 8 million people who had not bothered to register and 40% of the remaining electorate who did not even bother to turn out; we had 12,000 people rejected at the polling stations because they did not turn up with their ID; and even of the 60% who voted, at least one-quarter had to vote tactically rather than for the candidate they actually wanted. That is what is wrong.
I was incredibly impressed by the opening address of the Minister, who emphasised, very early on, the equality of votes: that one vote should not be worth any more than that of a millionaire, or perhaps we should say of any other elector. That is clearly the biggest vacant area of this Bill. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Fuller, that we should have one way in which we vote in this country, but clearly we disagree, in that we need to make sure that people’s votes count. At the moment, they do not, and the Bill is completely blank in that area.
We need rejuvenation in our democracy and I will make one other small point, which is around the voting age. I absolutely welcome 16 and 17 year-olds voting. As has been said before, it has been shown, particularly in Scotland and also, I believe, in Wales, that people of that age range vote more than the 18 to 20 or 18 to 24 year-olds, and that, once they have voted, they continue to vote far more than the cohort that was not able to vote at that age. To me, that rejuvenates democracy. What I would say to the Minister and to this House is, please make sure that the votes of those 16 and 17 year-old electors who enter the polling station at our next general election, unlike mine back in Wanstead and Woodford in 1970, are not wasted.
Lord Markham (Con)
There have been over four hours of debate at this stage, with many views, and I shall speak briefly on what I think are two larger, overriding points to consider. First, this Bill is central to the legitimacy of our democracy and, as such, any rules that we set under the Bill must be fair, unbiased and consistent.
I accept that that the acronym FUC is probably not the wisest acronym I have ever come up with, but I hope we can all agree that fairness, unbias and consistency need to be the bedrock of everything we consider here. Otherwise, as I think the noble Baroness, Lady Paul, said, we are in danger of seeing the Americanisation of our politics. I think anyone who has seen, in the American example, the way that states and districts have been gerrymandered, or the way that politically aligned district attorneys and judges from one party or another subvert the law in favour of one party or another, will accept that that is not a path any of us would want to go down, or the kind of democracy I believe any of us want.
The second overriding point I want us to think about in our democracy is that we must not feed the narrative that this is an establishment stitch-up to somehow disadvantage Reform. We need only look at the recent AfD vote in east Germany or National Rally in France to see the inherent dangers of something being seen as an establishment stitch-up. We need to make sure that this is not an opportunity for Reform to cast this as somehow the establishment versus the people. That will only be to our detriment and we need to make sure that the Bill does not add fuel to that fire. With that in mind and with the principles of fairness, unbias and consistency, I will talk about some of the inconsistencies and the things that I think that the Bill sets against these.
My noble friend Lord Jamieson set this out very clearly when he asked: why would we have a proposal that seeks to decrease voter security by moving away from voter ID, unless we were trying to make it easier for a certain segment of the population to vote than another, perhaps to disproportionately favour one party?
Around the electoral age, I would say that, if we believe that 16 year-olds should be allowed to vote, we must give them the ability to inform themselves properly as well, and, like it or not, social media is the platform that is now the major forum for political views and exchanges. Yet at the same time we are restricting social media feeds and personalisation, which is the main way that 16 and 17 year-olds will receive political information. Surely, if we consider a 16 year-old old enough to choose a Government, we must accept that they are old enough to hear the arguments on all the media platforms without government restrictions.
The second principle that I will take to Committee is that any rules on donations are fair and unbiased. Anything that we do which specifically rules in or out particular groups to the benefit of one party or another, such as the rules on union funding mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Johnson, will again put this Bill under the spotlight. If rules are seen to enable unfettered large union donations to Labour, while at the same time restricting large individual donations to Reform, including even retrospectively, I am afraid that there is a danger that we will feed the Reform narrative that this is an anti-establishment stitch-up, which will do much greater damage to our democracy. I believe and worry that this will give much more succour to their argument.
I will finish by saying that as we go through Committee, the criteria I will be looking to test each measure on are fairness, unbias and consistency. I will probably try to come up with a better acronym, as I say, but those are the rules that I will be applying in Committee.
Lord Janvrin (CB)
My Lords, I find myself in agreement with the introductory two points from the noble Lord, Lord Markham. I shall try to be brief. My particular interest in the Bill is in the changes proposed to our electoral registration system. This stems from being, six years ago, a member of a committee which undertook post-legislative scrutiny of the Electoral Registration and Administration Act 2013. The committee drew attention to the obvious fact that large numbers of eligible voters are missing from our electoral registers, and we recommended at that time that improving the accuracy and completeness of the registers should be given government priority. Six years later, the problem is only much worse.
As others have drawn attention to, the Electoral Commission research suggests that a staggering 8 million people across the United Kingdom are not registered to vote. Like others, I therefore welcome the intent, as recommended by our committee six years ago, to pilot new and automated methods of voter registration to remove barriers and make it easier to register. These systems are in widespread use in other countries; the technology exists. I ask the Minister about a timetable for moving forward on this. It is an urgent problem, but solutions can be found if the will is there.
Let me turn briefly—and I will try to be brief—to some of the other provisions in the Bill. On political donations, I welcome the Government’s intention to tighten the rules, and I look forward to the extensive discussion, as is evidenced by this debate, on how best to do this and to take account of the Rycroft review. I add that I support the intention in the Bill to strengthen the independence and effectiveness of the Electoral Commission. It has a vital role to play, and I ask the Minister whether she is satisfied that the commission has the resources to carry out effectively the many tasks now assigned to it.
I have doubts on lowering the voting age, but it is a manifesto commitment, and I can see that a case can be made to improve democratic engagement in this way. Those still in education can more readily be taught about why voting matters, and a commitment adopted early in life may stick. But this can only possibly make sense, as many others have said, if sufficient real resources are made available to schools and colleges to accompany this change.
I welcome the fact that the Bill recognises that electoral interference from hostile overseas actors remains a real threat. I was a member of the Intelligence and Security Committee, which produced a Russia report in 2019. This murky domain is constantly evolving, and we are right to take it very seriously.
As other noble Lords have said, we live at a time of unprecedented uncertainty, when democracy and the rule of law are in retreat around the world. We in this country are reminded daily that public trust in our ancient, hard-won and precious democratic construct is at a low ebb. As others have said, this is a real challenge of our times. Ensuring that electoral processes are free, fair and fit for purpose is one necessary way of addressing this challenge. I welcome the Bill.
