Absent Voting (Elections in Scotland and Wales) Bill

Adam Jogee Excerpts

Friday 4th July 2025 Commons Chamber

[Adam Jogee (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh North and Leith (Tracy Gilbert) on getting this Bill to its Third Reading and getting both sides of the House behind it, although I note that there are no SNP Members in the Chamber. I am a proud Member for an English constituency, but we in Newcastle-under-Lyme have seen the benefit of a system that defends and supports the franchise and ensures that people are able to have their say. As such, I wanted to gently contribute to this debate, to give my support to my hon. Friend and encourage colleagues to get behind the Bill.

Democracy is important. It is so important that we discuss the Bill, ensuring that people up and down the United Kingdom, including in Wales and Scotland, are able to hold their elected politicians to account to ensure that their decisions reflect their views. We do so on the first anniversary of this Labour Government—that speaks very much to the power of the vote. The Bill is about ensuring that people have as much support as possible to vote, to have their say, to shape the future and, as I say, to hold their elected representatives to account at local and devolved level in Scotland and Wales.

I used to work for a Welsh MP, and I lived in Scotland and also worked for a Scottish MP before my election to this House, so I well recall the challenges and experiences.

[John Grady]

My hon. Friend is the Member of Parliament for the wonderful place of Newcastle-under-Lyme. Does he agree that the purpose of the Bill is to bring some much-needed consistency to voting arrangements across our family of nations? Voters in Newcastle-under-Lyme, Newcastle upon Tyne or the wonderful Newcastleton in Scottish Borders should all be able to vote in a reasonably consistent way.

[Adam Jogee]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. I am an English MP; we are talking about Scotland and Wales; and my wife is from Northern Ireland. Our four nations are very much represented in my short contribution to this debate.

I have seen personally the ease of the postal and proxy vote system. I love to vote in person, but those in the west midlands Labour party are hard taskmasters and encourage us to vote by post so that we can be knocking on doors, seeing my hon. Friend the Minister beating Torys where and when we can. However, making it easier to vote for people who have health or family issues, or who are called away for work and the rest, is vital. We have seen the consequences—the threats to our democracy—of people not thinking that politics represents them and their issues, and does not involve or include them. We must think about what we can do to neutralise those concerns and those fears, as my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh North and Leith (Tracy Gilbert) has done so brilliantly in her Bill, notwithstanding her technical amendment, which was supported by the House. It speaks for itself.

I am grateful to you for calling me, Madam Deputy Speaker. I am here to support my hon. Friend before I get the train home, and I look forward to the Bill successfully passing its Third Reading.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Holmes (Hamble Valley) (Con)]

First, I congratulate the hon. Member for Edinburgh North and Leith (Tracy Gilbert) on her tenacity in getting this Bill through its parliamentary stages. It is timely that the hon. Lady has today—on the first anniversary of an election that I might care to forget, but that she will definitely care to remember for the rest of her career—made such a great change to our democratic structures through our Bill. If she has achieved this much in the first 12 months, I, for one, look forward to seeing what she will achieve in the next four years. I would like to genuinely congratulate her on behalf of the official Opposition and Members across the House on the way she has conducted herself in getting this legislation on the statute books. Her constituents will also quite rightly be proud.

I also want to take this opportunity to wish Members across the House a happy first anniversary—although, technically, the anniversary is tomorrow. We were all tired in the early hours of that morning; for me, it was 4.36 am, as I remember. I wish a happy anniversary to all new MPs across the House on their first anniversary of serving in this place. I look forward to working with them on a cross-party basis over the next four years, and maybe beyond.

[Adam Jogee]

rose—

[Paul Holmes]

I was just about to refer to the hon. Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Adam Jogee), but I will let him go first.

--- Later in debate ---

[Adam Jogee]

I wish the shadow Minister a happy anniversary, too.

[Paul Holmes]

Well, I thank the hon. Gentleman—my friend—for what I know are warm and genuine congratulations. I was about to say that I even congratulate the hon. Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme a happy anniversary on his election. I am still utterly convinced that while he is the most sartorially elegant MP on the Labour Benches—[Interruption.] The Whip on duty, the hon. Member for Bury South (Christian Wakeford), who has not even bothered to wear a tie, is somehow shouting “Shame”. I say to the hon. Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme that I am still convinced that deep down, he is a secret Conservative, and we look forward to seeing his slow conversion to this side of the House over the next four years.

[Adam Jogee]

Wishful thinking is all I will say, Madam Deputy Speaker. I am very proud of my Labour party membership card, thank you very much.

[Paul Holmes]

Thou doth protest too much—I think we will just keep it to the fact that the hon. Gentleman is the most sartorially elegant member of the Labour parliamentary party, and I would be grateful, after this debate, if he could tell me where he gets his ties.

By the way, I also want to say happy anniversary to those of us who survived the last election, too—especially my hon. Friend the Member for Broadland and Fakenham (Jerome Mayhew), who is sitting on the Front Bench next to me.

I welcome the Minister being in her place. The Conservatives completely agree with her remarks on the amendment that was tabled. It is perfectly straightforward, and we support it. In a rare moment of cross-party unity, we completely echo what the Minister has said, and therefore we do not need to say much more on that.

I will just pay tribute to the four Back-Bench contributors for their remarks. The hon. Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme has said he is making a habit of beating Conservatives, but let us just see what happens in four years’ time—I will not predict what will happen at the next election. As I said earlier, he is a genuine friend, and I genuinely like his engaging contributions to many debates in this House; they are always backed up by the principled aims he has in any area of policy in this House—long may that continue.

The hon. Member for Aylesbury (Laura Kyrke-Smith) gave a great speech. She set out the full scope of the Bill clearly and how it will make a tangible change to many people who live in Scotland. I congratulate her on that.

Even though the hon. Member for Portsmouth North (Amanda Martin) is from a rival city down the Solent from me, I thought she made an excellent contribution. She made important points on the changes to the legislation to ensure that veterans cards can be used as official ID for voting. I represent many veterans in my community, particularly naval veterans—as I know the hon. Lady does, with the home of the Royal Navy in Portsmouth North—and I know that that is a vital change that is being made. It was a commitment of the previous Government; I think it is fair to say that parliamentary time ran out, so we were unable to do that, so I am pleased that that the new Government took that forward.

The hon. Member for Crawley (Peter Lamb) was right to share his expertise on devolution, and gave fascinating historical context for this Bill. I remember being in the Stag’s Head pub on the University of Southampton’s campus in 2006, when he was chairman of the university’s Labour Society and I was chairman of its Conservative Association. For transparency, I will declare that it was a lot smaller than the Labour Society. I am not sure whether he ever imagined that we would share a Chamber today. As we saw from his speech, he is a fierce defender of democracy, a fierce supporter of devolution, and a passionate defender of his beliefs and principles. I wish him well going forward.