David Morris
Main Page: David Morris (Conservative - Morecambe and Lunesdale)Department Debates - View all David Morris's debates with the Cabinet Office
Voter ID Pilots
David Morris Excerpts(5 years ago)
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Chloe Smith
I welcome the hon. Gentleman’s characteristically thoughtful way of addressing this matter and welcome his engagement with the substance of it. He raised a number of things. First, I am a supporter of the franchise having been devolved to Wales, and I look forward to seeing what my counterparts in Wales will be doing with that shortly. I work closely with them and, indeed, with colleagues in Scotland to make sure that we are, together, operating a system that works for voters.
Secondly, behind the hon. Gentleman’s example of e-voting is a point about the powers under which we are doing these pilots that were passed by the previous Labour Government, as I mentioned. Indeed, in the past those powers had also been used by that Government to test e-voting. That is an interesting reflection on the history of how we have been able to come to this point of using powers to look at ways to make the voting system relevant to voters and protect their votes. I am here today principally to talk about how we are protecting their votes. I do not think this is going to turn into a general debate on e-voting, although I should confirm that the Government’s manifesto was not in favour of that.
David Morris (Morecambe and Lunesdale) (Con)
At the last general election, the Labour candidate in Morecambe and Lunesdale lived in Blackpool and registered herself from her parents’ front room in Morecambe. Her husband had actually been the Labour party manager for the hon. Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood (Cat Smith) in the previous election. Is it not time that we had voter ID in Lancaster?
Chloe Smith
I would be delighted to see interest from Lancaster City Council in participating in the pilots. I would like to put on record again how grateful I am to all the local councils that are taking part in them. Some very hard work is being done by administrators to test this important move in our voting system. The example my hon. Friend gives reminds us that there are concerns up and down the country about how well protected our electoral system is, and it is right that we address those.