The Lord Bishop of Hereford
My Lords, I join a number of noble Lords who have raised the issue of deepfakes in electoral campaigning. I am pleased to be supported in this by my right reverend friend the Bishop of Leicester, who is, unfortunately, unable to be here today. It is regrettable that the Bill does not address the growing challenge to our democracy posed by deepfakes. Democracy depends not only upon the integrity of our electoral processes but upon the integrity of the information environment in which those processes operate, as the noble Lord, Lord Sahota, powerfully reminded us. Voters must be able to know when political content has been generated or materially altered by artificial intelligence. Without that assurance, it becomes harder for citizens to distinguish truth from fabrication, and easier for bad actors to manipulate democratic debate.
Deepfakes pose a distinct challenge to our democracy because they erode the trust on which democratic life depends. They diminish confidence in what voters see and hear, weakening our shared basis for public deliberative discourse. Ofcom research from 2024 found that 57% of respondents were concerned about the impact of deepfakes during the general election; almost half reported that they did not know if they had seen one in the previous week, and a quarter reported that they had.
The Christian and Jewish scriptures forbid the bearing of false witness against one’s neighbour, and we have already seen this played out within our own politics. In 2025, a deepfake falsely depicting George Freeman MP defecting to Reform UK circulated widely online yet reportedly did not meet the threshold for any criminal offence. Noble Members of this House have also been subject to deepfake imagery calling their character into question in a most disgraceful way. It is imperative that the law prohibits the creation or distribution of content that falsely purports to be a candidate or to speak on their behalf with the intention of deceiving voters, while of course at the same time the law must continue to safeguard satire, parody and legitimate political expression.
All AI-generated content should therefore carry clear imprints indicating that it is synthetic media. However, we should go further. AI-generated political content should be ineligible for monetisation, and platforms should be required to provide regular reports to Ofcom detailing monetised political content and enforcement actions taken against offenders. We should also take seriously the recommendation of the Communications and Digital Committee in 2025 to establish a levy on UK profits from online platforms to provide sustainable funding for media literacy initiatives.
As I close, I wish to add my thanks to my right reverend friend the Bishop of Lichfield for his contributions both today and in his time in this House. He has a gift for offering understated but remarkably shrewd insights to our deliberations here, and has ministered faithfully in this place through his pastoral relationship with staff across the House. He will be greatly missed, and not least for his example of taking significantly less than the speech limit in this debate. It is fitting that my right reverend friend has ended his time in the Chamber as he began, advocating for the importance of strong British democracy.
The omission of any consideration of deepfakes in this Bill is a missed opportunity to safeguard and strengthen this democracy further.
Lord Shamash (Lab)
My Lords, first of all I congratulate my noble friend Lord Macintosh on his maiden speech. I also wish the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Lichfield very well in his retirement; I hope he has planned it properly so he will have a lot of fun.
The message I want to convey is the issue about underregistration, which people have discussed during the course of this debate. Before I do that, I decided I would get a printed copy of the Representation of the People Act—something I have lived with for many years—and it is that thick. There are 536 pages in this bit of legislation—536.
I remember in 2001, when I was a young lawyer, going to a meeting about the creation of the Electoral Commission. That was 25 years ago. One of the issues we discussed was consolidation, which is a matter I have raised with my noble friend the Minister. It is desperately called for. It is a nonsense that we have been through this—25 years and we are still waiting for consolidation. I do not think I will live to see it, the way we are going. It is quite extraordinary. What a way of carrying on, frankly.
We have had the figure of 8 million people not on the register. Just think of it this way: that is every single person in London. That is the population of London. That is 8 million people who are not on the register who should be.
I wish to address underregistration, covered by Clauses 17 to 24 and Schedule 2, which set out the mechanisms for automatic voter registration—AVR—without an application. Clause 20 goes on to set out the provisions for a pilot scheme. I urge the Minister to take speedy action to implement the pilot in as short a time as possible, so that the scheme will be ready for the next general election, not the one after.
The measures seek to introduce more automated forms of voter registration and could help enfranchise the millions of private renters, and other underrepresented groups, who face barriers to both registering to vote and remaining registered when they move home, for example. Datasets could lead to more than nine in 10 private renters being registered to vote. Of the 9.41 million private renters over 16 in England and Wales at the 2021 census, 8.5 million lived in households likely to interact with the council for council tax, HMRC for self-assessment tax returns, DVLA for driving licences, and DWP for universal credit, state pensions or other means-tested benefits. Automatic registration would update electoral records when people update their address with trusted public services such as local authorities for council tax, et cetera.
Research has found that AVR could increase private renter registration from 65% to 90%—a dramatic increase—by removing these key barriers to registration. However, the Bill currently contains no clear legal duty or timeline for the nationwide rollout of automatic voter registration. Without this, there is a risk that this reform will be fully effective only for a general election in the 2030s, rather than the next one. The Government should commit to laying regulations by a specific date and to ensuring adequate resourcing and equality impact monitoring.
My view is that to deal with this now is very urgent if we are serious about getting our electoral law into some sort of proper shape. Therefore, will my noble friend the Minister give a clear indication that the AVR system, via the pilot, will be implemented quickly, as set out in the Bill?
Lord Young of Acton (Con)
My Lords, I declare an interest as the director of the Free Speech Union.
The noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, said earlier that he was looking forward to my remarks, seemingly under the impression that the Free Speech Union would be within scope of the new regulations in the Bill. But the Free Speech Union is not a think tank; nor is it regulated by the Charity Commission. So, unless there is an amendment in the flurry of government amendments we are anticipating which somehow brings campaigning membership organisations within scope but nevertheless exempts trade unions, I think the Free Speech Union is probably safe. I share the reservations of the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, about that practice, and I will be voting for his amendment shortly.
I note that the party of the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, received a £2.4 million donation in 2005 from a company called 5th Avenue Partners, owned by Michael Brown, who was based in Spain at the time and was later convicted of fraud. So while I do not think the Bill will affect donations to the Free Speech Union, it may well affect donations to the Liberal Democrats.
I want to talk about the impact that lowering the voting age to 16 will have on the regulations that are due to be brought before both Houses by the Secretary of State for DCMS later this year, restricting or preventing children from accessing social media. I share the same concerns as those articulated by my noble friend Lord Markham. If you are going to lower the voting age to 16, it makes a blanket ban on under-16s accessing social media less sensible. According to Ofcom, among 12 to 15 year-olds, individual social media platforms are the most used single news sources. To impose a blanket ban on under-16s accessing social media in the forthcoming regulations would make it much harder for children—when they reach the age of 16, they cannot access social media platforms before that point—to make informed decisions about who to vote for.
There is an obvious solution to this problem, which is not to restrict access for under-16s to content of democratic importance, news publisher content and journalistic content. There are duties in the Online Safety Act that require social media companies and other providers designated as category 1 providers to protect all three types of content, set out in Sections 17 to 19 of the Act. But these duties have not yet been activated, despite assurances from Ofcom that they would be activated this summer. It perhaps will not surprise noble Lords to discover that all the take-down duties in the Online Safety Act have been activated, but some of the keep-up duties—the duties inserted to safeguard freedom of expression—have not yet been activated, including the duties to protect content of democratic importance, news publisher content and journalistic content. My question to the Minister is: will she assure the House that, when those duties are activated, under-16s will not be restricted from accessing the kind of information they will need if they are going to make informed choices about who to vote for when they reach the new, lower voting age?
There is another, related concern: what content social media platforms are obliged to age-gate, because the content is supposedly harmful to children. These child safety duties in the Online Safety Act kicked in in July 2025, meaning that in order to access supposedly harmful content, you needed to be able to prove that you were 18 or over. But some of the content that was age-gated included a speech by Katie Lam in the House of Commons about the grooming gangs, footage of anti-immigration protests outside asylum hotels and, ironically enough, a video made by Spiked about online censorship. I ask the Minister whether she will make it clear to Ofcom that it should no longer insist that social media companies age-gate this type of content to those aged 18 and above, if the voting age is going to be lowered to 16. That is precisely the kind of content covered by Sections 17 to 19, so the simplest remedy would be to not restrict children’s access to those types of content. If that is a step too far for the Government, will the Minister at least assure the House that speeches made in here and the other place will not be restricted for 16 and 17 year-olds, as some of them are at present? To paraphrase Robert Lowe in the context of the Reform Act 1867: we must educate our masters.
Lord Pack (LD)
My Lords, I too thank the Minister for opening such a long and detailed debate, one that has shown the broad range of expertise in this House, including that of the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Lichfield, whose presence we will certainly miss. Even if it is not quite a one-for-one swap, it was very welcome to hear the maiden speech of the noble Lord, Lord Macintosh, and I am sure he will contribute much to the Bill and other topics in the future.
As someone with a PhD in the Great Reform Act, I am tempted by the reference made by the noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill, to digress deep into the 19th century but, mindful of the time, I should perhaps rather concentrate on some of the common themes we have heard in the debate: the need to strengthen and protect our democracy, so that it is the voice of the ordinary citizen that is dominant, not that of the billionaire or the foreign Government and so that the necessary bureaucracy of elections serves the citizen and helps them exercise their democratic say, rather than obstructs or frustrates them.
There are important measures to welcome in the Bill, such as the introduction of votes at 16, the progress on automatic voter registration and the strengthened independence for the Electoral Commission. But there are other areas where the Bill as it currently stands falls short, where it leaves too many loopholes or even creates some new ones, and where there will therefore be much to test out in Committee—when, let us hope, the Government will be open to persuasion.
The Government themselves have acknowledged the need to do more. They tabled a very large number of amendments late in the House of Commons process for the Bill—a subject to which I suspect the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, may return shortly. The Government have also talked of the need for further amendments to help implement the Rycroft review, as well as requesting that the Electoral Commission review spending limits, and made that late commitment given by the Minister in the House of Commons to a new task and finish group looking at mega donors. Clearly, there is much more still to do.
So often, reviews, proposals and good intentions run into the sand of “when legislative time will allow”, but we have a primary legislation vehicle available here and now, so it will be crucial that we make full use of Committee and Report to polish, fix and improve the Bill. There is a certain urgency about it as well, given the dangers and strains that our existing systems face. There are dangers from abroad, as set out by the new chief of MI6 in her first public speech just before Christmas, and those set out by the director-general of MI5 when briefing political parties earlier this year. There is also the unprecedented concentration of donations to political parties from just a handful of the super-rich, a trend accelerated in the last few days but present before then too. For example, more than 80% of all the declared donations ever received by Nigel Farage’s party have come from just two people.
It goes wider than that. For example, as the noble Lord, Lord Wills, mentioned earlier, Transparency International has shown that the proportion of donations coming from those giving £1 million or more has surged thirtyfivefold in under a decade—and those figures are even before last week. We are moving rapidly from a broad-based, democratic system of financing parties to one of unprecedented sums coming from a tiny number of people.
There is no one magic solution to solve that. Action on multiple fronts is required, which is why we need this Bill but also an improved version of it. For example, as the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, the noble Baronesses, Lady Royall and Lady Goudie, and others have mentioned, there is a question about the breadth of donations that need capturing by rules covering transparency.
There are also some important loopholes in what the Bill proposes. I have mentioned before the Donald Trump loophole, as one could call it: the ability for him to split ownership of one of his firms with several members of his family, thus bringing each of them individually underneath the threshold at which the protections in the Bill in terms of foreign ownership of firms would kick in. The threshold set in the Bill is a much more generous one than the threshold set for controlling foreign ownership in our newspaper sector. I am not clear why our democracy should deserve lower protection than our media landscape. Although the measure to add transparency to donations direct to candidates is very welcome, it also creates a new loophole as the Government are not planning aggregation rules—so one large donation could be, completely legally, split into multiple small donations to candidates and kept secret.
We will have to explore these and other examples further in Committee, along with toughening up the proposed corporate donation limits, where in particular the Electoral Commission has quite rightly warned that there is again scope to split multiple donations among multiple people and therefore have them become acceptable because they are not aggregated. But such closing of loopholes can get us only so far, and that is why we on these Benches welcome the many suggestions in the Commons, including from the Labour Benches, for progress towards a donor cap so that a small number of very rich people cannot drown out the democratic voices of millions of ordinary citizens.
I hope the principle of protecting our democracy as one in which every individual gets their fair voice—but also, perhaps, the strong support we have heard from so many in the Labour Party in this debate today, as well as the support from many other parts of this House, including from the noble Lords, Lord Evans and Lord Carter, and the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, as well as many on the Labour Benches—will encourage the Government to have a very open mind on this topic as the Bill progresses.
That, though, is just the “money in” part. We also need to do much better at regulating the “money out” part, as there are significant gaps in the controls on campaigning expenditure. The Government’s letter to the Electoral Commission asking it to review certain cap levels is certainly welcome, but we also need to move away from the Government being in the driving seat on setting the limits that will apply for their own re-election bid. It should be an independent regulator that is in the driving seat.
We need to recognise that political campaigning is not a part-time activity. As we all know very well, it happens all year round, year after year. Yet expense limits are part-time. They do not apply all year round, year after year. That leaves a huge gap in our democratic defences, one that needs closing with year-round spending controls. As the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, mentioned, we also need to close that gap because we are now in a world where national mailshots at local election time, unless it is near to a general election when the general election limits apply, are in fact a completely uncapped, unlimited form of campaigning that can completely drown out the campaigning that takes place at a local level.
I would not want to disappoint noble Lords by not mentioning the merits of electoral reform. First past the post is designed for a two-party system, yet we now have five and six-party systems around the country. While I commend the modesty of the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, in feeling that an election system that results in his own election is flawed, it is possible to take a different view of that. So often, supporters of first past the post have talked about the stability and the clear mandates that it provides. I humbly suggest that the evidence of the last few years suggests that perhaps now is the time to look again, so I very much hope that talk of a national commission to draw up proposals to change our electoral system will turn into action.
I turn to an area of much greater cross-party agreement: the need to tackle abuse and intimidation of those taking part in a democratic system. It is a topic that I know the Minister is committed to and that has rightly been mentioned as an important issue in this debate by the noble Baronesses, Lady Leaman, Lady Morgan and Lady Smith, and others. There are undoubtedly some welcome moves in the Bill on that topic, but they are pretty limited compared with the number of excellent reports and recommendations such as from the recent Speaker’s Conference or those set out by the Jo Cox Foundation or the Online Safety Network. There has been very little movement, in particular, in the online aspects of those problems, so I very much hope that is an area where we can make progress in Committee.
I have one final area to mention. There is of course that question of electoral consolidation, as mentioned by the noble Lords, Lord Hayward, Lord Norton and Lord Shamash, and indeed by many other Peers in the other recent debate that the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, held in this House. The statute book is an overcomplicated mess; reviews and experts have consistently concluded that for decades, but the situation keeps on getting worse. That is a problem for returning officers and for the public sector staff working at the front line to try to make our elections function. It is a problem because of the risks of foreign influence that it opens us up to, as the Rycroft review has set out. It is bad for the ordinary citizen and for civil society because, far too often, to work out how you can use your democratic rights, you need to call on a lawyer. Lawyers are wonderful people in many ways, but the need to call on them should be safely limited.
To give just one illustration of the complexity of election law, the Explanatory Notes to the Bill point out that it refers to and amends 20 Acts and 19 statutory instruments. To be fair, there is a very welcome piece of what one could call mini-consolidation in the heart of the Bill on the rules to do with election forms, and those would certainly help us avoid situations such as the ludicrously long 72-page statutory instrument that was required simply to add the veteran card as an acceptable form of ID. Having tempted the Government to one step of tidying up election law in this Bill, I hope that in Committee we may be able to tempt the Government to a little more. Why, for example, are the Parliamentary Elections Act 1695 and the European Parliamentary Elections Act 1993 not fully repealed? I give those as two simple examples of how there is tidying up that could be done that would make things clearer and would clear the road to full consolidation in due course.
Our democracy is a precious thing. We have warnings from other countries of how quickly democracy can decay if it is not properly nurtured and protected. Much of the Bill is welcome, but much of it needs improvement to go further. There is an urgency about those improvements, because in legislative time the next general election is already near. What we do not fix in the Bill, we may well not be able to fix before the next election. I look forward to the Government continuing to engage with other parties and outside experts, and to Peers working collaboratively across the House so that the Bill ends up being a major milestone to improve our democracy rather than a missed opportunity that we all regret.
Baroness Finn (Con)
My Lords, this has been a long and thoughtful debate. I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Macintosh of Eastwood, not only on being a long-standing friend of the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, but on a witty and erudite maiden speech. I wish the right reverend Prelate a long and healthy retirement.
Having listened to today’s debate, it is hard to escape the conclusion that this legislation is both rushed and ill thought through, with a lack of proper consultation. However, I thank the Minister for taking the time to meet last week to discuss our concerns. As the Bill progresses, I will work with my noble friends Lady O’Neill of Bexley and Lord Jamieson to provide scrutiny from our Front Bench, focusing on Part 4 on campaigns and political expenditure and Part 5 on enforcement and the Electoral Commission.
Before I turn to the details of the debate and the measures we will pursue, I wish to address two matters of principle. First, changes to the rules by which political parties compete should command the widest possible confidence, as my noble friend Lord Markham made clear. Some of the Bill has been consulted on and some of it is welcome, but its most consequential political finance provisions were added late in the Commons, after the Rycroft review, without the cross-party agreement that should accompany changes capable of altering the competitive balance always present in how political parties finance their operations. Even a well-intentioned Government should proceed by consensus wherever they can.
The Rycroft review, published on 25 March, recommended an annual cap on donations from British voters living abroad. The Government chose a £100,000 cap and announced that it would apply to donations made from that day. On 6 July, the Government announced a further minimum residence rule. An overseas elector returning to the United Kingdom would remain subject to the cap until he or she had been resident here for a full calendar year, a rule which would apply retrospectively from 25 March. A modified cap, running from 6 July, was also proposed for people moving here who had not been registered as overseas electors. The Government said that those provisions were needed to remove opportunities to circumvent the strengthened regime.
The Government are the temporary custodian of state power. They should not use that power to frustrate the finances of their political opponents. The best safeguard against a future Government doing the same to any one of us is a body of electoral law made, wherever possible, by agreement.
That brings me to the second principle. Retrospective legislation is an extraordinary measure and demands the most compelling justification. Under these provisions, donations that are today permissible may suddenly become unlawful after their commencement. The Government point to a time-critical risk of evasion, but this House must test whether that claim justifies such an exceptional course and whether adequate safeguards have been provided. It is important to draw a distinction between retrospective measures that apply from the point of a government announcement and those that apply before any formal announcement. If the Reform party has accepted dubious donations in full knowledge of what the Labour Government already laid as amendments in July, that would be unwise of it.
Whatever Ministers’ present intentions, they must understand that conventions can break down when there is rushed, retrospective legislation without proper consultation or cross-party engagement. One side cannot resist the temptation to act unilaterally, the next retaliates, and the rules of democratic competition become another instrument of partisan power. We should not begin that race to the bottom.
As I said, this has been an interesting and considered debate with excellent contributions, not least from a former Prime Minister, my noble friend Lady May of Maidenhead, who spoke powerfully on crypto assets. It has demonstrated both the depth of concern and the wisdom of subjecting these late and complex provisions to full scrutiny in your Lordships’ House. We have heard important questions on everything from the rationale and consistency of the proposal to give 16 and 17 year-olds the vote, from my noble friends Lord Brady of Altrincham, Lord Bailey of Paddington, Lord Young of Acton and Lord Farmer, to the rights of Commonwealth citizens to vote, from my noble friend Lord Mackinlay of Richborough, and the abuse of candidates, from the noble Baronesses, Lady Morgan of Cotes and Lady Smith of Llanfaes.
I digress momentarily to say to the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool, that he is absolutely right that the great Stanley Baldwin sadly did not lead the Conservative Party to victory in the 1929 election, but he did lead the party to an historic victory two years later in 1931, with more women than men believed to have chosen the Conservatives at that election.
I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response to all the concerns raised in this debate, but we should also acknowledge the areas where there is scope for agreement. We support measures that protect candidates, campaigners and elected representatives from abuse, intimidation and violence while preserving robust political debate. We will also engage constructively on the regulation of election advertising, including the challenges posed by AI-generated material. There are other measures, such as the consolidation of electoral law, which many noble Lords have mentioned, that can command broad support. That only reinforces the case for proceeding by consensus wherever possible.
This is a wide-ranging Bill that will require scrutiny and amendment across many areas. I draw attention to a few matters that we intend to pursue during its passage. We have concerns about the proposed £100,000 annual cap on donations from overseas electors. Overseas electors are British citizens. It is a significant departure to say that a citizen may help to elect the Government but may support a political party only up to a limit that does not apply to a citizen resident here. We do not believe that difference in treatment has been objectively tested by the Government.
Protecting politics from foreign and illicit money requires parties to know the identity of a donor and the true source of the funds. Existing permissibility and reporting rules are not by themselves an answer to every modern risk, so we support proportionate risk-based due diligence duties. As my noble friend Lord Johnson of Lainston pointed out, we go to a great deal of trouble to ensure that we avoid the wrong type of donor. A residence-based cap is a potentially blunt proxy. The Electoral Commission has warned that the new overseas donation rules are complex. We will test their proportionality, workability and transitional effects in Committee.
There is, however, one related area where for now we support a clear prohibition. That is for donations made in cryptocurrency. The noble Baroness, Lady Morgan of Cotes, made a compelling case for a moratorium rather than an outright ban. If we cannot know with confidence where the money funding a donation has originated, we cannot know whether it ultimately came from a permissible source, and that is a fundamentally different issue from restricting a lawful donation from an identifiable British citizen simply because that citizen lives overseas. Where the origin of the funds cannot be reliably ascertained, protecting the integrity of our political system must come first.
We also oppose the Bill’s proposal to restrict a company’s political donation by reference to its post-tax profits over the relevant five-year period. My noble friend Lord Leigh of Hurley spoke eloquently on this issue. There are many legitimate reasons why a company may record little or no profit. A start-up may take years to become profitable, while an established business may reinvest its earnings in growth. Neither circumstance is inherently suspicious. Company directors must act within their legal duties, and political donations or expenditure exceeding £5,000 in aggregate over 12 months generally requires prior shareholder authorisation. The Government can target shell companies, foreign control and pass-through funding directly without excluding genuine British businesses merely because of their accounting position.
The interaction between the Bill and the Electoral Commission’s revised sponsorship guidance creates another risk. The guidance was published on 27 August and is due to apply from 1 January 2027. It explains that a payment may be sponsorship even when made on commercial terms if it helps a party to meet the costs of an event. Branding on banners, literature, lanyards or videos may therefore fall within the donations regime. The position is more nuanced than the present draft suggests. The conference stands supplied within the commission’s maximum rates, and genuine services for an external fringe event bought at market value, may remain commercial transactions, but parties and businesses need a clear and predictable boundary. When the Bill’s new corporate profit and control tests are layered on top, ordinary exhibitors may become impermissible or may simply withdraw, rather than risk being treated as political donors. Party conferences are important forums in public life and businesses commonly engage with more than one party. We will seek a clear statutory protection for genuine commercial transactions while ensuring that disguised donations remain fully regulated.
A related problem concerns party-linked property companies. Political parties have long been associated with social and political clubs whose land or buildings may sit in a legally separate company. If an asset-rich but non-trading company winds up and transfers property to the connected party, the new profit test could prevent the party accepting the transfer even though it is not the mischief at which the rule is aimed. If the profit test remains, we will seek a tightly drawn exemption for long-standing party-connected companies incorporated before a fixed date, with suitable anti-avoidance safeguards. The transitional treatment of certain exempt trusts under the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 provides a model for protecting historic arrangements without opening a route for new shell companies.
The Elections Act 2022 created a power for the Government, subject to parliamentary approval, to designate a strategy and policy statement to which the Electoral Commission must have regard. The current statement expressly preserves the commission’s operational independence. Clause 78 would repeal the power and the associated duties. We oppose the repeal because the statement puts proper weight on practical protections against electoral fraud and interference. The 2015 Tower Hamlets election showed why vigilance matters. Despite the comments of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, and as my noble friend Lord Udny-Lister highlighted, more recently Democracy Volunteers reported possible family voting across 15 of the 22 polling stations that it observed at the Gorton and Denton by-election, and there is evidence that it occurred in Birmingham in May 2026. Clear national guidance, training and reporting are essential. Repealing the statement without demonstrating how those safeguards will be maintained risks sending the wrong signal.
I turn finally to a point raised by my noble friend Lord Jamieson. Devolved franchise rules in Wales and Scotland allow qualifying foreign nationals who are lawfully resident, including some people with limited leave to remain, to register for devolved and local elections. Once registered, they are permissible donors under the current United Kingdom political finance rules, and no general cap applies to individual donations. The Rycroft review said that it had not been provided with evidence that this route had been used to channel foreign money, and I make no allegation that it has, but it identified a potential vulnerability requiring monitoring. If the Government’s case is that the political finance rules must be coherent against foreign influence, they should explain why they are retrospectively capping British overseas electors while leaving this route unaddressed.
Electoral law belongs to the whole country. It is not the private preserve of the Government of the day. Ministers should legislate as though every power and precedent they create may one day be used against them. We will support measures that genuinely protect the ballot, but we will resist provisions that weaken confidence that the rules are being made in a non-partisan manner. The Government should think again before the temporary possession of power becomes a permanent invitation to partisan retaliation.
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have contributed to what has been a thoughtful, wide-ranging and characteristically well-informed debate. I have particularly enjoyed some of the history lessons we have heard about, though I should say to the noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill, that many of the dates she gave were before the Labour Party came into existence—well done for winning those elections. The breadth of experience brought to bear by this House, particularly on electoral matters, is one of its great strengths, and I welcome the careful scrutiny that noble Lords have given to the principles and purposes of this Bill. I, too, echo the thanks that have been given to the many organisations that have provided briefings to us all. I particularly thank Philip Rycroft for all his work on his excellent report.
At its heart, the Representation of the People Bill is about strengthening confidence in our democracy, ensuring that our electoral system is secure, accessible and fit for the future; that those who administer and participate in elections can do so safely; and that every eligible citizen is able to take part freely and with confidence. My noble friend Lady Paul spoke powerfully in saying that challenges to our democracy do not come from voters turning up to vote at their local polling stations—we know that. But challenges do come from elsewhere, and we must all put our minds to how we tackle them.
I was interested to hear both that the Bill is too big and that it does not include the things which noble Lords from around the House want in it. We have also heard that it is being rushed through—that is an opinion—and we were asked whether it will be in time to address imminent crises in some of the areas we are looking at. We can only do our best to get things through as quickly as we can, and to create a Bill that is practicable and manageable but which tackles the main issues.
I will seek to respond to the main points raised in the debate. Where I am not able to cover every contribution in detail, I will of course write to noble Lords. It has been a long debate and I am pretty sure I will not get to everything.
I start by thanking the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Lichfield for his contributions to your Lordships’ House and I wish him well in his retirement. It was a great honour that he chose this debate for his valedictory, and I am grateful for everything he has done during his time here.
I thank my noble friend Lord Macintosh of Eastwood for his maiden speech, which was described by my noble friend Lord Foulkes as powerful, elegant and witty. I totally agree with those sentiments. I note that my noble friend Lord Macintosh is from the Isle of Skye—I have been there only once, but it is one of the most beautiful places I have ever been, and I envy him that. I also echo his thoughts. While we are talking about the political world, as we do in this Bill, all of us owe thanks to our families who put up with the vagaries of living with our political careers. I thank him and wish him well in his career in your Lordships’ House.
I start with some of the points made about engagement on the Bill, which is crucial. The measures in this Bill have been developed through close engagement with key partners from across the electoral community and the devolved Governments, and with younger people, civil society organisations, academics, think tanks, the Parliamentary Parties Panel, the Electoral Commission, the Association of Electoral Administrators, the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives, colleagues from across government, and so on. To deliver these changes, we will continue to work closely with our partners in local and devolved government and with political parties, the electoral sector, education and civil society, and citizens themselves, as we need to ensure that impacts are thoroughly considered and changes are successfully implemented. I absolutely dispute the accusation of lack of consultation. I have been provided with a long list of meetings and engagement that I am happy to provide to the noble Baronesses, Lady Finn and Lady O’Neill. I checked that Philip Rycroft did consult with the Conservative Party during the course of his report.
There has been a great deal of talk—not surprisingly in the current circumstances—about donation caps. My noble friends Lord Wills and Lord Foulkes will know that my style is both to listen and to act on Members’ concerns. This Bill will be no exception to that. The noble Lords, Lord Evans of Weardale, Lord Rennard and Lord Carter, my noble friends Lord Watson and Lady Hodge and the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, wanted to insert a wide enabling power in the Bill. As I said in my introductory speech, we must put politics back under public control. There are shared concerns about the rise of big money in politics and its ability to dominate public power. This Bill is not the totality of our ambition for electoral reform. Work will continue. As a first step, the First Secretary of State and the MHCLG Secretary of State have written to the Electoral Commission to review spending limits, which we believe are too high. We are establishing a cross-government task and finish team to consider threats to UK democracy, including political funding, illegitimate influence and broader threats to political equality. I have heard all the points raised in the Chamber, and I will take those back for consideration.
A number of Peers spoke about the cap and asked why it should be retrospective. We will not allow bad actors to funnel money into our elections in advance of a change in the law. There is a clear time-critical risk of evasion of these new rules that would undermine their purpose if they were brought in at a later date. Donations made by overseas electors—I think this is the information the noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill, was looking for—that breach the new requirements will have to be returned. Regulated transactions involving an overseas elector as a participant that breach new requirements will have to be repaid. Donations made by individuals who returned to the UK, but who were not overseas electors from 6 July 2026, that breach the new requirements will have to be returned. Regulated transactions involving an individual who has returned to the UK as a participant that breach new requirements will have to be repaid. We are removing the incentive for those who want to circumvent protections that we deem necessary. This is not about any one particular donation. These provisions were in consideration before this weekend.
The noble Lords, Lord Wallace, Lord Evans, Lord Rennard and Lord Carter, and my noble friend Lady Hodge raised issues around party spending limits. The Secretary of State and the First Secretary State have asked the Electoral Commission to undertake a review on lowering registered political-party, third-party campaigner and candidate limits to ensure the entire electoral spending framework is scrutinised and fit for purpose. In terms of timing for that, the commission has been asked to provide recommendations no later than July 2027.
Completely understandably, we have had a number of contributions on crypto assets. I will write to answer the specific questions from the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan. I will make some general comments, but I will write and answer her specific ones. The noble Lord, Lord Fuller, and the noble Baroness, Lady Finn, asked very particular questions on this. With this ban, we need to take decisive action to defend the legitimacy and integrity of the democratic system from foreign interference. We do not want to undermine the ban. Applying the ban only after Royal Assent of the Bill would risk bad-faith actors taking advantage of the advance notice of the passage of legislation and undermining public trust in our democracy. As set out by the former Secretary of State on 25 March, any donations made to political parties in crypto assets will not be permitted under the new requirements. Recipients will have a period of 30 days following the coming into force of the provisions in the Bill to return or forfeit crypto-assets donations accepted on or after 25 March 2026, after which enforcement action can be taken and failure to comply will risk criminal liability.
There have been a number of comments around think tanks. This has been a really important issue, both debated here today and in the discussions on this Bill outside. Today we have heard contributions from the noble Lords, Lord Wallace and Lord Brady, and my noble friends Lord Wills, Lord Evans of Sealand, Lady Royall, Lady Hodge and Lady Goudie. Electoral law already covers think tanks that donate or spend during regulated election periods. Our reforms will ensure that only those with a genuine UK connection can contribute to our democracy—for instance, requiring recipients to undertake know your donor due diligence to guard against illegitimate foreign funding. The Rycroft review identified broader risks of foreign financial influence across the political system, including the potential for existing arrangements to be exploited, rather than risks specific to any one type of organisation. Our reforms are designed to address those system-wide vulnerabilities, but we are continuing to think about the issues around think tanks.
We heard many points about the consolidation of electoral law. I understand the issue, particularly after listening—not in the Chamber—to my noble friend Lord Shamash setting out how broad the spectrum of electoral law is. We also heard comments from the noble Lords, Lord Evans, Lord Jamieson, Lord Fuller, Lord Norton, Lord Shamash and Lord Pack, and the noble Baroness, Lady Royall. We understand the calls for consolidation of electoral law. Of course, major reform would take very careful consideration and an extensive amount of time. The Government’s immediate priority is the implementation of our manifesto commitment. A full-scale consolidation and simplification would need an in-depth review and modernisation alongside consolidation, which would be the job of more than one Parliament to achieve.
The Government have an ambitious agenda to improve our elections, including giving 16 and 17 year-olds the right to vote and strengthening the rules around donations. We are focused on delivering that agenda via the Bill. However, we are cognisant of the challenges facing election teams. As the noble Lord, Lord Pack, said, we are taking a tiny step towards consolidation with the forms issue, and we will continue to look at areas that can help modernise and improve the electoral process and delivery.
We heard many comments—some formulated as questions—on young people voting at 16 and 17, and rightly so. There is a lot of support for this around the Chamber, although I appreciate that it is not universal. The noble Lord, Lord Patten, asked us to look at the Australian preparation for elections. I am very happy to look wherever we can for information about that. I am not sure that the noble Lord, Lord Brady, meant to say that voting can damage our health. I do not know whether that is a new Tory strapline, but I do not think we will be picking that one up.
The noble Lord, Lord Macintosh, spoke about votes at 16 improving voter turnout in Scotland. The noble Baronesses, Lady Leaman, Lady Foster, and Lady O’Neill, and the noble Lord, Lord Markham, spoke about voting at 16 and 17, as did many other Peers. The important question is not what else you can or cannot do at 16 but whether 16 is the right age to be able to vote, and our Government are clear that the answer to that question is yes. Sixteen is the right age to be able to exercise your democratic right. Extending the vote will allow 16 and 17 year-olds to have a say in the government who shape their future and set them up for lifelong engagement in democracy. Sixteen and 17 year-olds have views that deserve to be represented, as my 16 year-old grandson is always telling me. As we have heard from the experiences in Scotland, engaging voters at a younger age will build the foundations for a lifetime of participation in our electoral processes.
The noble Lord, Lord Farmer, tried to press me on scientific evidence in favour of 16 and 17 year-olds not being able to vote. I say to the noble Lord that we do not give people the vote based on their intellectual or cognitive abilities, and that applies to 16 and 17 year-olds—as it does to all our voters.
Many noble Lords, including the noble Lords, Lord Wallace and Lord Bailey, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Royall, Lady Prashar, Lady Thornhill, and Lady Deech, asked the very important question about the steps being taken to support young people’s voter education, which goes right to the heart of the previous question. My noble friends Lady Lister and Lord Watson referred to the APPG’s work on citizenship education, which I commend. We want to break down barriers and drive participation. We know that education and engagement are a crucial part of implementing this policy. It is vital that young people understand and value democratic processes and feel they are relevant to them. We want to ensure that democracy education reinforces the importance and value of participating and inspires greater democratic engagement, and we want that to start at 16 and continue into adulthood. We are working with the Electoral Commission, the devolved Governments and civil society to consider what additional measures we can take to support schools, colleges and youth groups to roll out practical voter and civic education, and our colleagues in the Department for Education are looking at this in terms of curriculum.
There were some important questions about addressing online abuse, particularly abuse targeted at female politicians and candidates. We all need to address online abuse as a matter of urgency. The noble Baronesses, Lady Royall and Lady Goudie, and the noble Lord, Lord Johnson, mentioned this: the noble Lord, Lord Johnson, mentioned in particular Ann Widdecombe. We have had a number of attacks on elected politicians that make us focus our minds again, but hundreds of other attacks go on around the country. This is a top priority.
The Online Safety Act placed a legal requirement on all tech platforms to proactively tackle the most harmful illegal content, much of which disproportionately affects women and girls. This includes harassment, sexual exploitation, stalking, controlling or coercive behaviour, extreme pornography, and intimate image abuse. We have implemented the new measures in the Online Safety Act and, going further still, we have criminalised the creation of non-consensual sexual deepfakes—building on existing offences—criminalising sharing or threatening to share such content. We have made this offence a priority under the Online Safety Act. We need to continue our efforts in that regard to make sure that this does not have a place in our political dialogue.
There were some questions around AI-generated misinformation and disinformation. Illegal AI-generated content is already regulated under the Online Safety Act, as I said. A range of legislative offences apply to deepfakes and misinformation and disinformation in this context, including the false communications offence, which makes it illegal to knowingly spread false information with intent to cause non-trivial psychological or physical harm.
I have a number of comments on bank cards and whether they undermine the security of the policy. Our understanding is that the policy will remain secure and that this use of bank cards does not undermine it. We are limiting the policy so that only cards from UK-regulated issuers can be used. That is because the UK is recognised having one of the strongest systems in the world for stopping money laundering and terrorist financing, so this safeguard will ensure a high level of security. We are also limiting the policy to cards that have a visible expiration date and require that this date has not elapsed. As bank cards are a non-photographic form of ID, it makes sense that they need to be in date to maintain security and integrity. Although bank cards do not bear photographs, we believe that this is a sufficient and appropriate level of security. The change will ensure that more legitimate electors are able to meet the voter ID requirements and will not be denied their right to vote.
The last thing I will have time to cover is the national commission on electoral reform, which a number of noble Lords asked about. I understand the push for that. The Government’s priority is a politics that works for all people. The Prime Minister has been clear on his commitment to bring about a new voting system and he welcomes a national debate about this. But this Bill is not the place to legislate for that debate. We have to get these measures over the line for our 16 and 17 year-olds to vote at the next election and to curb foreign influence in our democracy. Our Prime Minister is open to different ways of having a debate about how we can better include everyone’s vote and voice, and we will set out a path on that in due course. I look forward to those discussions.
I did not think I would be able to respond to all the points that were made, and I did not. I will respond to noble Lords in writing where I have not got to them. This Bill is a significant and necessary step in renewing the foundations of our democracy. Of course the Government recognise that this House will rightly wish to probe these matters in detail. We will continue to engage constructively as the Bill progresses, and I look forward to the further scrutiny and debate that will follow in Committee.
My noble friend Lord Evans of Sealand mentioned our Prime Minister’s wish for a national conversation about democracy. As I said, I welcome that and look forward to it. But the principle is clear: our democracy works best when it is trusted, secure and open to all those entitled to take part. That is what this Bill seeks to achieve, and it is in that spirit that I commend this Bill to the House.
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage
That the bill be committed to a Committee of the Whole House, and that it be an instruction to the Committee of the Whole House that they consider the bill in the following order: Clauses 1 to 6, Schedule 1, Clauses 7 to 19, Schedule 2, Clauses 20 to 49, Schedule 3, Clauses 50 to 53, Schedule 4, Clause 54, Schedule 5, Clauses 55 and 56, Schedule 6, Clauses 57 and 58, Schedule 7, Clauses 59 and 60, Schedule 8, Clause 61, Schedules 9 and 10, Clause 62, Schedules 11 and 12, Clause 63, Schedule 13, Clauses 64 and 65, Schedule 14, Clauses 66 to 69, Schedule 15, Clauses 70 to 74, Schedule 16, Clause 75, Schedule 17, Clauses 76 to 91, Title.
Lord Rooker
After “Whole House,” insert “but that Committee stage will not commence until the Minister has made a statement setting out which clauses and schedules of the Bill, including amendments made to the Bill, the House of Commons did not have time to consider on the floor of the House;”.
Lord Rooker (Lab)
My Lords, I spoke for less than a minute on Second Reading and therefore I did not have an opportunity to congratulate my noble friend Lord Macintosh of Eastwood on his very powerful maiden speech. My purpose with this amendment is exactly the same as the one on the public accountability Bill: to strengthen the role of the elected Members of the Commons. I will make a couple of general points and then come to this Bill.
In the Commons, Second Readings are all effectively guillotined. It is called the programme Motion and it affects all Bills. The effect is that the Government always want to boast about the numbers of Bills, which is done at the expense of scrutiny of Bills, so the Bills arrive in your Lordships’ House as a result of inadequate scrutiny. We end up sending more amendments back to the Commons than would otherwise be the case. Then, in the Commons, the Government—it is only one Government in both Houses—blame the extra work for elected Members in the Commons on the upper House abusing its position, leading to calls for reform. Even when we return amendments to the elected Members, they are limited in the time they can use due to the original programme Motion. My view is that elected Members need more time for scrutiny. The Government have to return to Parliament some of the power that they have taken away with the programme Motions designed to fit in more Bills rather than better Bills. Asking for a list from the Government of what they have not allowed to be scrutinised puts the buck back where it belongs.
On this Bill, on 2 September the Commons dealt with Report and Third Reading. They had five hours during which there was debate and Divisions, on which I do not comment. Then the programme Motion from 2 March took over and the Government’s 15 new clauses and six schedules occupying 72 columns of Commons Hansard were approved on the nod—no debate, no speech, no vote. One of those new schedules—in the Commons it was called Schedule 8 and it has now turned up in the Bill as Schedule 12—is 19 pages of the Bill.
We are a revising Chamber. We need to know what we are revising, because in this case you cannot identify from the Bill any of the changes passed on the nod. They are dispersed throughout the Bill and the numbers have changed. They could, for example, be italicised. We would not need a list then. The Bill would show us that these were the bits on the programme Motion passed on the nod. The only way at the moment is via Commons Hansard, which of course is a bit unsatisfactory. We should have an official list from the Government of what the Commons did not have time to scrutinise. That is what it is all about. We cannot identify in the Bill the part that we are not revising but scrutinising for the first time because nobody else has scrutinised it.
We are being taken for Charlies, as it were, because we get the blame later on. I venture to say that there will be a lot of amendments to this Bill. In a few months, when the rows start about what has been sent down there, I want the audit trail complete. In a way, that is why I have raised this amendment.
Lord Hayward (Con)
My Lords, I strongly support what the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, has just said. He has identified a problem. It is not new. It has evolved over a period of decades, but it is a real problem that this Chamber is facing now. I strongly support the detail outlined by the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, which we face and which the Commons has not addressed.
Lord Pack (LD)
My Lords, conscious of the time, I will very briefly say only that I fully agree with both noble Lords, Lord Rooker and Lord Hayward. Were what is being proposed what we were used to having, we would think, of course, it is completely obvious that we would never abolish the provision of such straightforward information that would help us do our job better, so I very much commend the proposal of the noble Lord, Lord Rooker.
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
My Lords, the amendment that my noble friend has tabled seeks information on the amendments debated in the Commons, so I thought it would be helpful to the House if I set out the scrutiny that the Bill had in the House of Commons.
The Bill had its Second Reading in the House of Commons on Monday 2 March. The House of Commons then ordered that the Bill should be committed to a Public Bill Committee. The Public Bill Committee itself decided on its sitting pattern. The Committee completed its scrutiny in nine sittings over five days. As usual, all clauses and schedules were considered, as were all proposed amendments and new clauses that were selected by the chair. Report took place on Wednesday 2 September. The House of Commons ordered that consideration should conclude no later than five hours after it commenced. All proposed amendments and new clauses selected by the chair were considered.
I have no doubt that noble Lords will add to the work of the Commons with their usual high-quality scrutiny. There will, I am sure, be time to debate all the issues that noble Lords raised in detail as the Bill progresses through the House.
Lord Rooker (Lab)
I am grateful to my noble friend, but let us get this absolutely clear: the Committee in the Commons did not discuss the stuff that was dumped in the Bill after the programme Motion on Report. The Committee did not know about it. The reality is—noble Lords can read Commons Hansard; it is there for them to read—that 15 new clauses and six schedules, occupying 72 columns of Hansard, were approved on the nod. They were not discussed. What is more, they were all government amendments, because the programme Motion means that only the government ones are passed on the nod: the ones in the names of opposition or individual Members disappear.
The programme Motion is designed to secure the Government’s business, and quite right too. I was there at the beginning, in 1997, when we introduced the idea of guillotining every Bill, but it has got out of hand because they are too close, too tight. More Bills are being pushed through, and we are now ending up with unscrutinised legislation, and that is not good legislation. I beg leave to withdraw.